Well, this sweet little boy is not nearly as sweet as you'd think. Of course, he CAN be very sweet, he is creative, loving, can be very funny, and I do love him with all my heart, but he is a difficult child.
He was always difficult as a matter of fact, from the moment he was born a month early. The day we took him home from the hospital he started screaming bloody murder - he had colic, he had acid reflux, he was lactose intolerant... He screamed and screamed and only relaxed some if you held him. Probably because of that it took him years to learn to sleep in his own bed. Where other kids just scream for a while when you put them in their bed by themselves for the first time, and then get the message within a day or two, that never worked for Monty. He screamed for hours on end till he got himself worked up in such hysterics that he seemed to be choking. Years and years of working on getting him to go to sleep on his own.
And then don't even get me started on the potty-traning stories, which could easily fill various books.
Now that he is six, almost seven, it is getting more obvious that he is just a little different. He frequently comes home from school saying that other kids were mean to him, and that he doesn't have any friends. But then when you ask the teacher, or when i see him play with other kids, he seems like just any other kid with tons of friends. But evidently his perception is that everyone is mean to him.
When we go to school in the morning, he always wants to park his bike directly next to Stoney's bike. But usually Stoney gets there a few minutes earlier, because Monty is just slow in a lot of things, and another child has already parked their bike next to Stoney's. And every morning Monty has a meltdown, because someone took "his" spot. And life is not fair because he wanted to park his bike at that spot.
The same when he hangs his coat up at school, he wants a specific spot and it has to be that spot.
And then the temper tantrums... oh the temper tantrums...
And then there is the fact of his school work. His 1st grade teacher has done a lot of complaining about him. She said: "in all my years of teaching i have never seen a child that cannot be motivated by any form of reward or punishment."
Other then Stoney, who will do just about anything for a bribe, Monty is not sensetive to that at all. "You don't get desert if you don't make your homework." And he shakes his head and says: "Nah, i don't want desert." We have occasions where we worked with him for an hour to get twenty simple math problems done, whereas the next day he did twenty more problems in seven minutes. When he doesn't want to do something, he just doesn't want to do something.
Another comment in his most recent report card. "Even though he is always last to finish his work, he does seem to understand all the things being taught, which is surprising, since he never seems to pay any attention."
There is a pediatric service attached to the school and one of the doctors is going to do some test with him to see if there is something that they can diagnose. Maybe he has some behavior disorder. But then again, maybe he is just the way he is. He is just Monty.
Oh Monty... on n'est pas sortie de l'auberge.... Either way, I am sure there will be many more years of interesting and challenging moments to come.
