I do not think I will have a problem with Ellie being obsessed about buying Elmo stuff. Oh, she knows who he is and even knows his name (a surprise to me), but she didn't know he would come alive when she touched him at the toy store. I've never seen the girl jump so high (luckily she landed).
Elmo scared her almost 3 days ago and she still talks about him. After the initial scare, the only word she said for the rest of the evening was a very sad "Elmo" as though he disappointed her severely by reaching out and saying "Hi."
The following day she wanted to wear her Elmo shirt to school and she went up to all the teachers to explain to them how he attacked her at the store. Unfortunately, they misunderstood her and assumed she was just excited about her shirt.
Because of the incident, she has learned the meaning of "scared" and even learned the sign for it. When the topic comes up (still pretty often, even days later) she says "Elmo" and signs for "scared". Mommy responds with "Elmo scared you?" and she says "Yeah" and then goes into the details that I witnessed, though I'd love to understand the words from her perspective.
Another interesting detail on her piecing together information... When the cat hisses at her (usually because Merlin is around), Mommy says "The kitty is afraid of Merlin," to which Ellie responds "Elmo" while singing "scared".
It is so fascinating to watch her link related topics together like that.
3 comments:
This is also really interesting from a developmental perspective and how the brain processes fearful events. I think it's sweet that you acknowledges her fear and helped her put words to it. And also that you gave her a way to express it. That probably makes it much easier to process and teaches her it's ok to be scared -- we all experience it, even animals.
I hope she still likes Elmo because I think Pappy got her this exact toy for Christmas!
Spleeness - I think that she has definitely taken the experience to heart and I hope she knows it's ok to be scared. She seems to understand that anyway.
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