Rocking and hitting (revisited)

Any one that has ever lived by us in the last three years knows about Isaac and his rocking. I've mentioned it on this blog before. His feet have permanent scars from rocking so much. He doesn't rock quite as much as he used to but still does it a lot. It has always been a little funny and kind of annoying. It is really driving us nuts lately, partly because Mr. Eli has started to do the same thing! He sees Isaac and gets right next to him and they both laugh and rock and make their funny repetitive rocking song. At first it was funny and Eli would just do it when Isaac was doing it but now he is rocking himself to sleep. We are going nuts. Beds creaking, waking everyone up at night and early morning, etc.



Previously we haven't done anything to stop it because we recognize it as self-stimming and understood that Isaac needs a way to soothe himself. But now that Eli is starting to copy him we are not happy. We figured that babies use pacifiers to soothe themselves (something Isaac never cared for) and you eventually snip the pacifier as they get older. We wonder if this is the same sort of thing except you can take the pacifer away but how are you supposed to stop the rocking? We let Isaac choose a spot in his room and told him if he needed to rock he had to go to that spot and rock. The above picture is Isaac's little spot. It seems to be working a little. When Eli rocks we just say "no." Oh does he get mad! We aren't sure this is the correct route to take but we are going to see what happens.



I heard Eli this morning making noises. I went in and said, "Good morning Mr. Eli!" He decided to reward my bright greeting by punching me, followed by "Neh" (no). So precious. It's his favorite pastime, telling me "neh" and then throwing or pushing or hitting whatever is closest to him. He isn't always like this but is a good portion of the time. He sometimes creates a desire to pull my hair out, which is OK because I could afford to lose a bit of hair; it's a bit too thick for my liking.

It's only been about an hour since I posted this and yet, I needed to write:

Dear Mister Cranky-pants (you know who you are),

Please stop hitting me, and kicking me and yelling at me in your loud baby voice. I don't like it. I ask that you spend a few hours in your bed this afternoon. Then, when I come to get you out of your gulf of misery, also known as your crib, we can both be reunited with smiles and a new found desire to love each other. I love you anyway, but maybe spending a few hours in your bed will make me show my love to you better.

Let's put our boxing gloves away and end this match.

Love you,

Mommy