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Children Who Are or Seem to Be Afraid


Miythandria
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A couple of instances regarding this over the past week on vacation.

 

I've been attempting to get my son to go off the high dive (10m) at our pool for the last year +.  First, he said he'd do it when he turned 6.  Then he said he'd do later in the summer, then it was "next summer"  then this summer came and it was "I don't want to".  I tried offering him small bribes, but nothing would hit his trigger.  He'd get about half way up the ladder, get scared and come back down.  I knew once he jumped, he'd love it, but couldn't talk him into it.  Flash forward to last week, at a community pool in Wisconsin and the promise of $10, which combined with some birthday money would be enough to get him the $30 remote conrolled helicopter that he'd been wanting for several months, sealed the deal.  Once he jumped once, he jumped about 2 dozen times.  Got back home, it took a little convincing that the high dive at that pool was the exact same height as the high dive at our pool, once he went, he went probably 50 more times over the last 2 days.  Sometimes I'd be going off the low dive next to him, sometimes I'd be going after him on the high dive and other times he was just down there by himself or with other kids from the pool jumping in.

 

2nd instance happened at KI.  He had ridden Banshee earlier in the season, never quite made it to 52" last season, went on the 1st trip this year.  He enjoyed it, but something along the way convinced him that he didn't want to try go again.  I never pushed the issue too much, asked him a couple of times when we were over by The Bat, but never prodded him to try it again.  His grandma likes the ride as well, but after having hand surgery earlier this year, she was a no go on coasters for a while.  She joined us last week at KI, hand all healed and ready to ride.  With my wife pregnant and unable to ride, her husband unwilling to ride any coasters beyond the most tame and our son not quite at 54", she figured Diamondback wasn't going to happen on this trip, but wanted to get on Banshee again.  I was more than happy to go with her, but we were dragging my son along as well, give him a chance to ride with grandma, a 70+ year old, 30+ year old and 7 year old all in the same row; 3 generations having fun together.  He kept saying he didn't want to ride it; did not like it.  I kept reminding him that he loved his first and only ride on Banshee.  He kept tagging along, never putting up too much of a protest, but not exactly thrilled.  After going thru the ride, he kept complaining that he had to pee, and wanted to get off; didn't sound like he enjoyed it much, had me thinking it may have been our last ride this year until mom could get back on coasters next year and would "force" him to try it again.  Then something funny happened b/w the getting off the ride, eating dinner and getting on Viking Fury, he couldn't stop talking about Banshee and decided he loved the ride.  He even expressed regret that he forgot to wear his Banshee shirt that he got after his first ride.  I told him that was ok, his cousing was coming down from CBus this week and she was going to want to ride it, so he could wear it then. 

 

Kids, like people, are "funny"  sometimes they just need a little pushing and time to make them realize an experience is worth living.

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^ Locations are important. I really couldn't tell what parks you were talking about until you said Kumba, and then I knew it was Busch Gardens. (Not that it's a bad thing, but it's still a good suggestion to state where 'down here' was at.

Sorry. I have mentioned where I moved to on numerous occasions. Just left it out this time and named a ride.

He also loves Shiekra and Manta.

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  • 1 month later...

Another instance for me was when my best friend ( at the time before I moved away ) bribed me to ride The Beast. He offered me a $10 dollar gift card to Blockbuster. ( this was years back When I was a kid and Blockbuster was relevant. ) he also stated there were brakes that slows you down on the drop of the first hill. So I agreed, climbed the hill, went down the first drop and hit the first break run. I was grinning ear to ear, all the way to the station it was so awesome. Now he didn't lie completely about brakes being on the first drop but it didn't dramatically reduce speed as he put it. But wow, that was a decade ago and The Beast to this day is the Best ride at KI in my opinion. I laugh about it now, $10 blockbuster card, Pfft now n days I would have told him to pound salt. But I'm so happy I did it.

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One day about 4 years ago, my Friend and I brought a couple girls to KI and they wanted to ride Drop Tower. A ride I've never ridden before, and was quite terrifying to me at the time. I didn't want to look like a chicken so I ended up ridding it. I hated it, and looking at it today still gives me butterflies. We rode it 3 more times that season with these girls. Even then Im still not fond of it. So much that we don't say the word Drop Tower at the park anymore, it is now designated: "The Rainbow Shaft"

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I am probably around the age of some of the kids talked about on this topic, and I have three friends (ages 10, 11, and 12) coming with me to Kings Island in a few weeks. The 11 and 12 year olds have never been on a roller coaster and I had taken the 10 year old to Kings Island only recently for their first time at any amusement park. I didn't "force" the 10 year old on anything except two rides: FAAC and Surf Dog. She had thought FAAC was connected to Diamondback and she didn't believe me when I said it wasn't. She was worried about Surf Dog since she had gotten motion sick before, but I was trying to coax her into it to get away from that fear. Fast forward to now, she promises me to ride a roller coaster with a loop, and I let her choose which one and described them all in detail. She surprisingly picked Banshee for her first looping roller coaster, and has convinced the 11 and 12 year olds to ride with us. I'm not afraid of any of the rides and I'm only going to attempt to get them on The Beast, as their first "big" roller coaster. I'm going to let all of the other rides be chosen by them (except for the 11 year old, she got bribed with food to ride everything the 10 year old will ride). I'm just doing this out of love, and out of love for roller coasters. I want them all to enjoy the experience, while still trying things out. I just hope the 10 year old, Rachel, won't get too pushy.  :P

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Something like that happen to me and my daughter this year on Banshee. She wanted to ride it cause her friend did and loved it. So we get in line and she was completely fine until she got in the seat and was terrified. A KI employee notice her cring and asked her if she wanted to ride and she told him yes. But then she quickly changed her mind. And so we exited the ride. I liked how the young man handled himself in the situation like they have been trained to handle things like this. If so my hats off to CF.

Sent from my SM-G900V using Tapatalk

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