Persistence

A huge part of parenthood lies in training your persistence.. at least that was how it felt whenever I had to go through a "let's see who can persist longer" sort of saga with Ace.

Of course, usually, I win:)

But being able to persist longer is nothing to boast of. Being able to stick by your stand, persist and not lose your temper and still keeping check of your emotions.. and eventually winning your kid over with persistence and patience ALONE.. not fear, threat or guilt.. that, I personally feel is the highest state any parent can reach..

It would be interesting to see that as Ace grows up, who can persist longer ;) Hahaha...

Anyway, we went through an episode related to persistence the other day.

It was like 10 plus at night already and we were supposed to meet up with Mel and Germaine. We told Ace we were going to Tiffany's house and to our surprise, he remembered what I told him a week earlier and reminded us, "We go and visit Tiffany and present give Tiffany..." he said. We were supposed to go there to pass Tiffany her birthday present...

Becuase it was our birthday, Mel and Germaine also prepared a set of presents for us and just so that Ace will not feel left out, he is also given a cow's toothbrush and a packet of Pokey biscuits..

"I want to ahm.." Ace told me when we were going back in the car.

"We eat tommorrow ok?" I asked Ace.

"No, I want to eat now. I want to eat in the car..."

"I am not saying that you cannot eat, we eat tommorrow lah. So late already now and you have to drink milk later.. plus you ate so many things just now..."

"No, I want to open, I want to ahm.."

"Can mama keep it for you?"

"No..."

"Can we put in the fridge and eat tommorow?"

"I don't want to put in fridge. I want to ahm..."

"Well, ok, if you eat now. You can only eat one. If you eat tommorrow, I let you eat all... There are many biscuits inside the box you know..." I told Ace.

"I want to eat now. I want to eat all..."

"If you eat now, you only eat one. The rest will belong to mummy.." I was trying to let Ace understand delayed gratification. "If you eat tomm, you can eat all of them.." I decided to speak his language.. "You want big big biscuits? Then you have to eat tommorrow..."

"I want to eat now. I want to eat all..."

And then I repeated the same lines a few times and Ace repeated the same lines a few times..

I think after I repeated like 10 times, he finally realized I was NOT going to give in. I must say that the thought of giving in is tempting.. just a bloody packet of biscuits anyway.. why be so anal. It is actually very tiring to repeat the same script so many times.. But I remembered that I was delivering a lesson on persistence and delayed gratification here so I stood by my guns.

He started to waver. Instead of saying no, he started to keep quiet. Eventually, he started to nod his head.

But that is only half the battle won.

He started to tear open the box and only stopped when we told him we would throw it all away if he opened the box. "The box spoil lah.." he told us as if explaining why he box is torn...

Anyway, he finally let go of the box and allowed me to hold it for him.

The next morning, he woke up and told me, "我可以吃biscuit了!" and he smiled ;)


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