I hope this is the right place for this, and I don't exactly know where to start... I'm just looking for ways to decrease my stress and to help facilitate things.
Our 5 year old has recently been playing with a new neighbor that he can see from our yard, her and her friend are 7 and pretty nice.... The problem is he is having trouble interacting at times. He's usually fairly good socially in general and he's been going to a small preschool program where he just thrives.
There are times when he has a hard time in general. He often takes a little while to warm up to people and doesn't like saying goodbye to people. He likes to observe things first and will often not participate in a class (like a music class we all go to or waldorf parent/child- at his preschool he tends to participate in everything)- these things I am in communication with his teachers with and just with the suggestion to keep modeling things and be respectful of the space and time he needs- but not to worry about it.
So here are some of the things that are happening.
-He will go out to the edge of our properties and just watch the girl (or girls play). They may say hi or shout his name and he often won't say anything.
Other days he just simply runs over and starts to play
-Sometimes he might just want the girls to watch him do his fun things (like run around quickly or jumping on one foot) but since he won't even really say hi they don't really understand what he is doing. If I'm around I might ask him if he wants to show the girls he can jump. If he says yes then I will suggest he tell them. If he won't then sometimes I will talk to them and tell them.
It's just awkward
-He may tell me he is thinking what to say. I might suggest things or offer to go with him. I do try to reinforce to the girls that he is 5 and sometimes doesn't know what to say, but I do worry that they will eventually grow tired of this and just ignore him (or be hurt if they overhear him say he doesn't want to play, she's not my friend or some other thing he sometimes shouts out)
Many times even if I go with him and say hello, he might still just sit there and not talk.
There's only so many times I can stop cooking dinner and come out and help him
-He is very adamant about who he calls a 'friend' and if I imply someone we know is a friend he would generally shout out 's/he's NOT my friend'
So I have to be careful of this but most of the teachers I know refer to the children in a program as 'friends' and I tend to do this too. Sometimes he just arbitrarily limits the term friend to the children in his preschool or says the neighbor is a friend one day and then not the next.
Sometimes he'll say "I hate... " so and so if I bring up the friend thing (even if it is someone he enjoys playing with)
I need to train myself to use a different term (child I guess) so he doesn't have this outburst. I guess I'd like to help him find a way to express this w/o an outburst
-Sometimes I need to set a time limitation-- he needs to go out and say hello or play and then he will need to come in for dinner. Once he was standing around for 10 minutes trying to 'think what I'm going to say" while the girls were standing on the property line shouting Hi, Hi Josh, Josh what are you doing, etc. Then he finally went over and talked to them for a minute and then was very sad when I called him in for dinner. (This particular day I made it particularly clear that was his time to play with them or outside, the time limit was not 'sprung' on him). He was disappointed last night when his friend went in after we were outside for about 30 minutes- but he kept saying she might go in for dinner soon, etc- and I would say, 'yes, so you should go talk to her before she needs to go in for dinner'.
It is stressful for me because we are still getting to know the neighbor's there and I can't spend all my time in the yard. I don't want to limit his outside time... but I feel like we might have to limit it to the time that I can be outside with him.
He spends lots of time talking about the girls and anytime he sees them through our windows he will talk about going and playing etc. The thing is it started off much easier and now he's finding it harder. He keeps asking us throughout the weekend and days, when's J (the neighbor girl) home? What if I see J outside? I wonder when J's getting home, etc etc. and he talks a lot about playing with them
My dh is an introvert and I was very shy as a child- mostly because I didn't interact a lot with children, so I want to be respectful of how he feels but I'm having a very hard time negotiating this and being useful. Especially since this doesn't crop up with the friends we hang around with. I'm torn whether to just let him handle it or to really involve myself. He rarely asks me to help, but sometimes he will come and ask me to come over with him.
Any thoughts? Do I just need to really set aside the time to be out there with him for a few weeks (dh has been working through and past dinner some days, so this is just been hard cause at some point I do have to cook dinner). Should I just step back and let him handle it himself? Should I involve the other parent more since it could be troubling for her daughter having to negotiate this or sometimes hearing him have an outburst?
Dinner time is generally a disorganized whirlwind as it is, now I'm adding this on to it and it's even harder to be 'clever' calm and helpful about facilitating the situation. Maybe I'll try some rescue remedy for myself and Josh, lol
Jessica
Our 5 year old has recently been playing with a new neighbor that he can see from our yard, her and her friend are 7 and pretty nice.... The problem is he is having trouble interacting at times. He's usually fairly good socially in general and he's been going to a small preschool program where he just thrives.
There are times when he has a hard time in general. He often takes a little while to warm up to people and doesn't like saying goodbye to people. He likes to observe things first and will often not participate in a class (like a music class we all go to or waldorf parent/child- at his preschool he tends to participate in everything)- these things I am in communication with his teachers with and just with the suggestion to keep modeling things and be respectful of the space and time he needs- but not to worry about it.
So here are some of the things that are happening.
-He will go out to the edge of our properties and just watch the girl (or girls play). They may say hi or shout his name and he often won't say anything.
Other days he just simply runs over and starts to play
-Sometimes he might just want the girls to watch him do his fun things (like run around quickly or jumping on one foot) but since he won't even really say hi they don't really understand what he is doing. If I'm around I might ask him if he wants to show the girls he can jump. If he says yes then I will suggest he tell them. If he won't then sometimes I will talk to them and tell them.
It's just awkward
-He may tell me he is thinking what to say. I might suggest things or offer to go with him. I do try to reinforce to the girls that he is 5 and sometimes doesn't know what to say, but I do worry that they will eventually grow tired of this and just ignore him (or be hurt if they overhear him say he doesn't want to play, she's not my friend or some other thing he sometimes shouts out)
Many times even if I go with him and say hello, he might still just sit there and not talk.
There's only so many times I can stop cooking dinner and come out and help him
-He is very adamant about who he calls a 'friend' and if I imply someone we know is a friend he would generally shout out 's/he's NOT my friend'
So I have to be careful of this but most of the teachers I know refer to the children in a program as 'friends' and I tend to do this too. Sometimes he just arbitrarily limits the term friend to the children in his preschool or says the neighbor is a friend one day and then not the next.
Sometimes he'll say "I hate... " so and so if I bring up the friend thing (even if it is someone he enjoys playing with)
I need to train myself to use a different term (child I guess) so he doesn't have this outburst. I guess I'd like to help him find a way to express this w/o an outburst
-Sometimes I need to set a time limitation-- he needs to go out and say hello or play and then he will need to come in for dinner. Once he was standing around for 10 minutes trying to 'think what I'm going to say" while the girls were standing on the property line shouting Hi, Hi Josh, Josh what are you doing, etc. Then he finally went over and talked to them for a minute and then was very sad when I called him in for dinner. (This particular day I made it particularly clear that was his time to play with them or outside, the time limit was not 'sprung' on him). He was disappointed last night when his friend went in after we were outside for about 30 minutes- but he kept saying she might go in for dinner soon, etc- and I would say, 'yes, so you should go talk to her before she needs to go in for dinner'.
It is stressful for me because we are still getting to know the neighbor's there and I can't spend all my time in the yard. I don't want to limit his outside time... but I feel like we might have to limit it to the time that I can be outside with him.
He spends lots of time talking about the girls and anytime he sees them through our windows he will talk about going and playing etc. The thing is it started off much easier and now he's finding it harder. He keeps asking us throughout the weekend and days, when's J (the neighbor girl) home? What if I see J outside? I wonder when J's getting home, etc etc. and he talks a lot about playing with them
My dh is an introvert and I was very shy as a child- mostly because I didn't interact a lot with children, so I want to be respectful of how he feels but I'm having a very hard time negotiating this and being useful. Especially since this doesn't crop up with the friends we hang around with. I'm torn whether to just let him handle it or to really involve myself. He rarely asks me to help, but sometimes he will come and ask me to come over with him.
Any thoughts? Do I just need to really set aside the time to be out there with him for a few weeks (dh has been working through and past dinner some days, so this is just been hard cause at some point I do have to cook dinner). Should I just step back and let him handle it himself? Should I involve the other parent more since it could be troubling for her daughter having to negotiate this or sometimes hearing him have an outburst?
Dinner time is generally a disorganized whirlwind as it is, now I'm adding this on to it and it's even harder to be 'clever' calm and helpful about facilitating the situation. Maybe I'll try some rescue remedy for myself and Josh, lol
Jessica
I chuckle EVERY time I think about that.
)..
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