In George's world, everything is a tragedy. He's in a phase where he has a vision for everything. And most of the time he wants to do it himself. Unfortunately, he's not yet able to be independent and he lacks all the communication skills necessary to tell us what he wants. So he's resorted to throwing himself on the ground, hiding his face in his hands, and sobbing. It just about breaks our hearts, especially when the best way for us to handle it is to just ignore him until he gets it cried out. If we try to pick him up or comfort him, it just makes it worse.
Last night I had to go in to the office, so DH was alone with George for dinner and bedtime. Apparently George wanted a muffin and DH made the mistake of removing the wrapper for George. George threw the muffin down, tossed the plate aside, and then flopped onto the floor just inconsolable. He'll do the same thing if we ask him to do something that he doesn't want to do, like move away from the hot stove. He'll just throw himself on the ground and cry.
Today, George and I joined some of our friends for a Valentine's party. George did very well for the first hour, playing and socializing. But at lunchtime he just melted down. First he cried because two of his friends were sitting on white wooden chairs. Since those were the only two of that style, I got George a green folding chair to sit on but George was not appeased. So he threw himself on the floor to sob. After he calmed down, he decided to just stand at the table with his friends rather than sit in the offending green chair. He was happily sipping on his juice box until he noticed that the other girls' juice boxes were bigger than his. So it was back to the floor with more sobbing. After calming down, he played with his food for a little bit. He wasn't eating much, so I tore a little bite off to see if maybe he'd eat smaller pieces. This sent him into hysterics of kicking and screaming and sobbing on the floor. At that point, I just picked him up, said our goodbyes, and we headed home. He sobbed for 15 minutes in the car before falling asleep. Once home, he napped for over three hours. The poor guy just wore himself out. When he woke he kept talking about the party, telling me "George cry. Chair!! Juice box!!!" I guess those things were really upsetting to him. We talked about what had happened, and I gave him a bunch of extra cuddles this afternoon. Now to help him figure out how to deal with these frustrations in a more socially acceptable manner. It sure is tough to be two.