Life Is But A Drink

Last week, I shared how we had to lay the gauntlet down with our daughter recently in order to preserve our own sanity (see here).  Today, we shift to my son in this second installment about being mean.

The other day, we got an email from my son’s kindergarten teacher.  Yes, an email.  From the teacher.  If I’ve learned anything in the last 8 months of elementary school, it’s that an email from the teacher is almost never a good thing.

Unfortunately, today, [your son] hit another student in the chest in the hallway bathroom.  When I talked to the two boys, [your son] said he hit him for no reason.  I am not sure where this is coming from, but [your son] knows to keep his hands to himself.  If you would please speak to him, I would greatly appreciate it.

Now, my son is a sweet kid.  Really.  He’s not violent.  He rarely does anything bad.  He’s almost too good, if there is such a thing. But he’s also a boy and, sometimes, he does stupid things that boys do – like pop his friend in the bathroom for no apparent reason.

Some parents would probably just ignore the situation, chalk it up to boys being boys, and move on.

We are not some parents.

While we recognize that he is a 5 1/2 year old boy and is apt to do things that 5 1/2 year old boys do, we also recognize that he needs to learn that (a) school is not a place where you can pop your friend for no apparent reason; and (b) if you break a rule at school (like the general school rule against popping your friend in the bathroom for no apparent reason) and your teacher has to send Mom and Dad an email, there are going to be consequences.  Dreaded consequences.

So, we sat down with him that night and grilled him.  Why did he hit his friend?  Why did he think it was ok to hit his friend?  Didn’t he realize it was totally not cool to hit his friend at school?  We told him we were disappointed in him and that we didn’t like getting emails from his teacher, telling us that he had done something bad.  Because he was better than that.  We knew, he knew it – the end.

And then we told him that we’d discussed it and agreed upon a punishment of no television or videos through the end of the week.  And he could only watch television or videos again when the weekend came IF he did not get in a lick of trouble for the rest of the week at school.  He cried a little, mostly I think because he was upset that we were disappointed in him (that really gets him) and perhaps slightly because he was sad about his punishment.

That first night, he didn’t really feel the pinch of his punishment since there wasn’t any time for television watching anyway.  But, the second night, at around 8:00, I put a video on for my daughter and told my son he either had to go up to his room or down to the basement to play by himself while his sister watched her show.  He didn’t fight me, and headed upstairs to play by himself in his room.

As the show was wrapping up down in the family room, I could hear him crying at the top of the stairs.

What’s wrong, kid-o?

I’m bored up here playing all by myself.

Yes, well, I understand that but this is your punishment because you hit your friend at school, remember?

I know, but I’m bored.

Well, next time maybe you’ll think twice about hitting your friend.

Yes, I said that.

It’s like straight out of the script of disappointed parent.  I play the part well, I’ve learned.  All those years of high school drama, I suppose.

I felt bad, but I also felt a little relieved that the punishment was making an impact.  There’s nothing worse than handing down a punishment and having it roll of your kid’s back like it’s no big deal.  You want it to sting a little.

The good news is that he didn’t get in trouble for the rest of the week, and he got to watch a video on Friday night.  And I think he’s learned his lesson about popping friends at school. For now, at least.

Sometimes, it’s hard to be a parent.  And sometimes it’s particularly hard to be a good parent.

My daughter is 3 1/2.  And, as I’ve mentioned before, she’s a determined little one.  She always has been. She popped out knowing what she wanted and when she wanted it.  In some respects, we admire that about her.  That sort of determination is going to take her far, we’re sure.

Recently, though, it started to get a bit out of control.  There were loads of temper tantrums and too much crying and far too many demands.  It was draining.  Exhausting.  Frustrating.  And my husband and I were literally at our wit’s end.  It had long ago stopped being even slightly amusing.

Even our 5 1/2 year old son was frustrated.   And his frustration boiled over at our “lovely” Easter brunch (see here) where my daughter made all of us mildly miserable.  My son spent much of the brunch with his head in his hands, overwhelmed with the fact that his sister was “ruining it”.  When the 5 1/2 year old can’t take it anymore, you know you’ve got to do something.

An intervention was needed.

My husband and I sat down and we talked it out and came up with a game plan.  We decided to be straight with her, and tell her she was acting out too much and that it needed to stop.  We explained to her that we were going to ignore her if she started making demands of us and would continue to ignore her until she asked us nicely.  We told her that if she ever started to act unreasonably (irrational tears, temper tantrums, general rudeness), she would immediately be sent to her room by herself or would end up losing some privilege.  We told her in no uncertain terms that, if she acted badly, we were going to be mean.  And she seemed to get what we were telling her.

And, by golly, we stuck to our guns.  We flat out ignored her when she demanded milk at the breakfast table.  We sent her to her room the moment she started to cry and throw herself on the floor because she couldn’t find the marker she wanted to color her princess.  There was no negotiation or attempt at talking her down from the ledge.  And there was no giving in, even when she would stand in the doorway with tears streaming down her face and announce loudly to anyone within earshot that her mom and dad didn’t love her anymore.  

And we took away privileges if she couldn’t get herself back under control.  She missed a gymnastics class.  She didn’t get to listen to music in the car on the way to preschool.  One day, when she threw a temper tantrum about the coat that I had picked out for her to wear (“I don’t want that puffy pink coat!  I want a different coat!”), I sent her off to preschool in the freezing cold without any coat at all.  We were vigilant.  And we were mean.

{Of course, we weren’t mean all the time.  Only when she was acting like a lunatic.  When she wasn’t being crazy, we were our normal, loving selves.  We played with her.  We hugged her.  We told her we loved her.  I don’t know why I feel the need to clarify that, but I do.  I just want make sure you understand that we weren’t jerks to her 24 hours each day.}

It was extremely difficult for the first few days.  Because we’re not mean people.  And we definitely don’t like being mean to our daughter.  She spent a lot of time being ignored or in her room, crying by herself.  She quickly learned that we meant business.

By the end of the week, though, it was over.  She was an entirely different child.  The irrational tears essentially stopped.  There were no more over-the-top temper tantrums. When she wanted something, she’d ask and she’d ask nicely.   I’m not kidding you.  It was like a miracle.

It’s been nearly a month now, and all is still going very well.  Every once in awhile, she slips back into her old ways but it’s rather short-lived and, most times, she quickly self-corrects.   She clearly remembers that it’s not fun to hang out in her room by herself and doesn’t want us to go down that path again.

I think the most amazing thing about all of this is that she is so much happier now than she was a couple of months ago in the midst of all of this craziness.  She laughs and seems to be enjoying life so much more than she was before.  It seems like her acting out was actually stressing herself out, too, and now that she knows her boundaries and recognizes the consequences for crossing them, she’s more comfortable and less stressed.  We thought we were doing this for ourselves and our own sanity, but it appears that it was somewhat about her and her mental health, too.  Imagine that.

Here’s to being mean.

So far, in this child-rearing life of ours, we’ve been lucky that my busy weeks and my husband’s busy weeks have steered clear of each other.  He’s been able to pick up the slack for me and then I’ve been able to pick up the slack for him.

But, then last week, it happened.  We both had busy weeks.

I was going to be running around like a chicken with my head cut off to 18,000 meetings and events in the course of 4 days.  And he was scheduled to be in Disney World with 80 of his students.

We didn’t really know what to do.  We just knew society wouldn’t look too kindly on us leaving our two small children in the care of a couple of cats and a Labradoodle.

And then my husband suggested that he take the kids with him to Disney World.  Would it be easy to be both a dad and a chaperone?  Heck no.  Would the kids have a blast?  Heck  yea.  Was it our only choice?  Pretty much so.

So, my husband and the kids left on a bus filled with high school kids to Disney World on Wednesday night.  I barely noticed they were gone (remember headless chicken?) until Saturday morning when THIS happened:

Yes, I SLEPT IN until 9:34.  NINE.  THIRTY.  FOUR.  Now, this is momentous.  Unrivaled.  Amazingly amazing.  I can’t even begin to tell you how fabulous this was.  I think I was 23 years old the last time I slept in until 9:34.

And, damn, it felt good.

I showered and got dressed.  And because I was feeling so rested (9:34!), I took the dog on a two-hour walk.  We started walking and we just kept walking.  Usually, our walks are rushed and squeezed in between other activities.  On Saturday, I had no place to be and nothing I HAD to do.  So, we walked.

We capped off the walk with a trip to Starbucks.  We sat outside together while I enjoyed my Grande Soy Caramel Macchiatto (yum!) and acted all leisurely-like.  And that dog o’ mine got lots of compliments.  He’s kind of a rock star when we take him out in public like that.  People are just drawn to him.  I’m convinced he has super powers of some sort.  There’s no other explanation.  I mean, he’s a dog… who slobbers and does all those other things that dogs do.

After we got back from our mega-walk, I spent far too long trying to redeem a couple of American Express reward cards that I got from work.  The little pamphlet that came with the rewards cards said that I could redeem them at Talbot’s (online or in-the-store, how convenient) and I’d recently fallen in love with this particularly magnificent dress at Talbot’s and decided that I was going to redeem these fancy cards so I could own this particularly magnificent dress.

But then the online system rejected my cards (of course).  And then I chatted on the phone with a lovely lady at the online ordering service at Talbot’s who explained to me that, despite the fact that the pamphlet said I could redeem them online, I couldn’t and I would have to go to a store.  So, I got in my car and drove to a store because, at this point, I was determined to own this particularly magnificent dress no matter what.  But then (of course) they didn’t have my size and when I asked the equally lovely saleslady if I could order it, she proceeded to put me on the red Talbot’s bat phone with, yes, the online ordering service which reiterated that I could not use my rewards cards with them.  We finally figured out that I could use my rewards cards to buy gift certificates and then I could use my gift certificates to buy the dress through the online ordering service.  Complicated much?  At the end of the day, mission accomplished.  But, it took far too long to order the stupid dress. And it also took far too long for me to tell you the story about ordering the stupid dress.  Sorry.

By the way, the Talbot’s red bat phone?  Nice idea in practice, but really lame in reality.  Loud and muffled.  It felt so 1980′s.  And not in a cool retro way.

My long walk in the morning with Eco was great, but it left me with blisters on my heels because my tennis shoes are about 8 years old.  You think I’ m kidding, but I’m not.  They’ve been basically horrific to wear over the last year or so.  No support.  And the insides are literally disintegrating and rubbing against my feet in places that they are not supposed to rub.  Hence, the blisters.  I partly blame them for my declining workout regimen.  (Excuse!)  Because who wants to work out in shoes that hurt your feet.  (Excuse!  Excuse!)  So, I hit DSW and bought myself some new tennis shoes.  (By the way, I’m not generally a big fan of neon, but I have to admit I dig a neon tennis shoe.)

On the way home from DSW, I stopped at the nursery and bought about 18 million flowers.  And then I worked in the yard and planted all 18 million of them.  This photo isn’t of any of the 18 million flowers I planted, but of the tree in our front yard that has bloomed.  It is so pretty and smells so good, so I snapped a photo of it for posterity.  It’s times like these when I wish I had scratch-and-sniff photos on this here blog.

After my work in the yard, I sat on the back deck and drank a little bottle of something pink and alcoholic and played on my iPad. Without interruption.  For an hour.  Did you catch that?  An hour?  Ahhhhh…. I know.  I get giddy just talking about it.

Then, it was dinner time.  I got takeout from the teriyaki place up the street which I love, but for which no one else in my family seems to share my enthusiasm.  And, then I watched a silly romantic comedy on HBO On Demand and painted my nails an outrageous mint green color (Mint Candy Apple from Essie) because it seemed like the thing to do while you watched a silly romantic comedy by yourself on a Saturday night.

And then, well, I went to bed.

I woke up on Sunday morning seriously anxious for my hubby and kids to come home.  Don’t get me wrong.  I enjoyed my day in my parallel kid-less universe, but – at the end of the day – it was mildly lonely and not nearly as rewarding as those crazy Saturdays spent running around to gymnastics and Tae Kwon Do and piano lessons.  Seriously.