My Sensitive Child

Lately we've been having an interesting time with Alex...specifically, with Alex watching TV or movies. He's extremely sensitive about things that happen in the shows, and has yet to make it through a movie without crying. And we're not talking Marley and Me or anything. Nope, good ol' classics like Snow White, Curious George, Winnie the Pooh, and the clay-mation Rudolph. (And before you go saying that the Bumble is pretty scary, he cried way before that, when the other reindeer were picking on Rudolph).

While I am grateful for the fact that he's very empathetic, I also worry about him a little. Not because of the "He's a boy, so he needs to buck up and be macho" idea, but that I know there will come a time when he has to watch a movie in class, and I don't want him to get picked on because he cried throughout the movie.

We've tried talking to him beforehand about what's going to happen in the movie, so he knows what to expect. When asked about cartoons, he will tell you that that they're not real, and they always have happy endings. We've even tried showing him things in rewind - Yes, Tigger did just bounce on Eyeore's house and cause it to fall down, but if you rewind it, he bounces back off it, and the house is rebuilt. None of this seems to work.

James jokes that we should show him a Nightmare on Elm Street movie or something, with the idea that if you're going to cry, we might as well give you something to cry about. (At least, I hope James is joking!)

I love my boy, and I hope this is just a stage.