Backfire

My earlier posts about the creative ways in which I would get Doof to get ready for school in a timely fashion worked for a short while. I swear to God! He is the slowest kid I have ever met. I have tried everything I can think of and I consider myself to be a pretty creative person. I can stand there ticking off the minutes as they pass and reminding him to think about time passing as he's eating (pretending to eat).  I can threaten to take away things he really loves and then actually follow through and do that. I could try to think of things that he loves to eat and that I am positive he would just chow down...and that doesn't work, either. I cannot wrap my mind around the reason why he takes so long even when certain death is just minutes away. I had tried everything and was complaining to a friend when she suggested something she had heard or read. As I listened to this story, I knew I had found the answer! A mom who had the same problem with her son decided that she was sick of the kid missing the bus and being late to school. She decided that she would have him get dressed for school last and do everything else first. She would make him make his bed, brush his teeth, and eat breakfast and then get dressed. If he wasn't done in time, she would send him to school in his pajamas. It took two mornings of sending him in to school in pajamas and it was not a problem any longer.

YES! YES! YES! Shame AND embarrassment! At the same time!  This would surely work!

I prepped Doof the night before by telling him the routine would be switched up the following morning and that he would wear his pajamas to school when time was up and he wasn't dressed. He went to bed that night thinking a lot about how embarrassing it would be to be the only kid in pajamas and I know this because I heard him talking to himself that night in his room. "Doof. You can do this. Just get up and do all your stuff in a hurry. You can do this." (By the way, I think eavesdropping on Doof while he talks to himself at night might be my favorite thing ever.)

When I woke Doof up, I said, "Hey, buddy. Today is the day you get dressed last, remember?" He was so motivated to do things quickly that he hurried very quickly and did most of the things he is supposed to do, but then breakfast reared it's ugly head. All he had to eat was two (TWO!) teeny tiny Rudy's Farms sausage biscuits and take his medicine and vitamins. And he LOVES those things! I was doing him a FAVOR! A HUGE FAVOR! (Don't think it didn't cross my mind to make him eat cheese grits or scrambled eggs. Most people would prefer that, but not Doof. "Cheese grits AND eggs?!? MOOOOOOOMMMMMM!") Anyway, he actually ate his breakfast pretty quickly but it took him...I'm not kidding you...FORTY MINUTES to take two pills and two vitamins. But it gets worse! THE VITAMINS ARE CHEWABLE GUMMY VITAMINS, PEOPLE! Gummy. Chewy. Fruit-flavored. Vitamins.  Let me also say that the bus comes at 8:00 and I wake Doof up at 6:50. PLEN-TEE-OF -TIIIIIIIIME.

So after the forty-minute-vitamin-chewing-game I knew this wasn't looking good and I was secretly kind of excited and my adrenaline was pumping but I didn't remind him of the time crunch he was in because I wanted him to finally learn his lesson. He needed to know that I was serious and that I would keep my promise of sending him to school in his pajamas. But, you see, things got kind of tricky because he couldn't miss the bus because that was the best place to embarrass him, so I had to keep a close eye on the time. Well, I re-filled my popcorn and soda so I could watch the debacle unfold and have refreshments, too, and then when I looked up at the clock, I realized it was GO-TIME! I went to Doof's room to see that he was half-naked sitting in the floor on top of his blankets that were supposed to be folded nicely on his bed. "Uh-uh, Doof. You are supposed to get dressed last and your bed isn't made and actually, it's time to go to to the bus stop." You should have seen the shock on his face. He obviously absolutely does not have any concept of the passage of time! "ALREADY?", he said.

I just stood there in disbelief and said, "Put your pajamas back on. We're leaving." Then something horrible happened. I felt a wet spot on his pants. I am a social worker, people. This is already a risky plan, okay. I can send my kid to school in pajamas, but I certainly canot send my kid to school in peepeepajamas. UGH! He was ruining my plan! What was I going to do? Then it came to me. Check the drawer! Get clean pajamas! Right! And guess what was in the drawer. Only one pair of pajamas that were appropriate for the weather...and they were the coolest pair of pajamas he owns. They are superman pajamas. With a cape. (Thanks, Townsend Family.) So I had no choice but to make him wear his cool pajamas.

We walked to the bus stop. He avoided eye contact. He got on the bus. Nobody seems to notice right away. But, I am a proactive parent, so I decide to go to the school and talk to his teacher about his attire that day, so no special phone calls are made to any certain special child welfare people. I get to the classroom and Doof has just walked in from the bus and sits down at his desk. I whisper to the teacher the reason he's in his pajamas and she understands but then says, "Doof told me you sent a note to the office telling them that he was allowed to wear his pajamas today(....wait for it...)as a REWARD." My mouth dropped open and I looked at Doof. He was happy as a (why is "snake on a stump" coming to mind?) happy as a .... happy person could be. Just loving life in the second grade classroom while wearing his pajamas. I rolled my eyes and as I walked by him on the way out the door I whispered, "That might work today, but what are you going to say tomorrow?"

Well, the day goes by quickly and now it's time for Doof to come home. I anxiously await the arrival of the bus and when I hear it, I rush outside to get a look at Doof. I want to gauge how his day has been, you know, to see if he learned his lesson. He comes over the hill and I swear it's like something out of a friggin movie. He's running, his backpack held in his hand down by his side, his superman cape flying in the wind, and and great big ol' smile on his face.

Me: Hey, Doof! How was your day?
Doof: Mom! It was the BEST DAY EVER! All of my friends and even most of my teachers said they loved my shirt! The PE teacher even asked if I would let her borrow it! And my friend says he wants to wear it for Halloween!
Me: Oh. That's...great.

Major backfire. I don't have a Plan B, people. That was already by Plan Q. Shit.