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This
is a short letter that needs to be written. Ethen has been
getting bolder and bolder with his desire to negotiate and perform
chores on his time-table. Part of this increased desire for
autonomy is probably driven by the adolescence stage he has entered.
About a month ago it was his turn to do the dishes. He hates
dishes. In fact, he really hates dishes. This has proven
useful as a motivator that his parents have cashed in on a few times. |
| I
don't remember all of the circumstances, but dinner was over and I had
to go to some event that evening. As I was getting ready to
leave, I asked Ethen to do the dishes. He came back with his
usual negotiating tactic to keep him from doing them at this moment but
postponing them to some time in the future. For whatever reason,
he was successful in his tactic and entered into an agreement with me
to delay the inevitable task of dishes. |
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Ethen negotiated a deal that he could delay the dishes until the morning - here is the contract that was created and signed: I, Ethen, will do the dishes everyday - for every meal - starting December 20th and ending February 20th if I don't have the dishes (dirtied on December 20th and breakfast December 21st) done by 6:30 am on December 21st. Doing the dishes entails washing, putting up the dishes, sweeping the kitchen floor, and washing the counters and table off. The dishes will be in addition to other regularly assigned chores. Doing the dishes will commence immediately following dinner or at the soonest time I am able to do them. I will NOT complain nor go to bed until they are finished to my father's satisfaction daily. Then it was signed. |
| As
it turns out, Ethen was able to make the deadline by getting up the
next morning at 5:30. Luckily for him he was able to meet this
deadline. This meeting of the deadline only increased his desire
to keep postponing dishes though. Eventually in January it caught
up with him. One day I was headed to work and Ethen was off from
school (last part of their vacation) and I asked Ethen to put
Jannelle's car seat back in the car. Ethen told me it would be
done before I got home from work. Well I came home and it was
still on the porch. I told Ethen about it, and he said I will do
it but not right now. Well I insisted and he said fine, if it
isn't done by the time you get home from work tomorrow then I will do
dishes for a week. |
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 | Anytime
Ethen offers dishes for a week I am inclined to accept because he likes
doing them so much. I accepted. When I got home from work
on Wednesday I came and found Ethen and asked it he completed his
task. He told me that he hadn't and immediately realized he just
earned dishes for a week. I asked him to go and take care of it
and he told me he would but later. I insisted that he take care
of it now and he again made another deal that if it wasn't done by the
time I came home from work tomorrow he would get another's week of
dishes. I accepted again. Later that night we had scouts
over at the church. On the way home from the church there was the car seat sitting on the porch. I again asked if he wanted to take care of it now and he told me that he would rather wait. I reminded him that the last time he waited he got dishes for a week and he decided that he would take care of it immediately. I don't know why, but he hasn't learned he is bad at remembering to perform unpleasant tasks - but worse than that he also hasn't learned to quit trying to delay the inevitable because it just gets harder and harder to get out of the hole he digs for himself. I probably share some fault as I keep allowing him to dig the holes. |
Ethen has also taken up a liking with paper swords. He has always liked swords, but now he has started to make some out of paper. He watches you tube to learn how and then spends hours making them. On any given day there are probably a half dozen or so strung out throughout our house. Also, we have been trying to learn how to do family history. The different attempts have failed miserably. However, after attempting to do it, we have had some names emailed to us to complete the work for - so we took advantage of the opportunity to get it done. This was the first time we took Ethen to the temple although he has been with the youth. I still don't have any clue how we ended up with a couple of names, but we will take it. | 
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