My 2 ½ year old is a total and complete control freak. She must have full control over every last detail of every thing lately, down to coming into the room and demanding that I uncross my legs. And if control is not hers? Oh may God have mercy on your soul as she will release the kraken, (her terrible tantrums that have reached mythological proportions). It’s a near constant battle of the wills and a fight for control all day every day in our house that leaves me tired and not a little sad that we’ve spent so much of the day locking horns.

However, in the end, I don’t know what upsets me the most: that she’s in this frustrating control stage, or the fact that she’s currently acting a hell of a lot like me.

Truth is, I see the painful similarity quite clearly, but just in case, Hubby doesn’t miss the chance to squeeze in a “no question whose daughter she is” from time to time for good measure. Of course, this just rubs salt on the wound.

When I was in the pit of despair, the lowest point in my life, people crossed my path and gave me knowledge, advice and direction I desperately needed at the time. One of those people was a healer of sorts and she told me that I attract what I put out there. Put out love, get love. Put out anger, get anger. And so on. She also talked about how those people were my mirror.

I don’t know how much you can associate a 2 year old’s insistence on exploring her own independence on me attracting someone into my life to be a mirror on myself, but the prospect is rather disturbing. Perhaps it simply stems from another piece of wisdom this woman shared, “what bothers you the most about the people that irritate you is the fact that they have the traits you most dislike about yourself.”

Perhaps the truth lies in there. I’m a control freak, no doubt about it. I like things the way I like them. I have an eye for what I want and a clear vision of how things need to be. God help you if you just can’t do it my way. Maybe it comes from years of criticism and thus my neverending quest to be perfect to keep the criticism away. Sadly, I can be rather critical and short on patience when things aren’t going how I want, and I simple loath that about myself. Make no mistake, though. I’m a perfectionist and a control freak. Just like my daughter.

People who aren’t parents or don’t work with children may believe to some extent that the parent-child relationship is mainly about the parent teaching the child. How far from the truth. There is so much we can learn from them if we have the ability to silence ourselves long enough. Seeing things through their eyes, experiencing innocence again through them, and, my biggy, seeing your own short comings in how they choose to express themselves can alone be some of the biggest lessons a child can teach an adult.

So, for me, that little control freak who seems to get a demonic amount of pleasure out of testing my every last limit and nerve is in fact showing me I need to learn how to relinquish some control from time to time and find a better balance. Perhaps by learning to do that now I can in return teach her that valuable lesson through my own actions, saving her the agony of becoming a life long control freak herself.

Special thanks to Mama Kat’s Writer’s Workshop for this writer’s prompt – What does your child do that reminds you most of yourself? How does it make you feel?

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I try. I really, really do. I think, plan, study, hell I even write here about how to be the best parent I can be. Yet there are days when I just outright fail. And when I decide to fail, there’s no small “oops.” It’s an all out trip over your own two feet right in front of the guy you’ve had a crush on the first three months of the sixth grade school year and do a full on face plant, complete with carpet burn on your cheek and suffer the humiliation of him walking up to you and asking if your OK kind of failure (not that I harbor a photographic memory of all my failures or anything).

Today sweetness was at her daycare all day. She came in with Daddy (I drop her off, Daddy picks her up) and announced she had “fun at Kelli’s house.” She was in a great little mood. She played with Mr. Man and me as Daddy made dinner. She didn’t put up a fight when I mentioned she needed a diaper change. She was no harder than usual to get to wash her hands for dinner and she ate a big supper. We played after dinner for about 30 minutes, and she got both a five minute and a two minute warning that it was about time to get washed, brush teeth and head to bed. She even started talking to her car she was playing with, telling it “two more minutes until bed time.” But when it came time, Daddy swooped in to take her off to get undress and she came unglued without warning. She screamed bloody murder through getting undressed and while in the bathroom. I could hear Daddy trying to say funny things, talking in a calm voice to her, doing every thing he could to distract her. Finally, I knew he was reaching the end of his rope so I offered to help.

I tried talking to her. She was screaming “I want car!!” I told her I understood she wanted her car, but it was time to wash up for bed. She can play with her car tomorrow. She refused to let me wash her, ripping the washcloth from my hands. She threw the toothbrush across the bathroom. She was already half washed so I told her we had to finish washing and as I quickly tried to finish, she cranked it up yet another octave. I carried her to her room where she kicked me several times as I tried to put her down.

I could tell she was cold and tried to talk her into getting into her diaper and jammies, but she just screamed louder and louder. I tried to force on a diaper, and that was a total disaster that lead to even louder screams. Finally I could tell my blood was about to boil so I just walked out and shut the door. The screaming continued and she started beating on the door. When I went back in about three minutes later she took me to the diaper drawer and picked out a diaper. She let me put it on as she cried. When I reached for the pajamas she started screaming again, so I walked out again. When I returned the second time she allowed me to put on the pajamas and get her tucked in. She wanted me to snuggle and sing to her, but she kept alternating from sniffling and flailing and screaming until she finally wore herself out.

Now that I’ve had an hour to calm myself down (it’s so hard not to take the screaming, flailing and kicking personally), I can point out about 8,000 things I did wrong. It’s so easy to sit back and read about what you’re supposed to do, or write about it. But in the heat of the moment, it’s almost impossible to remember if you haven’t built it into a habit yet. A part of me thinks I should have just given her the car and that would have calmed her down for a bit, at least enough to finish getting washed and brush her teeth. I got into a power struggle, and a parent will ALWAYS lose the power struggle. Even if you win by not giving in (I didn’t give her the car), I lost by having 30 minutes of screaming and a really upset little girl. Another part of me wonders if I keep giving her what she wants when she gets like this, where will it end. She must learn some level of limits. Nine times out of 10 getting her to wash hands before a meal is a long, drawn out process of mind games and tears. I don’t give in on my rule. And she doesn’t give in on trying to get away with not washing hands. It’s so tiring.

But tonight I should have noticed she’d been gone all day, most likely holding in little hurts, and when she got home she just needed to let it out. It very likely had nothing at all to do with the car and everything to do with her cup of hurts overflowing. And I only made it worse by pushing through it with the nightly routine and not giving her license to just let it all out. I realized this toward the end and tried to talk to her about it with “Wow, you’re really upset. Let out the hurt so it feels better. It’s ok to let out all that hurt.” I think at that point she was so far gone I could have told her we were going to Disneyland and it wouldn’t have made a dent (even if she knew and cared what that place was).

I also failed by walking out. I literally abandoned her, sending the message that she’s not worth being around when she’s upset. She really poured on the desire to get me to show I loved her each time I showed back up. She tried to be cooperative even thought she hadn’t gotten all the hurt feelings out yet, solely because she wanted reassurance I loved her still. The poor little thing. I suck so bad it isn’t even funny. I think I feel the worst about that. What could I have done? Well, I need a break from the screaming so I should have told her that “Mommy needs a break. You let me know when you’re ready to get dressed and I’ll come help you. I love you,” then walked out and left the door open. I know she’d have followed me screaming and crying. I did at one point try to hold her and tell her I love her and to let it out, but again, she was too far gone to listen. My actions were what spoke at that point.

Ahh, 20-20 hindsight is a wonderful gift, isn’t it? So I stayed with her in her bed a bit, singing her our little song I’ve sung to her since the day after she was born, over and over at her request. I might not have been much help and made the tantrum worse earlier, but the least I could do was reconnect with some special time. Maybe I should start putting money away for her therapy now, at least to help her out a bit since it’s my fault she’ll need it.

Thank you for subscribing to my RSS feed at Heligirl: Positive Discipline Mommy! I would love to hear your comments and feedback on Feeling Like a Failure. If you have a blog yourself, I'd love to check it out and possibly even link to it here!
Thanks for reading! Heligirl: Positive Discipline Mommy

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Tantrums are often the result of a culmination of hurts that finally run over.

Have you ever had one of those days when the seemly smallest little thing suddenly turns your little cherub into passionate flailing, boneless, and red-faced inconsolable terror? There’s an explanation that really makes handling these episodes much easier, if only from an understanding perspective.

Pam Leo in her book Connection Parenting talks about tantrums in such a clear and concise way that it’s hard to misunderstand how some of these little (or in my case, hurricane force) storms seem to come without much warning.

Think of the child having a cup to store all of the day’s emotional hurts, Leo says. Every time the child feels hurt, another drop goes into the cup.  Then, that last drop, no matter how small, runs the cup over and the child needs to have emotional release of all the hurts. It’s important to understand they MUST have that release, otherwise these hurts are stored up and remain unhealed. Helping them to learn to safely express and then heal from emotional hurts is a big part of our job as parents and goes a long way toward helping build strong self esteem.

Sweetness, for instance, could be let down that she didn’t get the cereal she wanted for breakfast because we were out, then had to endure her brother playing with her car until he was finished, had to wear a hat outside even though she didn’t want to, wasn’t allowed to watch TV when she asked (even though she knew she wouldn’t), and wanted to go to the playground, but couldn’t because it was pouring outside. Then when Mommy suggest an art project and got everything ready, Sweetness had a complete and total meltdown because Mommy handed her a paintbrush, rather than letting her choose one herself.

At this point it’s so easy for the parent to lose it too and proclaim something like “there’s nothing to be upset about,” “do you need a time out?”, “so you don’t want to play, OK I’ll put it away,” “I’ll give you something to cry about,” etc. All of these things send a message that it’s not OK to express feelings. The response Leo emphasizes focuses on reconnecting with your little one by listening and expressing empathy for not only the little hurt that might have caused the tantrum, but the day’s hurts. Granted, you may not know what they all were. In fact, many little ones store it all up, especially when they’re away from home at school, daycare, at Grandma’s, etc. then let loose when they get home because they feel safe to express feelings at home. Some even go as far to provoke a hurt so they can let loose once they get home. Believe it or not, this is actually a good sign. Your child feels safe with you.

Regardless of what others may say, you can’t stop tantrums from happening. But, as I’ve experienced using Leo’s advice, you can sure reduce them and even shorten their length. In the example with Sweetness, I took her aside where she couldn’t dump the paint or knock over the easel and got down on the floor with her. At that point I talked in a calming voice to her to 1. acknowledge her feelings, 2. assure her they were normal, even if scary (these massive releases are scary to the kids), 3. Help give her a name for what she’s feeling, and most importantly, 4. Listen. “You sure are upset. Those are some big feelings. You wanted to pick out a brush to paint with and it upset you when I offered you one, didn’t it? It’s OK to have these big feelings.” At Sweetness’s age, it is useless to suggest other ways for her to get her anger out when she’s in the middle of a tantrum. We work on that when she’s calm. During the tantrum I can sometimes just rub her back. Other times she doesn’t want me touching her. So I just sit with her and tell her I’m right here and that I love her. When she’s having a real doozie and my talking only makes her scream louder, I tell her it looks like she needs some space to let out her feelings, so I’ll be on the couch, in the kitchen, right over here, what have you. If she’s in her room, I try not to close the door and isolate her. While having some peace helps her, I have to be careful not to send the message that feelings must be let out in isolation and I can’t be bothered with them.

Regardless of how the current tantrum is going, I tell her it’s ok to let the hurt feelings out so she can feel better. That is a concept she understands – butt cream makes the butt feel better (her words!), drinking milk when a bite is too hot makes her mouth feel better, so crying out hurt feelings makes her feel better. Once she gets past the worst part, she’ll sometimes talk to me, saying she was upset over this or that.

Lately, I’ve noticed she’s starting to recognize other hurts released. While a tantrum might have been set off by me not letting her pick a diaper, she’ll say in a post-tantrum sniffle something about baby brother having her truck. This helped me see that Leo was dead on and I am helping my little one by letting her release those hurt feelings then talk them out with me. As she gets older, we’ll talk more after outbursts, but now it’s enough for her to have me just listen, connect and be there.

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There’s a monster in our midst. It is a very ugly beast that challenges everything I thought I knew and struggle to learn. Despite all the classes, books, moms groups and research, I feel like this monster and all it’s relatives are staying just a step ahead of me, threatening to take over and destroy all my hard work. I speak of Sweetness’s now legendary tantrums.

I completely missed posting yesterday due to dealing with two of these nasty, nasty creatures. They come without warning now, when before I could usually see the signs and disarm it before it hit. But in the last week or so they’ve been coming on with such a force and lack of warning that we both struggle to get them under control before we suffer permanent hearing damage.

Yesterday she went into full blown hurricane six when I picked her up at daycare. You’d think she’d want to come home with mommy. She’d just finished snack and art and it was a perfect transition time when I arrived. I asked her if she was ready to go.

“No”

“OK, two minutes and we need to go.” I say, utilizing my education that warnings about a transition are very important at this age. Giving her these have worked so well for us the past 12 months.

Two minutes later: “OK, sweetie. Let’s go home and see daddy and baby brother.”

Enter hurricane six. She immediately starts screaming and throws herself on the floor. My attempts to put her shoes on lead to hear grabbing them from my hands and throwing them across the room barely missing another child. The daycare ladies are in shock. They’ve never seen this from her before. “She’s always so good” they say. She does tend to save up her frustrations until I arrive, that’s true, but usually she’ll wait until after we get home.

Since the other kids are getting ready for nap, one of the daycare ladies carries Sweetness out to the car and puts her in the seat. That’s when she starts arching her back and screaming even louder, if anyone can believe THAT was possible. Nothing I tried could get her strapped it. I need to pick up Mr. Man. The clock is ticking. I look over my shoulder at the daycare, fearing someone there will see me, or even call child protective services. The thought is running through my mind: “Is it a sign of child abuse when the child screams when you arrive? Will I be investigated?” I have to put an elbow on her pelvis, and strong arm her into the child seat restraints then listen to her scream for 15 minutes as we go get her brother. I love her so much and will not compromise on safety, I’m trying to tell her over her screaming.

Luckily by the time we picked up Baby Brother she had herself under control and was chattering away. That happy mood lasted until it was dinner time. Then we went into what has been our nightly routine the past week where she enters this same tantrum about the time we announce “5 minutes until we wash hands for dinner.” She’s had a massive tantrum every night now for more than two week from about the time we prepare to serve dinner until she’s in bed two hours later, regardless of whether she had a nap or not. These tantrums include lots of screaming and throwing herself around while our dinner gets cold, her not eating more than a couple of bites if we’re lucky, a very painful bathing experience where our ears are concerned, and a massive fight to get into her pajamas and bed. Last night she literally ripped the first diaper off herself and we needed to put on another one.

We’ve tried everything we know so far – offer her choices of soap, towels, food, jammies, who washes hands with her, if she helps make dinner with us, transition time warnings, and even “time ins” where I put her in her room and suggest she need a little time to calm down just like mommy does, tell her that I love her, and invite her to come out when she’s ready, then I leave, but the door is open a bit so she can see us and come out when she’s ready.

We’re tired of this to say the least and I feel like I’m walking on pins and needles to try to avoid these outbursts. It was definitely a Friday glass of wine night.

Thank you for subscribing to my RSS feed at Heligirl: Positive Discipline Mommy! I would love to hear your comments and feedback on This Too Shall Pass. If you have a blog yourself, I'd love to check it out and possibly even link to it here!
Thanks for reading! Heligirl: Positive Discipline Mommy

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