The Terrible 5s

Eli never had the terrible twos or threes. Our rough years have been four and five-and not solidly for two years. We'll go for awhile and I think we've gotten past it, but then it shows up again. Yesterday, we had multiple meltdowns and I was about at my wit's end. So I found this really great website for parents called Empowering Parents. Click here to check it out. I realized I over-negotiate with him and so when I say no about something, he knows there is a chance I will change my mind, at least in part. So when I don't change my mind, sometimes he is okay with it, but other times we have a meltdown. Which leads me to our other issue-he feels entitled to get something any time we go out. I don't get him something every time we go out, but I think I do it often enough they he figures he has a pretty good chance he will get something. So I've decided to come up with a specific plan instead of some wishy-washy idea of how I'll deal with these issues. First, I found this website with behavior charts (which we have used before, but not religiously enough). You can find these awesome charts for kids (or any chart for that matter) here. I picked the 3 strikes chart. Each day he does NOT get 3 strikes, he gets a behavior buck (from the same website). At the end of the week, he will get a $1 for every behavior buck he earned. Then, any time he asks me for something, I'll say, "Well, how much money do you have?" If he doesn't have enough money, he will have to save up for it. Any time I personally buy something for him, I'm going to save it for his birthday or some holiday so he isn't getting some book or toy out of the blue, just because I thought he would LOVE it. And last, I need to decide what constitutes a strike and spell it out clearly for him so that there is no wishy-washiness there either. I think I'll make a chart for that too...