Forecast Crazy

Several people talked to or e-mailed me about my last post. Turns out that more parents go crazy than I originally thought. In fact, almost everyone I know. Which leads me to question why so few people talk openly about it. It might just be a perception, but I get the feeling some people put family explosions on par with talking about nose hair and toe-nail trimming. Too private, too yucky, too personal. We all just pretend it doesn't exist, that it never happens, that we're above it, that our nose hair stays perfectly and inoffensively in bounds. That our kids don't make us nuts....

I see this dynamic mostly at school in the morning. You might see a heaving sigh from a parent arriving late to school, kids grumpy in tow - the climax to an inevitably rocky morning. Or the faint admission that some kid was a wanker in the wee hours the night before. Or a gorgeous eye roll over some kid's whine..... but it's all very cursory, ephemeral - like the whisper from someone walking away in the wind. Then everyone goes away and gets on with life. The moment passes, gone, like it never happened. Except that the feelings don't really go away, the shame doesn't go anywhere. And there's always more to the story than the parties will admit to. I feel like we're all leading secret lives of shame with our parenting, sharing only what will not be too harshly judged. We carefully craft the perceptions of others. Not unusual; appearing to our best advantage has some serious evolutionary underpinnings. But with parenting, with kids, we're all losing it, some more than others, and yet the "perception management" persists. I'm not sure why it's nearly impossible to admit that parenting is so difficult, so interminably insufferable on certain days, but it seems to be.

Could be that parenting, like nose hair maintenance, falls under the same quaint notions of Victorian idealism. Present the coiffed, corseted, effortlessly perfect person; never the work behind it. But it seems that we're all just afraid of judgment, for being who and what we are on any given day, myself included. If it's a monster who says horrible things to your children, let the monster roar. Maybe if we heard more roaring, we'd get used to the sound, find more monsters, form a support group, be less monstrous and relax about the highs and lows of this impossible job. Hope so; at least I can start doing it. Or try.

Where the Wild Thing Is: Shame and Parenting

Last night, I blew up in a big way. So many factors go into a mom melt-down that I can barely parse them out, but if I had to guess, I'd break it down like this: demanding kids - high on sugar, a poor night's sleep all around, a much needed kid-free weekend with mate and (masculine types beware of cooties) a massive dose of PMS. The combination was lethal and I erupted in a hurricane-like rage, blowing down six-year-olds in my wake. I managed to give myself a time-out, but stopped one short of responsible as I continued to shout for several beats through the slammed door at the offending parties.

Hmmmmm. I'm so ashamed when I lose it like this. It only happens when there is a perfect storm of stress - which should give me some hope or perspective. But it doesn't. I'm not an uncontrollable witch all the time to my children. But when I am, I feel like melting into nothing, feel like I've harmed them, broken them in ways that they'll always remember; if not consciously, then somewhere deep down, where the ego lives and absorbs all the shock waves of early emotional experience.

Nobody really talks about the shame in parenting, the guilt you feel when the well of patience is dry and the buckets keep on coming and you start to get really pissed off at the buckets. I wonder if other people feel as much shame as I do. I know that Chris does, that we both grapple with the tiny people, their demands, our needs, the balance of life. But how to prevent the episodes that inevitably lead to shame is a problem I have yet to solve. No matter how much you think about doing things differently, changing the triggers, avoiding sugar, taking time for myself, spending quality time with the kids, some times, the hurricane comes anyway. You can be having the best of days, then realize that your head hurts from solving too many sibling conflicts or that you're tired of cleaning up the same mess for the fifth time.

I always apologize to Harper when I blow-up, but apologies never make me feel any better and I doubt they make her feel any better either. In fact, the relative emotional uselessness of an apology only serves to augment my shame, as if I'm trying to absolve myself for sins that cannot be withdrawn. Every night, I check the girls before I go to bed, cover them, kiss them and whisper how much I love them as they lay so still and so beautiful. But on rocky nights, when I look at their perfect forms, their quiet, I feel even more sad about the bits of happiness that should still be with them that day.

What I worry about most is that Harper will probably be the same. The style that we have - mostly patient, adoring love, accented by blow-ups is the way I grew up. I wanted things to be different for her, but we always bring what we know. Maybe with more enlightenment, more knowledge or maturity, but the past always seems to creep in even with the most mindful barriers in place. On the bad days, I wish, just a little, that I 'd never seen so many storms when I was young.

Picking Up the Pieces of My Life - A Disjointed Rant

I've reached that rare parenting moment, or in my case several days, where almost everything my kids do makes me heave big sighs, roll my eyes, and hold back my vitriol. They're just annoying the hell out out of me lately and I can't tell you why. I take full responsibility for my mood, oscillating between irritable and barely congenial. But even with my questionable tolerance level, the kids seem to be in their own zone of button pushing. And the three of us are playing a game of "annoying tennis". They serve, I volley, we rally and then one of us loses the point.

For instance - night before last, Rose woke up at 3AM and demanded to watch a movie. With sweet sleepiness, Chris told her she was a whack job, kissed her and put her back to bed. When she tried the same stunt an hour later, I didn't open the door; I firmly told her to get her hiney back to bed. When she pressed, I all but yelled in a half-sleep. Rosie shuffled back to her bed and waited patiently to make her demands in the light of day.

Last night, she was up until 10:45. No, she didn't drink any coffee.....to my knowledge. After several bed checks and hours of cajoling, I found her in the closet playing with her truck. When I asked her why she wasn't in bed, she told me plainly that she'd found her truck and was playing with it. Perfectly reasonable at two, I guess. She finally fell asleep at 11:30.

Throughout this week, she's been obsessed with the bathroom sink. Brushing her teeth, washing her hands, and getting water "to drink" have caused the following results:

1) Three head injuries......minor
2) Eight bath and nine face towels used for clean-up
3) Seven time outs

And then the big sister; Harper's been up to her usual tricks - not listening....at all and even less after she's eaten "healthy" cereal from Trader Joes, taking an hour for one small task and engaging in the mother of all annoyances, talking in baby talk. My Dad hated baby talk, was quick to correct any "baby" transgressions and relentless in his criticism. Like most everything else, my parents and their lessons, intentional or not, creep into my parenting. Mea culpa on the cereal - I didn't try it before I gave it to her, but still....eighteen requests for teeth brushing would tire the most patient of mums. And the baby talk. I might be even less tolerant than my Dad; I try to correct her gently and reserve the criticism for myself.

But perhaps the most annoying part of this week has been picking up. Yes, it must be my mood, because I pick this stuff up everyday. But this week, my normal duties have become intolerable. This is a picture of the things underneath my dining room table this morning - the result of three hours of play. The rest of the house was equally junked, but this is a small sample.


Look closely and you'll see a Hello Kitty ice pack, a pair of Harper's underpants (clean) that Rosie decided to try on because she's a big girl, a tupperware container used earlier in the evening for crackers (cracker crumbs not pictured), an empty tape dispenser, Harper's turkey art which Rose drew on, crushed and stepped on (Harper hit her sister in retaliation, Rose fired back and they both got time outs), and several bits of art detritus.

I don't know. Being a stay-at-home mom means that you have to pick up the same stuff over and over again. It's the job, but that doesn't mean that I have to like it. And this week, I don't; I really don't like the stuff I have to do over and over again. And raising kids, like picking stuff up off the floor is and "over and over again" proposition. For now, I'll keep doing it and wait for an ounce of perspective. Because right now, I've got nothing - nothing but big sighs and momentary distaste for my chosen occupation.