Thursday, December 12, 2013

So we put the Christmas tree up. Because, for a brief moment, I forgot that I have an eight month old and a two year old. A two year old who is currently standing on the table fighingt his chicken nuggets. Go ahead and judge me. I'm too busy judging Mac's dance moves. He wants to know if I would give him "fives." I guess so. I've kept him in swimming and soccer as much as possible because the boy needs to burn all his excess energy. It had not occurred to my to turn dance music on. This could actually work well for me.

X-Man is having a ball with the Christmas tree. And by ball I mean taking the glass ball ornaments off the tree. And throwing them on the hardwood floor. And then crying when they break. He convinced that it's an evil trick on my part and that if he just throws the right one it will not break. Yeah.

I've made it clear that X-Man and I are at an impasse as to how he should behave when his wishes are thwarted. And when it comes to the Christmas tree, what we have is a failure to communicate. Actually, we communicate just fine, it's that neither one of us wants to hear what the other is saying. X-Man clearly is sick of hearing "DON'T TOUCH THE TREE!" And I'm tired of hearing "MY MISMIS!"

He has the same reaction to me saying no in these circumstances as any other circumstance. He tries to hit me. Now, we've tried time outs, we've tried mommy holding his hands, we've tried gentle redirection, we've tried standing in the corner, we've tried yelling "You don't hit Mommy!" I'm bowling zero right now. And pretty much every time I go, but that's a different tale of woe.

So, I tried a new tactic, the duck and weave. He tried to hit, I jumped backwards. He looked doubly annoyed. Which is odd, since I'm the adult here and he's the temper tantruming toddler. He flailed away again, I dodged again. Greater rage, accentuated with a slight shriek of anger. I was hoping to distract him out of his tantrum and thought I could get him to chase me. He took one look at me scurrying away and collapsed in front of the Christmas tree wailing. Full on child prostrate on the floor, head in hands, big old tears pooling on the hardwood.

Cinco has been taking notes and often does the exact opposite of X-Man. Whereas X-Man's default reaction is weeping, wailing and ragey, Cinco just laughs. Crawling away from mommy during a poopy diaper change. cue the maniacal laughter. Pull the empty hamper down, crawl in it and get stuck and scream, first in rage and then decide it's funny. Because an empty hamper in this house is really that funny an oddity. Pull yourself up into a standing position anywhere in the house, alert mom with your laughter, proudly proclaiming your great strength. Climb up the stairs and get stuck....better not say anything because mom will probably get mad.

So Cinco joined in the fray. Shrieking with laughter from across the room, which drew a reproachful glance from her older brother, she decided that what this needed was some hands on loving from her. So she sped her way across the floor, seriously this child hauls diaper like no one before her, and went to comfort the poor abused X-Man. And by comfort, I mean crawl onto his back and pull his hair. I figured he had it coming. Somehow not being able to hit his mother is life ending, but his baby sister mauling him, well that's hilarious. "Mama, baby silly." Yeah, she's not the only one son.

I'd continue on the odd behavior of my children, but I think the father figure is annoyed with me. I asked him to watch Cinco while I wrote this. I only roped him into it after she helpfully unplugged my computer, attempted to eat the cord and then deleted half a page of my work. Apparently having to watch his offspring is off putting to the father figure because he's retaliating by trying to get Cinco to walk. They are all conspiring against me.































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