Stephen - Master Negotiator

• Stephen is a fierce negotiator. We've had numerous instances where he will try a number of methods to get his way.
• On Taemar's Birthday there was an incident where he lashed out and hit Taemar. As a result his two current favorite toys were confiscated. Now, he was truly repentant and very upset. He apologised but insisted that the cars should be returned. Initially Mike said the cars wouldn't be returned until the following day. This upset Stephen a lot because he knew he would be seeing Pa that night and wanted to show Pa his new cars. Stephen kept up such a persistent stream of wailing, constantly telling us that he had apologised and he was being good, we were forced to renegotiate and return one car now and the other car later in the afternoon.
• A major challenge we face with disciplining Stephen is that he sees himself as an equal. Consequently any punishment he interprets as us being naughty.
• Stephen has also learnt to bend the truth if not outright lie. He uses the method of isolating his victim and then telling them that the other person lets him do or have whatever he currently wants.
• He also attempts to renegotiate at the logical conclusion to a prior negotiation, I.e. One more ride.
• Recently, when unhappy with a decision by Mike he attempted to convince Mike firstly that Taemar had made a different decision. He then told Mike that he was like a jigsaw puzzle that couldn't put the pieces together the right way, but Stephen knew how to put the pieces together, I.e. Mike was too stupid to understand what Taemar meant, but Stephen did understand.