A few weeks ago Jerret went to the "Special Persons Breakfast" at my nephew's school. After breakfast there was a book fair (how smart are they? Have a book fair when the people with the real money are around!) and Jerret bought JJ a Disney book that had stories from 5 different Disney movies in it. Out of the 5 movies, the only one JJ has actually seen is the Cars movie, but he quickly fell in love with the other stories after reading them. His two favorites are the story about Buzz Lightyear and one from Monsters Inc., and it has become routine for either Jerret or I to lay in bed with JJ and read one of these stories.
The other night Jerret was reading to JJ and I wanted part of the action so I barged in and plopped myself down next to them. While reading the Monsters Inc. story - you know the one where Sully scares all the little kids behind the doors - Jerret said "Hey Mom, you need to check the closet and make sure Sully isn't in there!" (dumb)
So I, being the great mother that I am, decided to jump up and slowly open the closet door to take a peek inside. (This is where we get really dumb) Rather than open the door all the way and let JJ know the coast was clear, no monsters in his closet, I said "Aaaahhhh! There's a monster in there!" and quickly slammed the door closed.
JJ's eyes were as big as saucers. He stared at me and then looked at Jerret, and then fixed his gaze on the closet door. He wouldn't speak...just stared.
I realized the trauma that we had just forced on our child and looked at Jerret and asked "Why did we just do that?" and we both just laughed at our stupidity. I tried opening the closet door all the way and turning on the light to show JJ that there wasn't really a monster in his closet, but he wasn't hearing of it. JJ quickly said "Shut the door!" and continued to stare at the closet door out of the corner of his eye. We tried reading another story to take his mind off of the monster, but JJ wouldn't even look at the book. We asked him questions to change the subject, but JJ wouldn't answer us. When we finally did get an answer out of him he would only whisper, as so not to wake the monster.
We are trying to forget the whole incident, but every time we enter his bedroom JJ has to run and close the closet door. And he will absolutely, positively not go to sleep with that door open.
4 comments:
LORI LYNN !!!!!! What am I gonna do with you!?!?!?!?!?! :)
REMEMBER.... a child's mind is still growing until at least 5 years of age.... and YOU are the one MOLDING his! Kids his age "see things literally" ....... If he hears you say "I'm burning up", he will think you are on fire..... as I have always said....THINK BEFORE YOU SPEAK. (especially around kids :)
Love you ..... :)
Reminds me when I asked Dandy to close the closet door so the monster wouldn't get out. I said it totally offhanded and he was like "ok that's fine" it wasn't until he got all the way to the door that he processed what I'd just said and started backing up. I just totally downplayed the whole thing and had Sophie (who's familiar with this routine) go close the door.
My brother managed to make his oldest daughter terrified of Santa Claus AND the tooth fairy (he told her the tooth fairy had a 7ft wingspan and looked like the grim reaper). Now several years later she just laughs about it... but at one point she wouldn't tell them when she had a loose tooth because she didn't want the tooth fairy to come!!
When my boys went through the phase of being afraid of things at night we let them sleep with their light sabers! Worked like a charm :)
LMAO.....Dumb, No....Officially parents, 'fraid so. The first of many "did I just do/say that" moments. He'll get over it and you'll think twice next time :oD
Post a Comment