Labor Day Realizations

We had a coming to a head of this attitude J has had. We went to our small group's leaders house for dinner and games with our small group. He not only told me he hates me but sat there and told his brother give me your m&m and I won't hit you. You guys are my witness - never in a MILLION years would J say this kind of stuff. Unless, as we found out, something is stressing him out or upsetting him. My good friend asks the best questions and as we were sitting there and talking about things she suggested asking him if there's something upsetting him. Brando talked to him and had to ask quite a few questions to get to the bottom of things. His friend he met in fundamentals is having a really hard time adjusting to school and cries a lot which J doesn't like. Plus his friend doesn't play with him any more - or anybody. The boy has had challenges, much like J, and continues to have them more severely than J's had to deal with, and J doesn't realize that it has nothing to do with him. I talked to him a little bit more about it this morning, letting him know sometimes it takes people awhile to adjust and it's okay if he cries. It's also okay if his friend doesn't play with him or want to, sometimes it takes awhile for people to get used to things before they can make friends. We'll talk more about it later, but hopefully that unearths the reaction we've seen coming out and he can make better choices about how to respond.