Single Mom-ing It

So my hubby brought to my attention that I haven’t done anything recently with my blog.  I’ve been trying to come up with something light-hearted and not so serious.

  As most of you know, I’ve been living as a single parent for most of the past 7 or 8 months.  My child has sort of taken this like a roller coaster ride and still isn’t sure some days what to think.  Mommy enjoyed being the one that only had to be mean on rare occasions and now mommy has to be mean more often.  Mimi has also taken up the responsibility of being “mean” and Anabeth is even more unsure of that.  See, my child truly is a great child…most of the time.  She’s been at her school since January and in that time; they’ve yet to see her bad side.  Most of our friends and family don’t believe she has a bad side because she’s so well behaved in front of others.  While I appreciate that, I wish she would be more like that all the time!  She’s a little genius at just under 3 years old and communicates truly better than some adults I know.  She lets me know when and what she wants to drink, eat, watch, play, etc.  It’s become a nightly ritual to watch a little TV before she goes to bed, but when she’s bad and throws fits, she’s not allowed.  I’ve been bad and given in and told her if she stops or says she’s sorry, she can watch TV. Wow…I just had a flashback.  My mom use to do the same to me.  Anabeth has no true concept of being sorry, but of course will say it if it means getting what she wants.  I did the same thing.  The past couple of weeks, however, I’ve been sticking to what I tell her and let me tell you…it’s hard!  No one ever tells you that being a parent takes you through more emotions than you ever fathomed existed in the world!  She makes me angry, sad, and happy and all within a 5 minute time span! 

  Two nights ago, we went to a friend’s house and when it was about time to go anyway, she informs me she wants to go home so she can watch TV before she goes to bed.  I can’t remember what happened, but getting in the car she got upset about something and began to cry.  I told her she had to stop or she wouldn’t watch TV when we got home.  She proceeded to alternate between crying and screaming at me for the 10 minute ride home.  When I went to get her out of the car, she completely shuts it off and calmly says she wants to watch TV.  I tell her that she can’t watch TV because she decided to cry/scream her way home which results in another “fit”.  I put fit in quotation marks because what my child does seems to go above and beyond what I consider a “fit”!  Keep in mind that I’m suppose to be resting my shoulder for 3 weeks because of severe pain I’ve been in for a while.  I end up having to drag her into the house and she cries while I let the dogs go outside.  I then have to drag her to her room to get her pajamas on and hold her down with one arm while changing her clothes with the other.  After finally getting her changed, she is still insisting she’s going to watch TV.  I tell her again that she’s not watching TV, so she begins beating her closet doors.  When I say beating, think being captured in a dungeon and trying to fight your way out!  I spank her…keep in mind that my spanking would make my dogs think I was lovingly petting them.  She then proceeds to start beating her wall, so I spank her again.  She then collapses on the floor and I grab her to put her in bed.  I leave the room…so I don’t beat her and feel even worse or get arrested…and she screams even louder and opens the door to try and come out.  At this point, she’s jumping up and down, red-faced, running toward me with arms up screaming “Mommy”.  I turn to her and she immediately turns away and makes an unpleasant remark that I can’t recall.  Finally, I tell her that she has one minute to stop or I’m putting her in bed, turning off the light, and leaving.  She looks at me as if to see if I’m serious and finally begins the calm down period.  She tries one last time to tell me she’s watching TV and I tell her she can either get juice and I’ll read her a book, or she can just go to bed.  After about an hour of a “fit”, she concedes that mommy has the best choice and we go get juice, a book, and then she goes to bed. 

 

  After a good night sleep, she comes out of her room as I’m taking the dogs out in the morning.  She looks at me and says, “Mom, I be good today, so I watch TV”.  She didn’t like that she had to go to school first, but managed to hold her temper in control.  When I get her in the car, she looks at me and asks, “Mom, are you going to spank me again?”  I tell her I have no reason to spank her if she behaves.  Then we head to school and as soon as we get there I see the sign and realize I forgot her lunch.  Her school only asks parents to bring lunch one day a month and it’s always the same day, but the battle from the previous night and my shoulder hurting in excruciating pain somehow made me forget to pack her lunch.  I go home, pack her lunch, take it back to school, and get to work only 30 minutes late!  The joys of not only having a child, but having a smart, beautiful, crazy, daughter that’s almost 3 going on 20 and the husband traveling!  Now on Thursday nights, we have to pray for daddy to have a safe trip home and she always asks Jesus to make sure he remembers her surprise.  Anywho, hopefully we’re going to have a peaceful weekend with the in-laws in Jekyll Island and Dear sweet Jesus, please don’t let it rain because that child wants to go to the beach more than a kid wants Santa to come at Christmas time!