So as of this past weekend, Leo can ride his bike without training wheels! Big milestone! He is three months shy of turning 5. It only took a few days of Brandon working with him, but as I saw him pushing and encouraging him to do it, it got me to thinking. Leo was scared at first - very intimidated. He gets nervous. A lot. He doesn't like new situations and he definitely doesn't like walking into a room where the attention is on him. I have seen many times over Leo work through anxiety. He shoves his tongue to the side of his mouth and takes deep breaths. He gets a very serious look in his eyes, but he eventually calms himself down. And then after about a 5 or 10 minute period of time, he is able to relax. It makes me feel so sad to see him get so anxious. I want to protect him from those situations, but then again I don't want to raise him to be shy. I want so badly for him to be the kid that can walk into any situation and feel at home. I wasn't like that growing up and it made trying new things so hard.
But as for the bike riding, Brandon pushed. And bribed. And literally within an hour, Leo was up and riding. He could do it just fine! Now all he wants to do is run outside and ride his bike. But he just needed that extra push to get him to try it.
So when is the pushing too much? Brandon is Leo's idol. He can get him to do pretty much anything just by being interested in it. Leo can snorkel by himself in the ocean (without floaties!), he does flips on the trampoline and is in an advanced gymnastics class. He races around on his little go-kart. If I were the only parent Leo would not be doing any of these things. Maybe because I hate making him try things he isn't comfortable with or maybe because I just worry too much he will get hurt. I realize though that I underestimate Leo's abilities. He needs the push. But I question when will the pushing go too far. Will Leo be telling his therapist someday how hard of parents we were and forced him to do things he didn't want to?? Or will he say he wished we had forced him more to do new things? At what point when he says he doesn't want to do something should we stop and say okay?
It can be so frustrating to see your child not try something new because they are scared. Especially something you know they will love if they just give it a go. But it's a fine line between forcing your kid to do something and helping them overcome their fears. And each kid is so different and responds differently. Carmela could care less. She's the one who walks into a group of strangers and says hello. Leo makes her go first when he gets nervous to go somewhere. She's often his crutch! Who would have thought that would happen? But Carmela also doesn't care to challenge herself. At all. I guess she takes after me :) This became clear when one day Brandon was trying to show her how to hold a hockey stick. After about 15 seconds of fumbling the stick around in her little hands, she actually said "this is too hard!", threw down the stick, and moved on to playing with her dolls. We are banking on her creativity and intelligence to carry her through life :)
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