Caffeine is required.

Okay.

So...........I know originally I said I was going to keep this blog light and positive and funny, AND I am happy to do this, when I am feeling these things. But, I also feel it's important to make it a fair reflection of The Motherhood.

Today, I am struggling. DS is a high energy, very bright and exhausting child. This morning he was up at 5:45. DH got up with him initially, I took over at 6:30. He's the kind of child who is 0-60MPH from the second his eyes open, to the second they close at night. (Which is sometimes a two hour plus ordeal, but that's an entry for another day.)

I can deal with it. I love him. It's putting me through my paces, and I am fairly confident he will mellow in the next couple of years and we can all look back at how frantic it all was and laugh, tossing our heads triumphantly into the sun of a bright afternoon while we sip lattes and turn appreciative looks of pity unto the young frantic mothers who pass us by, so much like our former selves it endears stranger to stranger.

But right now, today, when I look around all I see is how DS is nothing like the other children in his football class. He is the only one to display such unbridled enthusiasm and zero attention on the activity. He is simultaneously enraptured and torn away from attentiveness, resulting in a flux of in/out/in/out levels of comprehension. Worse still, he has a mean streak, and when he works himself up into a frenzy, he lashes out. Not often, mind you, but any time at all is enough to make me feel like bursting into tears, putting my hand up and declaring that it is I, the young rubbish mum, who brought forth into the world the feral child who just smacked yours. Please accept my apologies. Pass your judgement. Go on, etc.

Of course, I take a deep breath, I catch myself from falling into the pit of despair and I remind myself that he is at a difficult age, all children have different personalities, he will mature, he is kind hearted, and mainly the people around me offer gentle looks of commiseration and support. They toss their shoulders up and shake their heads, smiles creeping across their faces as they do so, as if to say. "Been there."

It is true. We've most of us Been There. When you are there it is quite easy to listen only to the harsh whispers of an ignorant few; those that have never had a small human, or have simply allowed the years to dull memories of the sheer terror of the Been There days. Far too easy to superimpose angry mob faces onto harmless strangers; fellow parents, nobodies, everybodies.

I am going to keep breathing, keep reassuring myself that I am not Rubbish Mum Ruining The Child, and maybe tomorrow we won't be here.

It's getting easier, even as I write.

X

Dinner, Interrupted.

My least favourite times of the day are meal times and sleep times.

So, you can imagine my delight when one went up in flames completely, swiftly followed by the other, careening my entire evening well and truly out of control.

Of course, it was the usual over tired tyrannical toddler thing that happened. Up at 6AM, playing at home, then running around the park with his friends, then swimming on top of it, and zero nap time. I should have seen it coming, really. But he had me fooled. He seems so jovial and put together one second, and then before the plate of food was even fully in front of him it was all, "MOMMY! JUICE! JUIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIICE."

I hand him his juice. 

"NO JUIIIIIIICE!! NO NO NO!!!" 

How could I have been so foolish? The last thing you do is hand them the juice. They don't really want the juice. If anything, the request for the juice is a just a vehicle for their anger. 

I bang my head repeatedly on the dinner table until the warm dark descends upon me. 

Not really that last part.

More screaming and throwing turkey stir fry and kicking and unsuccessful bargaining later - we are hurriedly throwing on pah jay jays and brushing teeth and going to sleep.

At 6:20, I emerged from DS' bedroom triumphant. He was out.

I was safe from his demands, which are as militant as they are nonsensical and contradictory, for now.

X



.

Serenity Now!

I always  knew exactly the kind of mother I was going to be. I knew all the things I was going to do, how to handle every delicate situation and, it has to be said, was very certain how to handle even the dreaded Terrible Twos. I would do it all with grace and composure and I would make it look easy. Then, I would sit down for a brief repose, clutch my pearls, smooth my dress, and perhaps do a spot of light baking to revel in my triumph of the Maternal and Domestic realms.

Then I had a child, and that stuff all hit the fan.

I am not sure there is a way that one can convey to a person who has never had children, or had to look after children, or perhaps (I am told there are even some who) have never met a child the absolute chaotic mess of feelings the little beasts can create in you. However, it is a truth universally acknowledged that a woman in possession of a small child must be in want of a holiday.

I am that woman today. I have abandoned all my high ideals of discussing feelings, and explaining action and consequence and I am just a bundle of nerves which had been tread upon almost to breaking.

But.

It's okay.

That is allowed.

If you're going to try to raise a human being, you need to realize that you are not perfect, you have little more than instinct and personal judgement to guide you, and you will mess up. The best we can hope for is to have a well intentioned syllabus of sorts, and love. Your child will always know they are loved. Similarly, they will certainly know when they are not. Even when you're red in the face from snapping at them, surveying the disaster area that was once your home, and wondering WHY DID I DO THIS TO MYSELF I COULD LITERALLY BE ANYWHERE ELSE RIGHT NOW, they will look at you with their little eyes and communicate something entirely without words.

You are mine. I am yours. I love you forever, okay?

For better or worse, this is the deal that we have struck.

So when I find myself as that big bundle of nerves, I take a couple of deep breaths and I let it wash over and under and away from me, and I continue on. So very little of DS' life is going to revolve around me, I shouldn't resent that all of it does right now. Thus goes my mantra.

Though, I do wish he would heel a little better on his leash...

I was never going to be a mother with a child on a leash, but I never counted on being the mother of a six month old who became adept at scaling the sides of his cot and lunging outwardly, in lieu of sleeping. As he got older, he got bolder, and seemingly less able to appreciate mortal danger. Coincidentally, I became more able to appreciate that much of my motherly role was to keep DS from killing himself.

And that's about the long and short of every day in the Terrible Twos. He's like your drunk friend at the end of the party. You know he should leave, you're tired, he's tired, and he's off his face - so you need to get him home, stop him from insulting people or getting in their way, and hope all the while that he doesn't puke over your new sweater. You just got this sweater, and if he does puke on it, you're just going to kick yourself and think, 'Obviously, Self, this is why we can't have nice things.'

X