Daddy's Fish BowlA Clear View Of A Father's Family Experiences

The Stare of Death

Tre has recently gotten meaner, point blank, period!  I didn’t think it was possible for someone so young to be so vindictive, but believe me our family has learned first hand that it is indeed quite possible after all.  Tre’s latest victim is one of the last people you would expect.  He has turned his back on his mom.  The world’s biggest momma’s boy has finally risen up, rebelled, & taken a stab at independence.  Secretly, I’m smiling inside, but don’t tell Fefe that. 

When Tre was a little younger, he got into the habit of biting and pinching.  He’d do it for absolutely no reason at all & found great pleasure in these antics.  We quickly mobilized all of our resources to combat this newfound pastime of his (sounds like a war story doesn’t it?).  Eventually we were able to thwart his evil plans of biting & pinching the arms of all those who walked this earth.  We only “thought” we stopped it, apparently we only suppressed his hunger for causing pain; because earlier this week it reemerged with a vengeance.

When I got home from work, Fefe expressed to me that he had pinched her earlier during the day.  She said it was just a light pinch, nothing major so I totally ignored it.  I’m guessing that Tre felt the urge bubbling and this was a “pinch for help” (so clever aren’t I) but we brushed off the warning signs. Maybe he was seeking an intervention before the pinching addiction had a chance to fully manifest itself; if that was the case, we failed him greatly.  Later that afternoon, Ty and I were playing a game and Fefe was sitting on the couch watching.  I guess Tre didn’t like the idea of not being the center of attention for the ever so short period of time that she took her eyes off of him.  So he decides its payback time and runs full speed across the room; letting out a howling shriek that I’m assuming was his battle cry.  Once he reaches the couch and makes his way to Fefe he latched onto her thigh and squeezed with what had to be the world’s tightest pincer grip.  All I heard was a devastating scream; Fefe was out of commission, immobilized by this little monster that she was once proud to call her son.

I rush over to her & find a very large red mark on her leg and a smiling Tre standing next to her, admiring his handy work.  So I pop him on the hand and tell him “no, we don’t pinch Mommy, that’s not nice” and made him sit on the couch.  Oh this action brought his whole little world crumbling down and in an attempt to obtain some protection he tried to rush back to the very person that he had betrayed.  I told him no, he was going to sit here and I would stand guard.  So Fefe & I switched places and she went to play with Ty while I sat on the couch.  After a few minutes, I figured that he had paid his dues and I released him from incarceration.  But not without restrictions, he was out on parole & I was the assigned parole officer.  One of the conditions of his release was to go and apologize to the victim, this was his first task (or so I thought) after being set free.  He ran over to Fefe & said “Mommy”, so I figure everything is cool and turned my head to the TV.  No more than 30 seconds later I hear another scream; I look back, Fefe’s on the floor and Tre is standing over her, looking at me with the meanest look on his face, as if to say, “this is what happens when you mess with me, I go after your loved ones.”

I was shocked, I mean literally immediately upon release he went back to finish the job that he had started.  I wonder if he was plotting this revenge crime while sitting in his couch jail cell for those oh so long two minutes.  We thought we were safe, we were confident that our corrective and preventative actions had been effective; we were wrong.  A valuable lesson has been learned; once a pincher, always a pincher! 

I know they say popping a kid’s hands or legs isn’t effective, you know violence only promotes more violence.  Well I’m not so sure about that, it seems to work pretty well for me, with the exception of the above example.  What are you thoughts?  Have you dealt with children who bite, hit, and pinch?  What disciplinary actions do you utilize?  If you don’t have kids, what do you remember about how your parents handled situations like this?