I know these constant puppy training references are getting boring but I just had to throw this out there. Your SS is testing the limits to see how far he can go with you in the same way an adolescent pup will test the alpha for dominance. Nip it now before it escalates and bites you in the rear.

He won the seat battle when you got up. And FH was wrong to back him up but your overruling FH might have saved the situation. I know you were upset, and you had a right to be - AT FH for not keeping his mouth shut. In your place I would have done the same thing (and I have). But then after rationally thinking about it, a better response to his attempt to claim a seat might have been to say calmly and assertively, "Then you got up so it's now my seat again. Oh well." And ignore the rest.

Next time he's in your chair and you want to sit there, I'd just say, "Excuse me please," in a calm assertive tone. If he doesn't move, I'd sit on him. LOL.

FH should have said....ss....u left so it was no longer yur seat. and don't feel bad..."I want to screamm shut the hell up" all the time....my skids fight over seats all the time..sometimes I just don't even want to hear their voices anymore...blabb, blabb, blabb.... and why they feel that they are entitled to certain seats is beyond me...the key here is to make sure FH recognizes SS is starting to assert himself and that both of u need to be together on squashing his behavior immediately....and both of u should say...when u pay the bills here u can sit wherever u want...till then...move....

"You can catch more flies with honey than you can with vinegar"

In my house the adults will throw anyone of the kids out of our seats on the couch, and I dont care if they have been sitting on the couch all day and I just walked in the door. Its a respect issue I feel anyways. I sure as hell aint sitting on the floor.

Also with the pushing issue, I would just more so punish him for Lying not the pushing. It was a long battle with my BK and SK about the lying. I finally lightened the punishing if they were honest. But lord if I caught you lying...You were done for the day! I have to say so far we are making real progress.

My SD8 acted like this for a while. She was about 6 when it got really bad. I wasn't sure if it was just her age or the fact that I was taking on more responsibility with her & she was just seeing what she could get away with. Probably a combination of both!

She lied constantly about everything. (Part of this is a learned habit from BM.) We would limit how much Halloween candy she could have & she'd sneak it & hide it in her room. Pretty normal, right? But one day I caught her hiding in her closet with the door closed. When I asked what she was doing, she said nothing. So I opened the door & there she was, her mouth full of chocolate. She knew she was caught & started crying. I tried so hard not to laugh!

She would fight us every night about dinner...didn't like this, didn't like that. So one night, as usual, she was giving us a hard time about it, we told her she had to eat it if she wanted dessert. We then left the room. Within 2 minutes, SD came into the room we were in & said she was done. We did not believe her. My husband asked her if she really ate it & she swore up & down that she had. She even asked for her dessert. My husband & I went to investigate & found her dinner in the trash underneath something. Boy did she get punished for that lie!

She slowly grew out of this stage, but like a normal kid tries to see what she can get away with. Any lies now are ones that BM tells her to repeat. Nice, huh?!

We also had the seating issue. SD would take my seat the minute I got up. Part of it's a game, part of it might be jealousy, not sure. My biggest complaint with seating issues is this: I was brought up that adults took first priority if there are a limited number of chairs. Kids sat on the floor. I have tried & tried to get SD to follow this rule & she absolutely won't. I think it's so rude! And this is the one thing my husband doesn't back me up on. I guess that's the difference in our families...mine is large & grew up middle class, his is small & grew up upper class. So I'm sure as kids they never had to sit on the floor! Even now, as an adult, I'll sit on the floor if there are limited seats just so people older than me have somewhere to sit. I don't know, it's a silly pet peeve, I guess!

after reading your blog I am beginning to think that the attitude around 5-6 is hopefully a phase. My ss6 has recently started yelling at everyone, lieing more than usual, and just being rather rude. When he is not in these "moods" (which are more often than not these days) he is very sweet, can be nice, and he's thoughtful. I am not sure what happens but at some point when a boy turns that age a switch flips and they begin to push harder at boundaries and at most times go overboard. I am really hopeing for everyone's sake this is all a phase. I doubt this helped you any lol but just figured i would share and let you know there are some people out there at the same stage with a 5/6 year ss doing the same thing lol.

After I said several times which part of the couch was my favorite (making DH move wif he was sitting there) SD5 started saying that THAT was her "favorite part of the couch" as well...

But, as someone else said, My house, we are the adults, and I "move her" if I want to sit there, of course she says "I was sitting there first" but I couldn't care less...

So far, DH hasn't said anything... hmmm he moves her too, when he wants to sit next to me...

~You can see clearly only with your heart. What is truly important is invisible to the eyes~ Antoine de Saint-Exupéry's