A Little Bit of That

 Matthew loved electronics from the time he was young. My best friend Leah used to babysit him (we called her Grandma Leah because whenever we went out, everyone used to mistake her for Matthew's grandma). At first she used to give him water bottles to roll around. He loved that, but soon he grew bored with them. So out came the tablet with the piano app...and a monster was born.


The tablet was fascinating to him. I had a kindle, and I wouldn't let him play with it, but I did play some music for him on it. However, we had some old phones that didn't work. We gave him those old phones after we pulled the batteries out of them. However, we only learned to pull the batteries out of them after we had the police show up at our back door at around 9:30 one night doing a welfare check. They had received 911 calls from our location. We discovered Matthew in bed with a cell phone that no longer had a SIM card. But did you know that you can still dial 911 from a phone that no longer works? (Yes, I realize this isn't a cell phone, but this is just one of the many examples of  him taking electronics to bed.)


Matthew could get comfortable anywhere with a phone or tablet.



We may have let electronic use get a little out of control over the years. Matthew grew hooked! He has his own iPad, which I eventually just took away one day and hid. He was throwing fits when it was time to put it away, and his behavior was atrocious whenever he didn't have it. After taking his iPad away and limiting time on our phones, his behavior became more cooperative, he had less tantrums, he was more helpful, and he played more with his other toys. It was amazing the change that came over him.

On next week's dirt...letting Matthew become more independent.

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