Tuesday, January 22, 2013

In our house its wear a helmet or duck

One of the many things that my bipolar hubs and my aspie have in common is the fact that they love to throw things.  It can be an everyday occurrence that something goes whizzing by for some reason or another.  Sometimes I can see it coming, especially in my hubbie.  He has been known to have the habit of getting into fights with inanimate objects.  Its actually quite hilarious, but I would never dare laugh when the drama is occurring.  Oh no, I have become amazing good at breaking up laughing on the inside, but looking compassionate and understanding on the outside.  Why yes honey it is stupid that the Keruig needs water to make coffee.  Yes honey I also have a hard time working the blender, the button are too small for human fingers.  Or whatever other justification that he has for starting a one-sided battle with something non-living.  If my husband begins to lose his fight, then he stomps to the backdoor, opens it up, and the object goes flying out the backdoor onto the patio or out into the yard.  (Neighbors, if you are reading this, this explains the random objects in our back yard.  I am sure you were wondering why on any given day a random electronic was in the yard.)

For my son, its actually a lot harder to see when the whirling will be unleashed.  This actually makes it more fun only in terms of the spontaneity of the object toss.  My baby has become amazingly good at deflecting items that come in his direction from his older brother.  If the tossing doesn't stop, I'm pretty sure the baby will be ready as a catcher for any pro baseball team by the age of 5.  My aspie throws things when he is happy or over-excited, when he is angry, or when the baby comes within 5 ft of his favorite train that he might be playing with at that moment.  When the baby is feeling spunky or wanting to get his older brother mad, he runs in, grabs a train, and goes running out as fast as he possibly can, laughing the whole time.  Its almost like he knows when his brother catches he will face a wrath, but those few moments of joy are oh so precious he has to do it anyway. 

What makes the throwing in our house so funny to me are the types of items that are thrown.  Never in my wildest dreams did I ever think I would see some of these items get the toss.  Here is an short list of the many things that have been thrown in my house.
  • diapers (both used and not used)
  • bottles
  • remote control
  • phones/cell phones
  • dvd's
  • dvd player
  • Smittie our cat (no cats were harmed in the throwing)
  • dishes/bowls/utensils
  • vacuum
  • potted plants
  • toys (and not just by my sons but will not mention any names)
  • coffee mugs
  • tools
  • items of clothing (both clean and dirty)
  • weed whacker (our son does not use this yet so....)
  • shower curtain rod
  • Laptop/Kindle
  • clothes baskets
  • food (including a smoothie)
Now let me make clear that I am not condoning the trowing of objects.  Its actually a big deal and we are working extensively to stop this.  We here, in the house of crazies, have started using a sticker system.  My aspie works for stickers and after so many he earns something that he really wants.  Usually its popcorn movie night, where I pop him some homemade popcorn and we watch a new movie of his choosing.  When we started the sticker system, there were three slots.  My aspie, being very smart says, "Daddy, you throw stuff too, you need to do the chart too!"  And so, now both my husband, the baby and my aspie work for stickers on the sticker chart.  Every night, before bed, we as a family ask all the questions on the sticker chart including:  Did you use the potty?  Did you brush your teeth?  Did you yell today?  Did you throw anything today?  etc.  It's cute to watch my boys and my hubbie answer the questions and high-five if they earned a sticker.  It's keeping my boys (all three of them) honest.  I'm not sure whose benefiting from the chart more, the little ones or the big one! 

Hopefully, the sticker chart will work wonders, but I just have to say though, if you ever find yourself visiting us just remember to wear a helmet or duck because you never know what could go flying by. 

2 comments:

@dkotucker said...

I've often thought of implementing a sticker chart for my husband too...he was not as open to the idea. Good on your hubby though! :D

melody.liberatore@gmail.com said...

Really enjoying you're blog!