Day 61: Children

In the past 24 hours, I watched my sister's son have three or four complete meltdowns. He didn't get his way and got angry. In his anger, he lost control and basically threw a hissy fit. He screamed, demanded his way, shouted and was defiant. He is five, so this behavior is understandable, but unacceptable.

Did my sister deal with it the way I might have, maybe not, but after having my stepsons and baby throw some winners, I have understood that parenting is more subjective than black and white. You can use different words or actions but with varying degrees of success. One technique might get him to cease the meltdown faster, but not teach him to control himself in the long run.

My daughter today was in a mood as well, maybe there is something in the water. She was pretending to drink out of a pumpkin sippy cup. I told her I would put some water in it to drink and give it back. Lil Bit has some lungs let me tell you!! She screamed bloody murder until I gave it back. She pitched a fit about everything I tried to feed her at dinner, and screamed with rage and fury when I was not presenting her with her frozen juice pop at a speed commensurate with her ability to ingest said Mott's freezer pop.

Nothing made her happy this afternoon and I couldn't do much about it. I managed to keep her calm and appeased for the most part, but she still had three massive screaming fits, which for a one year old who can't tell me what she needs or wants or what hurts is par for the course some days, but makes you realize that most parents of children throwing fits are completely lost as to what to do or are ignoring the behavior as part of a less immediate way to deal with the behavior.

The second that child resorts to a tantrum in public is the most humiliating and immobilizing moment, almost like a deer in the headlights. You want to throw a blanket over them, hide the behavior and simultaneously magically create a perfect child behavior to save face in the store, mall, friend's house, in front of your visiting sister and mother. In that second you feel like everyone is looking at you and thinking, what a disaster of a parent!

We have a tendency to judge too quickly, especially parenting, but each child and family have accepted rules, mores, norms that are part of the way they live, handle family roles, deal with emotions. What my family considered normal, you might think was ridiculous or inappropriate. I may not agree with a lot of parenting choices, but it tends to be only the very worst parenting shows up on our radar. We may see the playground "bully" pull our kid off the swing and not have heard him ask nicely for a turn before losing patience. We see the negative behavior, but not that his parents have been working for weeks on impulse control or patience.

Children even at one are little independent people who want what they want when they want it. As we mature, we realize social benefits to patience, delayed gratification, kindness, empathy, but as children, we are walking bundles of need and want. Just as you couldn't walk up to a random 40 year old man and order him around, getting your children to behave perfectly reasonably for an adult isn't going to happen much of the time. If you get it to happen 80% of the time, even with reminders and coaching, you're probably doing an amazing job.

My sister is very patient with her children. She and her husband do their best to avoid spanking. They explain why rules are the way they are, they establish expectations and consequences for failing to meet expectations. Most of the expectations for the kids are pretty much what my rules would be and are age appropriate. They might tolerate more back talk than I might or might be trying to demonstrate extra patience with company here, but they are doing the best job any parents could. Sometimes children are just children.

And the next time you see a mother dragging a tantrum throwing child through Wal-Mart, stop and ask yourself if it were your child, really what would you do? Give in to every whim? Probably not, so what would be your strategy when "no" doesn't cut it? Let them scream and cry, drawing every eye? Dragging them out of the store and going home? Spanking them right there? Ignoring them and continue to shop while your little darling screams like someone drove a steak knife through his eye?

Parenting is hard. You're trying to make sure every lesson, reason, rule is part of the grown-up person you hope your child becomes. And somedays, you're just hoping you have enough patience to allow them to grow up without drinking .  .  . too often, at least. 

Day 94: Parenting

This is kind of a long roundabout conversation. For one, once again I got sucked into a Facebook debate about first religion and then parenting. I wish I could just walk away when people say things that strike me as singularly ignorant or wrong.

Today I almost ignored it, but when someone says something doubting the existence of God, I can't let it go. I know it is futile to argue religion with people, but God calls us to share our faith. I don't try to force it on people, and I have a lot of questions about things that don't make sense to my human mind, but when someone opens the door, I would feel remiss if I didn't share what I believe. If I truly think God is the answer, I would be a crappy friend if I said nothing.

I used the analogy that God's plan for us is like how we as parents sometimes allow our children to suffer (i.e. cry in their cribs because they don't want to go to bed, be angry because we say no, etc.) because we know better than they do. My FB friend adjacent (a FB friend of a friend) basically criticized my parenting through the use of my analogy. It really hurt.

My Lil Bit was crabby and fussy around noon today. She usually takes a nap around 11, but did not get up as early today so I let her stay up a bit later. When it was time for her nap, I picked her up to sing to her, but she didn't want any of that. She started throwing a bit of a tantrum. She doesn't want up, doesn't want to be cradled, doesn't want to lay on my shoulder. She was squirming and pinching and screaming. I decided that her crying was escalating, so I took her into her crib.

I kissed her, gave her her zebra, blanky, and binky. The minute I walked away, she started crying again. She used to go straight to sleep or play nicely in her crib until she did. But I've kind of gotten her into the bad habit of being rocked to sleep every night, which is not something I want her to need every night. Plus, she isn't sleeping well through the night. She hasn't sleep through the night more than a couple of days in months. She has to learn to self-soothe so I can finally get some sleep and so she can feel safe and confident by herself.

I know many parents let their kids cry themselves to sleep at this stage of development. I hate it. I feel awful every second she cries. I walk away for a few minutes, wash a dish, try to let her calm down. If she doesn't, I go back in, give her back whatever she has thrown out of the crib, pat her back. I stand there for a minute and wait until she calms down. I walk out again. I keep doing that until she falls asleep. I have even sat in her room talking to her or singing "The Wheels on the Bus" with crazy made up verses until she stops crying.

This week I've been working really hard to get her to sooth herself to sleep with as little drama and fuss as possible. Then this guy criticizes me without knowing how old my child is or who I am or even what type of person I am. I've spent most of this week and weekend trying not to cry. I'm so tired. Not just physical exhaustion, although that is a lot of it, by emotionally wiped out. I'm tired of daddy being gone for her and me.

I'm not a perfect parent. I let the TV run in the background WAY too much. I spend a lot of time in my pajama's and I leave her toys all over the living room.  But I really resent people criticizing my parenting. Most people don't know what they are doing. And we all make mistakes.

I don't mind tips, if someone sees me doing something and they've tried something better or easier. It is hard to take a tip, but if someone offers it like really a gift not as some method of putting you down or telling you how to parent, that is OK. I just don't think until your children turn out to be perfect little people you have a right to judge someone else who is truly doing the best they can.

Some parents beat their kids, give them drugs, don't feed them. Those people need someone to judge them, like an actual judge and take their kids away. I'm not talking about those people. I don't feed my daughter all natural, all organic all the time. I sometimes have given her pieces of chicken nuggets. I give her toddler formula instead of milk because it has DHA and RHA for brain development and she still seems to have issues with lactose. She dances like crazy to Vivaldi and Taio Cruz and Martha and the Vandellas. I don't know how to do everything right. But I'm the one here doing it. She's had a sitter 4 times since she was born. I take her everywhere with me or don't go. I don't want to miss anything.

I do know she is twelve months old and has used a toilet a couple of times already. She can tell me that she is hungry or wants a cracker or sees a phone. She can hear a bark and sign dog. She signs please, eat, phone, cracker, dog and can follow simple directions that blow my mind. She is wickedly stubborn, smart and adorable. She is well behaved and loving. She snuggles me and kisses me. She is very rarely shy or concerned about strangers. She eats food cold, warm, hot and never fusses.

I think I'm informed. I know I am more patient than I ever thought I could be. I love her more than I would have ever thought possible. That is really the most important thing. Oh, yeah she also went down tonight with a few hugs and kisses and one brief cry fighting sleep and out. She doesn't feel abandoned or lost or unheard, she knows I am always here, always coming for her.

I may not be doing it the way you would. I may not be doing everything right. I am using all the years of knowledge I have, all the instincts, perceptions, and frankly, GUESSING about a lot of stuff using my gut. Even if you study child pysch, really most of us are using our best educated guess about parenting. Maybe my guessing turns out OK, maybe yours does too, just completely different. Isn't that what makes life interesting. If we all did everything the same, the world would implode from boredom. So please, self-righteous pomposity isn't allowed here. Got a tip? a KIND word of advice? then I'm all ears. Everything else is just trying to push your ways onto everyone else. My kid is just fine despite my failings as a human being. 

Day 251: Someone's MOM

I know I had a blog titled someone's mom earlier, but this is a totally different topic. I have noticed on the roads the past few days/weeks people driving horribly. People serve into my lane with virtually no room to spare or pull out in front of oncoming traffic. I just can't fathom how people can be so careless.

The swerving car narrowly misses my front right fender. I take a sharp breath and hold it without realizing I've done it. Heat rushes up my spine and prickles race up my neck and itch my scalp. After a few seconds of swearing inside my head, I think, Hey! I'm someone's MOM! and I wonder what would happen if I were hurt. Even if I just had to be rushed to the hospital, would anyone know to contact the daycare?

While these thoughts tend to the macabre probably due to a good horror habit courtesy Stephen King and Dean Koontz, people's moms die all the time. Good men with families go to work in the morning and don't come home. Before, I obviously worried about my own safety, but I never really worried about what would happen if I were just gone. My husband would be sad, and I would worry about him moving on, but part of getting married is knowing that someday you will have to go on without your partner, or vice versa. My family and friends would miss me and it would be sad, but after awhile life would continue. My daughter is the first person whose life would be absolutely altered by my loss. And when that car swerved, I didn't think of me.

Of course, to all you veteran parents out there this seems kind of like, duh, Captain Obvious! But it wasn't a conscious process in my mind to being more concerned about her than my own safety. It just struck me as pretty cool that one day without even thinking about it, I put her first in my mind.

It is scary to think that I am her forever mommy. I have to do all I can to be there for her as long as possible, which since I was 39 when we finalized, will be shorter than most parents can expect to be around for their children. If I am very lucky, I will get to be around for her to be my age. While I want a long life for me, I want to make sure I am there for her questions when she has her first date, prom, boyfriend, eventually baby. Being able to share her with my mom is the most precious gift I can imagine.

It is really amazing how such a little thing as Lil Bit can make me love so much, could change my world so profoundly. I am overwhelmed by how all the cliches about parenting are true, how deep the love and protective instinct are, how every day I fall more in love with her. What a privilege it is to be someone's mom.

So I drive a tad more defensively, set the cruise control at the speed limit (or close ; 0), and have soup instead of ordering pizza. My perspective of others has also become more tolerant and compassionate as I realize that other people are someone's mothers and fathers and deserve to be home for their families. Again, there is no way to put words to how deep the change in my world this little girl has made.

Day 310: Scary

Last night, my daughter was a little bit fussy when it came time for bed because she had napped on and off all day. She still sleeps pretty much when she is tired. I know some people get their kids on a schedule, but I figure that much of the schedule will take care of itself if you stick to a routine, but on the weekends, I let her do what she needs to do.

She ate a really big dinner, carrots, green beans, oatmeal with bananas and seemed fine. I gave her part of a bottle before bed and she fell asleep watching her mobile. I finished what I was working on and went to bed. Around 12:45, I heard screaming. I had forgotten to turn on the receiver for the baby monitor again. I am so tired I honestly forget many nights, but I usually wake up and turn it on sometime in the first hour or two. Last night, I could hear her no problem through the entire house. It was blood curdling.

We haven't had a night of crying since July. I put her down, she sleeps. If she wakes for a bottle, she kinda of whines for a few minutes and if I don't respond, she might give a quick wail to make sure I know she's serious. She rarely cries. Often she will grunt/whine a few times and put herself back to sleep. If she really needs to eat, I will feed her and back to sleep she goes. She slept until 10:20 on Saturday morning.

Last night, I found her in her crib just flailing around, screaming. I picked her up and she seemed to calm for a second and then the screaming resumed. It was so scary. I didn't know what to do. After rocking and bouncing and walking, I felt her stomach which seemed tight, so I gave her some of her tummy drops and placed a warmed rice pillow on her stomach. After rocking and shushing and some spitting up, she finally drifted back to sleep. But watching this tiny person scream like that was so scary. She couldn't tell me what was wrong or where it hurt. I didn't know if it was an emergency or just gas. She wasn't feverish but that was about all I could really check.

I was very proud of myself when my mommy instincts were right and she went back to sleep, but the fear I had for her was so palpable. All I wanted to do was hold and comfort her. I was pretty proud of myself for not panicking even though the crying lasted an hour, and I figured out what to do. I felt terrified and helpless then empowered. Being a parent is so much guessing and flying by the seat of your pants. Several times though I really wished Chad was home. Having someone else to share ideas and concerns can make you feel so less alone. I had no idea what I needed to do. It was so bad I considered the ER. If it hadn't gotten better when it did, I would have been the crazy lady in the ER in her nightie!

It was one rough night in months, but it does serve to remind me that this little life is still so delicately balanced and I need to be informed and ready for anything. Parenting is like one continuous minefield and even when you're getting it mostly right, someone will come along and tell you all the ways you're doing it wrong. Not sure which is scarier, worrying about being a great parent or all the people who don't. Mmm - now, that is scary.