“We can listen to music or I can yell at you to stop. Which would you rather?” I said to my kids, exasperated. They were making a shit-ton of noise and I felt like my head was going to explode. Everything was just so damn loud. The music went on – we settled on Rusted Root – and everything settled down. Or at least settled down as much as my incredibly high-energy children will let it.
But this incident was a culmination of a lot of self-exploration.
13
“I saved your life! I should be able to choose for just one day,” my seven year old declared.
He had a point.
“Just let me take care of you!” I yelled at my four year old as I chased him around our beanbag chairs. I was trying to get him to let me put a cold-pack on his forehead, which was rapidly developing quite the goose egg.
“Did you ask if you could splash him? You need to ask first,” I insisted.
“It doesn’t really matter whose fault it actually is, we need to clean it up together,” I said to my kids, talking about some mess or another. I heard those words come out of my mouth as if I actually believed them. But I did really want to believe them.
I am a blame monster. If there’s blame to put on someone – even myself – I am on the case. I used to think that if you could blame someone for a problem, they would learn their lesson and not do it again.
Problem solved, right? Uh, no.
“I’m laughing cause I read that book. She’s 14 now and she’s okay,” a woman commented to me. She gestured at the book in my hand, an advice book about parenting challenging kids. Absorbed in my own thoughts, it took a second to realize she was even talking to me.
The door to my six-year-old’s room burst open and he bounced into the living room. “What do you want to eat for breakfast?” I asked, sitting on the couch.
“I want to make eggs!” he declared.
“Just do the next right thing,” Anna sobs as she pulls herself up rock by rock towards the entrance of the cave she’s stuck in. Watching Frozen II on the big screen, I was too enthralled by her crisis to think about how her song related to me. But later, when I was re-listening to the song with my kids, the power of that message hit me. I choked up a bit as I watched the bouncing ball bop atop the words on the sing-along YouTube video.
I too have sat on the floor and cried “I don’t know what to do.” I too have stared miserably in the distance, incapacitated by the seeming lack of a path forward.
“He said his favorite time of day is when he’s going to bed and gets to talk to mommy for a while,” said the text from my husband, referencing my three year old son.
Kid, why don’t you just stab me in the heart again?