Monday, April 5, 2010

The Doggie

You can imagine me rolling my eyes and shaking my head as I recount the problems we are having with "the" doggie.

The doggie is a stuffed animal that I purchased last year after Valentine's Day on serious clearance. Kai picked it out as something that he wanted. So, I bought it and put it away until Valentine's Day this year. However, when I pulled it out this year Kai took one look at it, threw it down, and told me to throw it away. He didn't want it. I was a little hurt, but decided to see if Finn would like it. And he did! Finn loves the doggie. So, I gave it to him. He didn't have any stuffed animals and he loved it so much. I was thrilled.

Well, Kai quickly saw that the dog was now a desirable object and began to insist that it was his. It has taken a lot of repetition to get through to him that it is Finn's doggie. But that still hasn't stopped him from wanting the animal. Anytime that Kai sees Finn playing with it he will come over, offer Finn another toy (something that I've told Kai he must do if he wants to play with what Finn has), take the doggie, walk five feet, and then discard it. When I see this happen, I insist that Kai return the doggie to Finn since he no longer wants to play with it. I can't even count the number of times this has resulted in a meltdown that eventually ends with Kai in timeout for either not returning the dog or for returning it by throwing it at Finn.

It kills me that we're having this problem. It's not as if Kai does not have too many stuffed animals (enter exhibit A).

It's fairly clear that Kai only wants this particular animal because it's something that Finn wants and enjoys. I'm really hoping he outgrows this possessiveness, because this is really just silly.

1 comment:

Kristi said...

Owen is possessive too. It really can make life miserable. :(