Friday, December 03, 2010

The cray-cray of Ray Ray

Ray is the most difficult to get along with among the Eggerts clan. (Well, at least the men. I fully admit to being the stubborn, moody one from whom he inherited his traits.) As of late he's been having temper fits. The most common one occurs when he's told he's had enough computer time. The kid is a natural gamer - wanting to play on his Leapster, on the netbook or on my Iphone non-stop. In a way that Noah has never been interested. Ray loves gaming so much and since I supply him with mostly educational games (okay, so Angry Birds doesn't truly teach anything but perserverence) he has also learned SO very much. His letter and number recognition and blossoming reading and math skills have much to do with the games. But when it's time for the game to end Ray nearly always loses his mind. It's like a switch is flipped and he becomes a rabid animal. This sort of reaction will sometimes come up if he is over tired and he wants me to do something that Mark is trying to help him with. He'll go ballistic insisting that Mama do the most mundane and meaningless of tasks. Later, when the dust settles and he's gone back to being verbal he seems sincerely sorry and talks about his anger as if it is truly something that overtakes him. A little Jekyll and Hyde. His madness comes on so suddenly and burns so brightly that I am occasionally overwhelmed by it. He seems at moments out of control, a bit crazy and unpredictable. I totally expect him to attend an anger management class at some point. At least one. Is 4 too early to enroll?

But Ray is also the most passionate, the most cuddly, the most gregarious and charismatic. Almost daily he will tell me apropros of nothing that he loves me. I'll be driving to pick up Noah from school and Ray speaks up suddenly from the back of the van and says "I love you, Mama." And he gives the best hugs - falling into you, squeezing and squishy.

I have said it a million times and I will say it a million more: I liked the name Ray for him because he was a summer baby and it made me think of a ray of light - and he is precisely that. So warm, so bright, sometimes a bit too intense - but you can't take your eyes off him.

2 comments:

lonna said...

The older he gets, the more he still seems like Dermot. Dermot is the sweetest, most out going kid, but his anger can be all consuming, and it can come out of nowhere. All I can tell you is that maturity does help tone it down. Dermot has gotten to the point than when he knows he's upset, he's still rude to us, but he knows to leave the scene. If he's really upset, he'll go upstairs or to another room and close the door. Personally, I think that's appropriate for a 6 year old. If he doesn't come up with new strategies by adolescence, I'll have to work on it some more. Dermot had a really hard time being in control when emotions got intense. Around 5.5, he realized (after much nagging/teaching on my part) that he has to be some part of the solution when his emotions are out of control. I think the formal school setting helped too. Dermot is much more concerned about peers' reactions than ours, and his peers don't like the crazy. I take that as Dermot knowing that he's "safe" at home. We love him no matter what and he clearly knows that, so he feels free to "let off steam" at home like he doesn't do elsewhere.

Dermot also is a super gamer. I am amazed at how much the Pokemon games have really convinced him that reading is a good thing. His reading has just exploded since the summer.

NME said...

Lonna, Occasionally when Ray gets emotional I can take him to his room and tell him to come out when he is calm. And that often works. He'll come out a few minutes later, much calmer, apologizing and wanting to hug. I look forward to him deciding to that himself.