Have you ever thought about how utterly unique and crazy the relationship of mom and child is? No disrespect intended of course-there's a serious side of the question, but think about it: how would it ever be ok for a stranger to come up to you and hand you some trash they found on the ground, or sneeze in your face, or need a hug, or need help going to the bathroom, or throw things at your head, etc. but if they're your kid-it's totally acceptable/even expected, no questions asked. I was just thinking the other day about how funny it would be if Studio C did a skit that showed how ridiculous it is-the things we moms go through-and to highlight the utter nonsense of it by replacing the kid with a random person on the street/in the store etc.
I feel like it's safe to say that I have a toddler, and that the "terrible 2s" aren't age specific. Don't get me wrong, in general Jake is great etc, but I'm DEF seeing more of a personality/opinion coming out now a days. I feel like he's bipolar. He's either really happy/laughing/smiling or scrunching his face up in a grimace and fake crying/whining. Now I know why they call it the terrible 2's-not just cause the kid is frustrated/resisting everything and has sooo much energy trapped inside a tiny body etc, but it's a stage that is so hard cause they can't really communicate with you very well and you can't reason with them-there's this disconnect.
I mean, don't get me wrong, even tho Jake isn't talking a lot yet-he understands A LOT. He folds his arms when asked and says "Ameh" at the end of prayers, We tell him to sit down and he does, He knows what and where his chair is in the kitchen, we can ask him to put his shoes away and he takes them to the basket by the back door no problem, can identify some animals by sight/point to them, find things you ask him for (balls, blankets, sippy, books-we can tell him specific titles and he'll go find the one book from all the rest, etc). He understands A LOT but he can be SO irrational sometimes in his reactions to things. And I never know what is going to set him off. Sometimes he's his normal chill self and other times he's enraged over silly things.
He also is discovering/experimenting with the FULL range of his voice, and when I say full I mean full. My ears ring sometimes after his screeches/screams-code and I can't even hear each other, and he's not even mad/upset, he's just playing with his voice I guess, and the minute you say no or don't he does it more. Now of course if he were old enough to understand why that volume is NOT ok for inside, it would be easily fixed-he'd go outside until he could be the proper volume (I am auditorial-y sensitive and I will NOT have one of those households where all the kids are running/screaming/you can't hear yourself think), but he's 18 mo old and doesn't know better.
It helps tho to put myself in his shoes. For example, I'm trying to make dinner earlier tonight and had given him some green beans to nibble on cause I knew it'd tie him over, but eventually he was wandering the kitchen whining/fake crying like normal. I was seconds away from getting frustrated when the thought occurred: he misses you/your attention. So I stopped and asked do you want a hug? and sure enough he ran into my arms. Now did this mean he was happy and content for the rest of the dinner prep time? no, he went back to whining as soon as I had to put him down cause the sauce was boiling, but it helped put things in perspective for me. I kept repeating the lyrics to that cheesy country song over and over in my head about how "you're going to miss this, you're going to want this back, you're going to wish these days hadn't flown by so fast" to try and keep perspective. I want to see this time for the novel/unique time that it is, this rare and fleeting stage that Jake is in.
My mommy win of the day? Not caring that Jake spit out some of his dinner on the floor cause I hadn't bothered to mop it earlier. Mommy win. Hey, we gotta take every win we can get, and there really are a lot of them :)
In hind sight I see why it took him so long to fall asleep tonight (was babbling in his bed for 2 hrs after we put him down -he was wired, and we thought we could tire him out haha
I am the same way about loud, crazy noises. It would drive me crazy when you kids were younger and were screaming, yelling or fighting with each other. It seriously made me feel like my head was about to explode! Hah! That's why I was always reminding everyone, "You need to use your inside voice!" Now when your Dad is going nuts during a BYU football or basketball game I tell him if you are going to keep yelling like that I'm going to have to leave the room!
ReplyDelete