I keep a personal blog, too, so I only come over here to write when I'm thinking about Guard-wife related things. The spring of 2012 was really good for us as a family. We finally got into a groove--the one weekend a month thing wasn't kicking our butts anymore. Then in May, my weekend warrior (MWW) had the opportunity to finish his promotion packet and had to split train his drill weekend in order to take a physical fitness test. While he was there, he was in the wrong place at the wrong time, and was volunteered to work an extra week in May, which coincided with the last weeks of school for me, which created massive amounts of stress.
Which we survived.
And now, as we're heading to the end of July, MWW is spending another non-drill weekend working on Guard stuff (SRP processing), so we're here alone, and I'm thinking about the next five weeks and how crazy things are going to get as MWW prepares for July drill and three weeks of annual training. All of this will occur as I'm gearing up for the new school year and really could use the extra support at home.
But, alas, we will survive.
It's just a little anxiety-inducing, now that the almost 2-year-old Baby Bear is biting, and the 3-year-old Goldilocks is being...a 3-year-old girl. Yesterday, she cried and screamed because she wanted to sleep in her bedroom during naptime, but I had given her a chance and she kept waking Baby Bear up. Finally, she passed out in my bedroom. At bedtime, she was screaming because she didn't want to sleep in her bedroom (but she did).
I'm also coming to a point where I have to put on my own big girl panties in dealing with the kids. They want they want they want. Lots of things. They scream and cry if they don't get them. I completely understand why there are spoiled kids out there, because the tantrums stink, and life in the short-run would be so much easier with less screaming.
But, I'm starting to weigh the long-term effects. What are we teaching our children? That they can have anything/everything they want, any/every time that want it? That's hardly a life lesson.
Here are some specific thoughts.
1. TV -- It's summertime, it's hot, and we're watching more TV than we do during the school year. I'm not proud of that fact, but it is what it is right now (though as I'm typing this, the kids have the couch cushions off and are building castles and trains and boats, taking trips to the beach and the circus, and whatever else their imaginations fancy--it's actually pretty refreshing and gives me hope that I'm not ruining their minds this summer...well, except that they're humming the tune to Elmo's World as they're dragging the cushions around into new formations). I know people who use the "on demand" function of their cable provider to show kids shows when they're wanted. I see some use for this function, but I know that it is overused to proactively eliminate tantrums. Goldilocks frequently is screaming at me that she wants to watch Dora. Well, Dora's not on. Deal with it. I've had opportunity to talk with her about a television schedule, about being patient, about not getting to watch what she wants to watch. And yes, I've had to weather the tantrums. BUT, they are becoming fewer and farther between.
2. FOOD -- We visited my family in Texas a week or so ago, and one night we had my mom's taco salad for dinner. The kids were at first resistant to eating, and my mother suggested that she had something else they could eat. Yeah, that would have made feeding them easier. But guess what? We are not short order cooks. So, we held the line and the kids did eventually eat what was put in front of them, even if they didn't eat a lot of it (more for me!). For my particular brood, I'm not concerned about eating habits because they are generally bottomless pits that will eat most anything. So, if they choose not to eat what is being served for dinner, there is not a menu change. I'm not saying that it's never happened before and won't happen again (I'm human, though I may seem superhuman at times), BUT I am saying that I'm more mindful of not giving in to tantrums, riding it through--isn't it our responsibility to teach our children to respond in appropriate and productive ways to the experience of disappointment?
So, in this trying time with two children at a willful age, the challenge of parenting solo is one that will make my hair go gray, will make me scream and cry myself, but when we survive, it will make us better people--all of us.
