Nice hands

Today both Nathaniel and I heard something interesting from Grace's daycare teacher. Apparently, she's become "very aggressive" and goes after what she wants to the point of hitting other people and/or knocking them down. I am so not surprised that she is aggressive...I already knew this. She knows what she wants and tries to get it. I think that's pretty normal. The hitting and knocking people down is not ok, but I think it is normal for kids to go through a phase of that as they figure out how to express themselves.

What made me laugh was that G's teacher said that none of the older kids ("even the boys") "mess" with her. I guess they're all afraid of her? If she wants the toy they're playing with, she will come from out of nowhere, knock them down, and take it to play with it. I think it's definitely difficult to combat the "mine" attitude at our house considering everything at home is hers. With only one child, there's very little that's off-limits to her to play with, and certainly all of the toys are hers. So, I'm not sure how we can change that attitude at home. Actually, I don't see much of it since she doesn't often have the need to express that at home.

As far as hitting goes, she occasionally does that at home-- maybe a couple of times a week. When she does, I grab her hand to prevent her from hitting me again, firmly say "No." and then put her down and walk away. For now, this is the best way I know to convey to her that hitting people is not ok and it certainly won't make people want to hang around her. At school, they tell her to use "nice hands" (they don't use the word "no," although I think it's appropriate) and remove her from the other children for a minute or two. Unfortunately, she's also taken to hitting the new assistant teacher and we're trying to figure out the best way to deal with that.

I called my mom today after hearing that the teacher called Grace "the class bully." (Side note: Can you believe they already use that term at 15 months old???) Mom, as always, was super encouraging and told me that I behaved very similarly when I was about Grace's age. In fact, it was my aggressive behavior at this age that pushed my mom to do a lot of reading about birth order. She definitely believes (as do I), that God made Grace with a certain personality and that this personality will serve her well throughout her life. Mom reminded me that my Type A personality has made me ambitious, successful, and has served me very well in many situations. It certainly gets me into trouble often, too, but it's the personality God gave me. And the same is true for Grace.

So, I'm trying to be chill about it and, honestly, laugh a little about it. It's just the beginning of Grace's life and (as Mom reminded me) she won't be pushing down other kids forever! :-)