Parenting dilemma #386

Here is one of my latest frustrations with the standard parenting advice. It seems universally accepted that consistency is "the key" to parenting well. Kids need routines, structure and consistent limits. I know this to be true but here is the rub. Consistency is BORING. I get bored, they get bored, we all get bored and then we wake up and they are 18 and what kind of memories do we have? There is no spice in consistency, no fun surprises, no spontaneity. Take dinnertime. I offer milk or water with dinner consistently. Juice is a breakfast option and lunch sometimes includes fun drinks (g rated) depending on where we are so dinner I keep straightforward. But recently we have a night where R is working late and the kids and I are having a leftover dinner in the kitchen and I am feeling kickback, and the kids have been well behaved, and maybe there is a small glass of wine involved, and so, when J cannily asks me if he can have limeade I feel magnanimous and say - what the hey - limeade all around. All is good right? Wrong. Because while most kids might "get" that was a special treat (especially since I said so). 24 hours later I get hit with "Can I have limeade with dinner". And when I calmly, consistently (whoops) say "no" I get a whine and argument of epic proportions that just sucks the life out of me. GRRR. I am so tired of being played by small people who see an opening and try to exploit it. But I am just as tired of being consistent!

If everyone else jumped off the Golden Gate bridge..

Last night J decided we needed a DNA test. He is convinced that we are not his "real" parents since we are "weird" and have so many completely bizarre rules like no dessert on school nights. He feels certain that our unwillingness to grant him his every request (last night's was creating his own e-mail address in the middle of dinner) means we couldn't possibly be his true parents. He is becoming a gifted emotional manipulator, and while he doesn't come out and say "If you loved me you would let me...." it is certainly implied.

And for the first time he is uttering the words that mean the arrival of the social identity.."I just want to be normal like the other kids". He's in THIRD GRADE. I thought I had at least until 6th before I was faced with this argument. According to J the "other kids" have lunchboxes full of candy, go to sleepaway camp on a regular basis, watch American Idol, ride in the front seat and have their own e-mail accounts. These are this week's demands. I am sure next week it will be a cell phone, Red Bull, a 2am curfew and a car.

The 3 R's Reading, Rithmetic and Rebounding

Over the last few weeks R has made the jump from learning to read to being..a reader. We had that magical transformation where it just clicked in. He is reading labels and signs and there is less and less of the slow and painful sound it out method. And he is also really getting a handle on math - mentally adding and subtracting single and double digits. I'd like to think that this was a culmination of the months spent with me on the couch reading Aunt Shana's Scholastic readers pamphlet by pamphlet. But the truth is that Riley's academic growth is a direct byproduct of the NCAA tournament.



R spends his every free waking moment playing imaginary basketball these days on the mini-hoop fastened to the laundry room door. He does his own play by play and color commentary whilst shooting and rebounding ("He's fouled!") The score is kept in live time and 2 digit subtraction is often involved ("and the Warriors lead by 4, 27-23") with brief pauses for finger calculations. Not only does he frequently request that we watch his games but if we miss any PART of them we are regaled with a full game recap. Once the real tournament ended, R developed his own brackets, wrote in his teams and ranked them. He may not be able to read words with the silent "e" yet but he can spot Duke, Memphis State and Marquette at twenty paces. He fights with his dad for the sporting green so that he can read the box scores, and steals his Sports Illustrated magazines to scan for familiar names and interesting headlines. We see a bright future for this child - if not in academia then definitely in sportscasting.

Busy doing nothing

Someone sent me an e-mail this week which started..."I know that you are busy" and it made me stop for a minute. Because my days are somewhat busy and yet - I do NOTHING. The life of a SAHM is like writing in the sand on the beach. Just when you finish your masterpiece (read: get to the bottom of the laundry basket) the tide comes up and completely washes it away. I spend entire days just trying to maintain the status quo so the house looks the exact same at the end of the day as it did when we started the day. I know this isn't exactly a revelation. There are millions of mes doing this every day. But it feels especially salient now that T is in the clingy 9 month old phase. I spend hours a day walking around the house holding her while attempting to finish a project one handed or making lists in my head of projects I would love to tackle. And the irony is that they are projects like "start the taxes", "clean out the linen closet"or "fertilize". Projects that normal people would run screaming from but to me hold great appeal at the moment because they have a beginning, middle and an end. Sometimes I am able to appreciate the sort of poetic beauty of a day spent taking a walk to the park, making healthy snacks that kids gobble up and tucking everyone in bathed, exhausted and content. Today is one of those days when that is just not enough. But I am still "BUSY".

Birthday Blues

Well the blues have been coming on for a while now. I've been telling myself it is hormones, sleep deprivation... anything but admitting that discontent lives within me. Because in a warped way I feel that admitting any level of unhappiness will JINX all of the incredible blessings I have been given and for which I feel grateful at least some of the time. I am embarrassed to wallow in self pity when I sit pretty in my nice suburban home with a husband who has a good job and supports me and with 3 healthy children. I am so lucky.

But.

I am not sure I am really living the life that I was supposed to live. I keep having this nagging feeling that I am letting someone down. And frankly that someone is me. I used to feel smart, and good at things, and full of potential. I didn't know how my life would unfold but in addition to all these gifts I have in my personal life I thought I would be a productive, interesting person in and of myself. And I am not. And at 39 (39?!!) that feels like a failure. I feel like I have squandered a chance, lulled into letting time pass and not capitalizing on the path that was laid out for me. I was given a good education, surrounded by interesting people and I feel paralyzed by lethargy most of the time. I am a person who is OK at almost everything that I have tried and very good at almost nothing. And I am ready to trade that all around OK with just one talent or purpose that makes me feel a little more alive.

Enough wallowing. Boy - if this is 39 I can't wait to see how much narcissistic self-pity I can dredge up for 40.

Hold me close, let me go

My baby girl has had a heck of a month in the development department. She has mastered crawling, pulling up and a sly lean on the elbow that makes her look like she is at the beach reading a magazine. Her petite baby bod is all muscle. I change her diaper and literally envy her the baby 6 pack she has going. She was baby chubby for about a month around 4 months but ever since she started doing her baby crunches and rolling around she is lean and toned. And now when I pick her she does this immediate swivel of her upper body to look out and around the room. Like - "am I missing anything better than mama out here?" So then I think she wants to explore and I put her down but oh nooooo, she wants to be picked up only to swivel around again!! It's that hold me close, let me go dynamic. She wants to be adventurous but only from the safe perch of my arms. I know this is the first of many such moments in our relationship where she will need a firm emotional anchor from which to explore the world, but I am so not ready. I just want her to put her head down on my shoulder and snuggle in. But she has growing and learning to do - and who am I to stop her?

Yes - another plumbing episode at our house - will they never end?

In the past year I have interacted with maybe 7 plumbers and rooter specialists due to our lovely 1950's abode. They seem pretty unflappable and I figure a plumber has seen everything, right? When the shower stopped draining this week I had a feeling it was something beyond Liquid Plumber and called one up to get things going before GG arrived for her visit to find her bathroom in shambles. So he is here for all of 5 minutes and I am nursing T when I hear him hollering "Excuse me - you're going to want to see THIS" in a voice filled with awe and wonder. With babe attachd to boob I creep down the stairs where he is proudly holding a hairball that is literally the size of a small boa constrictor. I mean it was ginormous. Now while I am not surprised given that I feel I've lost 85% of my hair since T was born, it is a wee bit embarrassing to have it all on display in such a grotesque way. "Well - that's what happens when you have a baby" I reply. At that point HE actually looked embarrassed!! That's it - I have not a shred of decorum left in me. I am making fun of my hormonal imbalances with perfect strangers now.