Tonight Annie came up to me carrying a magazine, placed it on my lap, and pointed to the open page.
“I like her face, Dada!”
I looked down and did a double take. This is the what she was pointing to:
That’s right. Annie was pointing to an ad for antidepressant medication.
“Uh,” I stammered. “You like her face?”
“Yes!”
“But she’s…”
I paused a second, trying to figure out how to approach this.
“Tell me, Annie. Do you think she’s happy or sad?”
“Sad! That’s why I like it!”
Somewhere off in the background I heard the strains of the Psycho theme playing.
Okay, not really, but this wasn’t a totally isolated incident. Annie always laughs when someone cries on one of her kid shows, and she thinks it’s hilarious when I pretend to cry. She often comes up to me and says, “Cry, Dada! Cry!” And when I boo-hoo she doubles over, cackling.
Annie would find this photo hilarious.
She doesn’t always find this kind of stuff funny, though. In the rare instance that she’s in the room when someone on TV is crying in a serious context (such as on the news, Dateline, or a talk show) she doesn’t laugh. Instead, she watches, very serious, then quietly says, “She’s sad, Dada.”
Obviously, Annie is starting to understand emotions, and all of this is just part of the process. To be sure, though, and to make sure she isn’t a little Norma Bates, I gave her a test as I tucked her into bed.
“Annie, what do you like most… when Mommy is happy or sad?”
“I like when Mommy is happy.”
“What about me? Do you like it best when I’m happy or sad?”
“Happy!”
“And James? Do you like it when he’s happy or sad?”
“I don’t like it when he’s sad. That’s why I hug him!”
I smiled and kissed her forehead.
“Alright, Sweetie. Go to sleep.”
Annie passed my test, but I still think she’s a little weirdo for laughing when people cry.
Auntie_M says:
You mean you don’t laugh at people when they are sad/cry??? Why ever not?
Admit–you’re now considering banning me from your site!!!
Auntie_M says:
Ok, in all seriousness, now:
I think it’s great that Annie is exploring feelings. When I taught preschool (many moons ago), one fall I bought a whole bunch of pumpkins and first drew and then carved faces of various emotions into them while the kids were playing in our huge yard…very soon most were gathered around me, watching me carve.
Discussions flew back & forth between them and they tried to pull me in but I kept direction the conversations back to them. (These were kids ages 2-5). I heard them discussing what they thought the different faces looked like and what that pumpkin might be “feeling.”
Later, when we were inside, they again watched as took out pieces of construction paper, a paper cup, and a black sharpie pen. I had already lightly penciled in straight lines across the top of each page, along with the words I was going to write out–because for the life of me I cannot draw, write, or cut in a straight line and have to prepare carefully if I’m to do so and prepping with 15 2-5 year olds is just plain nutty! LOL
I then began to write out the words of our book: I have lots of feelings inside of me. Sometimes I’m_____________.
And below I drew big bold circles (tracing the cup to make sure I got that part right!)for simple faces.
And then with the pumpkins lined up behind us, we began to write our book…I was 21. Nearly twenty-two years later, I still have it! I have to say the cover wasn’t my best binding job but the memories far outweigh that minor detail.
All the books in the school had been changed out over the weekend to include some sort of emotion, pictures on walls had been changed but as this happened all the time, the kids didn’t think too much of it. But they started catching on pretty quickly.
We explored the books, the pictures, the pumpkins, the book I was writing with their help. We got out sentence strips and wrote down the words representing different emotions… On and on it went. They went through magazines looking for different emotions (I’d have loved to have found an antidepressant ad like that one!!!)
Very soon it was common for us to hear things like “I’m a sad [angry, tired, happy, bored, surprised, scared, etc] pumpkin today/right now…” (“Really, why is that? Tell me about it…”)
Or, “Miss Mary, I have a story for you to write down for me today…it’s about someone who was really lonely…” [“Let me grab your journal and a pencil/pen…”]
It was one of the most special “units” I ever did as a teacher. It was amazing what sort of depths were delved–it’s amazing how deep a 2 year old can be (or a 3, 4, or 5 year old!)
Point being: you can do the same sort of thing with Annie all on your own if you guys want to, minus the pumpkins, I guess as I don’t think they are ripe–but you could draw faces on an apple. Or just sit down near her one day without saying a word and start making a simple book one day. You’d be surprised what it could lead to…
But most of all: enjoy the process!
And I wouldn’t worry too much: Annie isn’t that much of a weirdo–she’s just part of the Spohr family!
Annalisa says:
Well, call me a weirdo too, but sometimes sad is disproportionately expressed that it can seem funny. I’m having this experience with my daughter right now. She will seriously get sad at very silly things, and while on the surface I take it very seriously, inside I have to suppress the urge to laugh because she’s being sad over something silly.
E.g., last week she decided she wanted to bike to a park when I told her we were going to a beloved park of hers. I told her no, it was too far to bike to it, and we were taking the car instead. She cried the whole ten minutes we were in the car, forgetting we were going to the park. “I want! I want! *sob* park!”. I kept telling her “but that’s where we are going!”, to no avail. She didn’t stop crying until we got there, so after a while I was trying not to laugh at how silly it was for her to be sad like that. When we got out of the car and she was beaming, I couldn’t help but tell her “see? You were so sad you weren’t listening to my words! That was just silly.” She nodded at me seriously, so I quickly added “But that’s okay, sometimes you just gotta be sad, right?”, and then dropped it.
I think in your case, Annie laughs at your pretend crying because she has a good sense that it’s so over the top that she’s sure you’re just being extremely silly at the time. The important part is that she understands the real difference between the two!
Rebecca Q says:
My youngest child just turned two and thinks crying is hilarious. she thinks it’s especially funny when her brother cries. She will run to me giggling saying “crying, mommy. crying.” I hope she grows out of this before kindergarten.
Randi says:
I think it’s a kid phase. My oldest used to awkwardly giggle when something sad happened. It was like she didn’t want to cry so she laughed instead.
Michelle says:
You mention she laughs when a kid cries on “a kid show”, but not serious news reports. That, along with the picture being of a comic book type reference, might mean your girl can already differentiate between fake crying (kid shows/animated pictures) and true sadness (live news reports). Now that’s a smart kiddo!
Paula says:
Sometimes I laugh at funerals.
When I watched the movie My Sister’s Keeper I cried so hard I began laughing. In the movie theater. I laughed and laughed until I was asked to leave. I laughed because I was beyond hysterical. And when I read the book I repeated the process.
Sometimes laughing at people who cry seems cruel but sometimes we laugh to keep ourselves from becoming a sobbing mess and making the situation worse.
Annie is learning this process.
Glenda says:
It’s funny when my daughter was 3 if I pretended to cry bc she’s was misbehaving, she’d tell me “cry mama”.
Maybe at this age they think it’s funny. Cute
Norma says:
I laugh when people fall…oh my the trouble I’ve been for that. I know it’s a nervous reaction. I try to control it but end up laughing even harder. Little Annie is incredibly precious! Thank you for sharing your stories with us.