Father's Redemption

I mentioned in my Thursday 13 post about BossyBoy and his color changes in pre -school. Green is good, Yellow is a warning, and Red is discipline/privilege taken away. Just so you were clear on that. I thought this a perfect Father's Day story.

The problem with BB's color change is not that he gets on Red..we can deal with that to a degree it's the lying part that we are trying to curtail. BB is under the impression that all is well if he lies and says he's on green. Which he should know that we find out but still persists on lying.

We have disciplined him to no end with time-outs and removal of privileges. Yet I think he has associated the discipline to the bad color and not the lying. I would try to explain to him in simple pre- school terms what he was doing wrong and that if he told the truth about his color he would not get in trouble. This has been a daunting task as each week/day we've had to pound it in his head again over and over to no avail.

Yesterday I think/hope he had an epiphany. He finally told me with great reluctance that he was indeed on yellow. I was so proud of him and praised him and told him he would need to tell his dad as his dad was the main one riding him most on this issue. Yet once we got in the car and going he started changing his story again and that he was actually on green.

During the ride home, I rehearsed over and over with him what he was going to say to his dad. When he finally got home, I announced proudly that BB told the truth today and that he is going to tell Dad what color he is on.
After countless minutes of coaxing and prodding, C gently told him that it was ok to tell Daddy what color he was on and that Daddy loved him no matter what, but just wants him to tell the truth. Through tears and terror, he finally reluctantly whimpered "Yellow". C swept him up in his arms and hugged and held him and told him how proud he was and how much he loved him.

It really was a very poetic tender moment. He held his baby boy in his arms and reassured him again that he was ok.
The prodigal son has returned and there is much rejoicing.