climbing x2

 yesterday was big, and today was even bigger. i *did* take mr smear to the climbing wall. it was a hot walk there, but mostly in the shade, and i sorted out a 12-entrance card and we got him into a harness.

it was a long, trying experience, and for all intents and purposes we may as well have never been there before. it took forever for him to relax enough to trust the harness even from low heights, and i tried to be as lenient and tolerant as possible (including letting him go to the kids walls). but i wasn't going to let him get away with his usual - giving up - and i didn't want to let him get away with less than he did the last time.

so we started with a goal, and then eventually lowered the goal a bit, and i tried both carrot and stick: the carrot was an ice cream, the stick was not leaving until he got it. we had until 11pm, but i didn't *really* want to put that to the test.

every minor achievement felt miraculous, especially getting him to calm down after he was terrified about coming down and with his screaming i was sure that the other people thought i was actively abusing him. at the end, he managed to get up pretty close to the original goal and come down by himself, and while i was really proud of him i don't think he could really wrap his head around the idea that he'd actually done it.

i told him we would come back in a week's time, and not to forget what he'd done. he said no, and told me that he wanted to come back today, and i said "deal". then i bought ice-creams and we enjoyed a really nice walk home.

gd was really sore today, so i took mr smear to his mma class and worked from there. then we bussed home, and i realized as we got off the bus that we were pretty much halfway between our apartment and the climbing wall, so we walked that way instead.

we arrived, checked in, suited up. aaaaand... we were back to square one, basically. this time, he got to choose the carrot (he's got a thing for sprite and fanta, i acquiesced), but we still had a panic moment (similar to yesterday's, though easier to get him out of), and we still had a lot of giving up and not trusting the auto-belay.

in the end, though, with lots of patience and manipulationcoaching and encouragement, he did it - and he did it his way (he stood at the bottom of his final run and planned out his route). i don't know which of us was more excited by the end, but he reached yesterday's goal, which was actually about a foot higher than today's goal, and he got his reward and i got mine.

i am so damned proud of him, more for facing his fears than for anything else. this is an achievement that nobody else can claim credit for, and that nobody can ever take away from him, and i'm doing my best to impress that upon him.

so damned proud ^_^

...

otherwise, i've still got the cough and it was a bit of a weird night/day. as great as yesterday afternoon was, bedtime was messy (he was angry with me because we didn't agree on the terms and conditions of bedtime, partially because he'd messed around so long that there wasn't time for a story). but as messy as bedtime was, i put on my best face when i woke him up this morning and we had a good conversation about the bedtime debacle and we started the day off on the right foot.

i worked from home, and it was a mixed bag, some of it successful but some of it feeling rather shitty.

oh, well.

at least i have the climbing wall experience from today. that really made my day.