Orange Rhino Challenge, 2 Week Update

Two weeks ago, I committed to trying the Rhino Challenge.

Believe it or not, things have actually been going pretty well.

I've been able to stay in the 0-3 range 90% of the time, with the occasional "oopsie" snap. I think I've had one or two that might be considered the nasty snap, but I was able to calm myself down and redirect before reaching the yell. (Explanation of yells types here)

For me, just decided that "it is not okay" to yell and then vowing to report if I do, seems to be pretty effective. Committing to keep accountable by writing it up in my blog adds that layer of being watched (even if only virtually and only by the 2 or 3 people that actually read this thing), and I would never yell around most people because of the "they would think I was a horrible mom" complex.

What do you do when you don't like a kid?

Yesterday one of my favorite bloggers posted a blog about having a nanny.  And one of the things I thought was interesting about her justification for being a stay-at-home-mom with a nanny is that only in the United States do we have this "my child, my problems" mentality.  Almost everywhere else still lives by the "it takes a village approach."

It got me thinking: As an American, I am very careful about reprimanding other people's children, because you never know when a parent will go ape-shit on you.

"Oh no you didn't just tell my child to stop kicking that kid!"

The next thing I know I'd be in a youtube video titled "Moms get in cat fight at playground."

So what do you do when a little kid is being a jerk?  

Really, at a playground is the easiest place to deal with this situation.  Tell your kid to stay away from the kid that is hitting/pushing/calling names/spitting/acting a fool.  If he doesn't, just leave.  You will most likely never see that little jerk again.

And while all kids can be little jerks once in a while, what do you do when there is a kid you know that is just generally a little jerk most of the time?

If it is a friend's kid, we just stop hanging out with that friend when the kids are involved.

But what do you do when the kid, the one that you see as a negative influence, is a more permanent fixture in your child's life that you can't simply weed out? What do you do if they are in their class at school, or go to the same church, or are on the same tee-ball team, or live on the same block.  Are you going to have them change classes?  Switch churches?  Transfer leagues?  Move!?!?  Even if you would/could do any of those things, in all likelihood, you'd just run into a new, different problem kid there, too.  You can't just keep moving.

And let me interrupt for a second to say that we in no way think our kids are perfect. All you have to do is read my blog to know that I know my kids can be loud and unruly. They can be mean (but usually only to each other).  But #1 we acknowledge our children's imperfections, and we are constantly working on positive reinforcement and constructive discipline to curb these behaviors. But most parents with the kids I can't stand think that their kid wears a halo and poops rainbows.  (You can't fix it if you can't/won't admit there is something wrong.) #2 I don't want them picking up any more bad behaviors while we are trying to correct the ones they already have!

Am I the only one with these dilemmas?  Are other parents facing similar situations?  What do you do???

Or am I just a jerk for thinking little kids can be jerks?

Kindergarten

So, this morning I signed Thing 1 and Thing 2 up for Kindergarten.

First, can I just say I had this little daydream about how perfect our morning would go...  Them dressed cutely in shorts and tshirts, with their hair side swept, and smiling and laughing excitedly about getting to visit their "kindergarten school."

But instead, they were little spawns of Satan. Running around.  Running into glass walls.  Being WAY too loud for a school environment (yes, they spent a lot of time singing a cute song they'd made up, but there is a time and place boys!).  Thing 2 swinging his dog purse around, even after swearing to me that if I let him bring it in that he would not misbehave with it ("Mom, it's not a toy.").  Then throwing said dog purse at each other.  Me trying to fill out gads of paperwork in between "boys stop that" "boys inside voices"  "boys quit throwing" "are you two too little to come to kindergarten?  You aren't acting like big boys right now, maybe you need to stay in preschool with the little kids."  I didn't dare look around to see the looks I must have been receiving as the other parents sat with their single children sitting quietly.

Am I a bad mother that I obviously lose my cool in said situations and just can't seem to control them?  Or am I a good mother because at least I have the good sense to know they are being hellions and am embarrassed about it, instead of being completely oblivious or just shrugging my shoulders and saying "kids will be kids"?

Either way, this mother was relieved when I was finally ready to walk out the door.  But right before I left, their soon-to-be-principle came out and introduced herself (and tried calming the boys down with her calm, hushed tones).  And since she was right there, and since there had not been a place for it on any of the forms,  I asked her about putting Thing 1 and Thing 2 in the same kindergarten class.  To my surprise, she said no, that as a rule, they do not put siblings in the same class.

I was a little shaken by this since Superman and I had discussed wanting to keep them in the same class through Kindergarten at least, but I was too exasperated from dealing with the tornado twins for the last 45 minutes, so I decided just to leave, tell Superman, talk it over, and then decide if we needed to readdress the issue with her.

A little while later I called Superman to #1 say "we must do something about the boys' discipline...I feel like their behavior is getting more wild" (he for the record doesn't think there is a problem, which is a problem for me).  And #2 let him know what the principal said about the two classrooms.

His answer, "Well then we will send them to a different school."  What now?  NO.

First of all, I did all of the research, preparation, and work to get them registered in THIS school.  Second, this is where their neighborhood friends will go.  And third, this is the school where the school bus will take them.  Just WHO does he think will be taking them to this out of zone school every morning?  Not me!!  I'm counting the days until my school drop off duties are over.  I can only take so many morning mornings of yelling "will you just buckle your freaking seatbelts!" while two kids are fighting and/or playing behind me and we are all running late because they were fighting and/or playing when they were supposed to be dressing, eating breakfast, or picking up...I'm going to lose my shit!

This is what I say: I QUIT!  I'm tired.  I have no fight left in me.  My energy will go towards something that affects my day positively, like figuring out how to put the fear of god in my kids (that does not involve spanking them in to submission) so that they will shape up and start behaving in public like children and not orangutans.  If Superman wants to fight the principal...let him do it.  I'll support him, but I am NOT doing the leg work on this one.  And if she still won't back down, he'll have to get over it, because I'm not sending the kids out of zone just because he has dreams of them growing up not only as brothers but best friends attached at the hip, doing everything together, and one day moving off to college and being roommates together.  Then marrying twin sisters and living next door to each other with their red and blue houses and matching SUVs.

Sorry...I'm just feeling stressed and this morning hasn't helped any.

I hate mornings

I hate mornings.  But not for the same reason most people probably hate mornings.

I've always considered myself a morning person.  I'm like my dad in that way.  And it turns out that Thing 1 and Thing 2 follow in our footsteps, because those little guys wake up in amazing moods 99% of the time.  Most mornings, they don't even wake up groggy.  They just seem to pop up excited and ready to play.

But that is the problem.  They want to play.  They are happy, sweet, and playful...  and mommy is all business, trying to get ready for work and school.

It breaks my heart, because mornings are the most one-on-two time I get with them.  Superman leaves for work at about 7:15, which means it's just me and my boys until it's time to take them to school.  I want to just lay in bed and cuddle with them while they tell me about their dreams (which they always seem so excited to tell you about), or get down on the ground and play trains, or play endless scenarios of "doggy", but I can't because I'm racing the clock.

Over and over again, my meanest mommy moments (which are also the most disappointed in myself parenting moments) always happen in the morning, while trying to get them ready for school.  At the time that my kids are perhaps at their sweetest and best, I turn into Momzilla.

They don't want to get dressed (because they want to stay in their pajamas and play) so I find myself physically restraining them to put their clothes on.  They want to play, but I get angry when I walk in the living room and find that they've pushed the coffee table over to the front closet and are standing on it to get their Candy Land game off of the top shelf, spilling dozens of other games in the process.  No matter how many times I promise myself I won't lose my tempter, I invariably end up yelling at some-Thing in the morning for something.  And I hate myself for it.

Some mornings I give in to the desire to just be mommy with them and enjoy their morning mood.  Like this morning.  I had just gotten out of the shower, when I heard Thing 2's soft whispering.  He was sitting in mommy and daddy's bed, next to Thing 1 (who was still sleeping) and saying "Time to get up brother."  Within minutes, both were giggling and laughing under my covers.  So, I abandoned the urge to use the time to blow dry my hair and put on my makeup, and I hopped in bed next to them.  We played tickle monster.  Thing 2 played puppy.  Thing 1 and I took turns giving puppy commands.  We gave lots of sweet kisses.  It was heaven.

But then at some point, I thought "Ugh, we are going to be so late."  So I got up and got back to getting ready.  The rest of the morning included a Thing 2 not wanting to get dressed fit.  A Thing 1 not wanting the breakfast Superman had set out for them.  And me walking into the coffee table incident described above after I finished blow drying my hair.

Our utopic morning in bed was long forgotten as my frustration and irritation grew.

I don't know what the solution is.  Some people say "wake them up earlier so you don't feel so rushed"  However... 1. when you wake them up, they wake up grumpy, 2. we'd have to put them to bed earlier, and I already feel like I barely get any time with them in the evening.

I need a different job.  I need to be a free-lance something or other, working from home.  Or a professor, where I could set my teaching time for afternoons.  Something where I didn't have to push my happy children out of bed and into the arms of others at 8:30 am every morning.

Sometimes I really miss Superman being a stay at home dad.  The boys could stay in their pajamas as long as they wanted!  Often, I'd come home for lunch and the three of them would still be in their pajamas with disheveled hair and in the happiest of moods.

Child Worship

In the early 21st century, the late comedian George Carlin defined "Child Worship" as an "excessive devotion to children by professional parents."  Of course, he is a comedian, so he also described these parents as "obsessive diaper sniffers," who are "over-managing their children and robbing them of their childhood."  He refers to those who fill their child's day planners with structured play dates and tutors and teams, etc. instead of allowing them good ol' fashioned play time (playing in the dirt with a stick).

Carlin's main objection to Child Worship seems to be it's contribution to the "self-esteem movement," which he said causes children to experience an artificially indoctrinated notion that they're "special" and "perfect" as if everything they do is wonderful and they have no flaws.  Not to say Carlin implied that all children are terrible, rather he asserts that they are merely "incomplete works."  You know, still learning things.  Making plenty of mistakes in the process.  The biggest fault Carlin finds with this "specialness training" is that we are breeding a generation of narcissist. 

What's so great about having high self-esteem he quips?  "All sociopaths have high self-esteem."

He goes on to say "A lot of kids never get to hear the truth about themselves until they're in their twenties when their boss fires them."

I will admit that as a parent, I can be guilty of Child Worship.  I adore my children.  Beyond adore.  I talk about them all the time.  It's hard for me to have a conversation with someone and not bring up a reference to them (or Superman).  What's funny is that I'm aware I do it, self-conscious of it really.  I can sometimes sense people's disinterest or even annoyance.  But I can't seem to stop.  The more I try to suppress it, the more it seems to pour out like word-vomit. Because they are my world.  My life revolves around those three guys, and I feel like most things I experience are somehow entwined with at least one of them.  

My office is filled, and I mean FILLED, with pictures of my family.  Baby pictures.  School pictures.  Old Christmas cards.  A wall calendar with collages of their pictures.  A digital picture frame on constant rotate of their faces.

Even on Valentine's Day, a day meant for lovers, Superman and I gave one another cards*, but made bags filled with candy and treats attached to heart shaped balloons for the loves of our lives...our boys.

*Although, I must brag on Superman for sneaking a cute balloon into my car while I was at work.  It was a sweet surprise to come out to at 5 pm.

Hello, I even started a blog about them!

But as much as I allow my life and love to be consumed by these 3.5 foot creatures, I do try to keep it in perspective.  I admit my kids aren't perfect.  Far from.  I know they are super rambunctious, loud, obstinate, stubborn, and independent to a point of being frustrating.  And we are working on that.  They are behind in speech development.  We are working on that.  They took almost 15 months to completely potty train.  Luckily, I think we are done (knock on wood) working on that.

And I know Superman and I aren't perfect parents.  I won't dare to speak for him on his parenting-weaknesses, but I will admit that I have plenty.  I'm impatient, get frustrated and lose my temper.  I yell too much.  I complain about being gone from them all day, but once I get home I will use just about any excuse to try and keep from playing trains on the ground with them.  And I can be lazy, letting things I know they should do slide because I'm too tired to force them to do it (flossing!).

But I don't beat myself up too much.  Sure, somedays I feel like the world's worst mother.  But then my son says an unprompted "I love you mommy" or I get a hand drawn Valentine's Day card with a train on it that says "I choo-choo-choose you Valentine" and all of that melts away.  I don't need my sons to become doctors that cure cancer, go to Harvard, or even get all As to feel like I succeeded as a parent.  I just want them to be happy, healthy, and normal.

Sure, I sign them up for music class, swim class, and tee-ball, but that's not because I think they need it to get ahead in this world, but because I have fond memories of being involved with these kinds of things when I was a kid.  The majority of my best childhood friendships formed not on a playground, but as part of an extracurricular activity.

And much more than wanting my boys to  be accomplished or to "feel special", I just want to teach them to be kind, loving, good people who are thoughtful and considerate of others and their feelings. I want them to be the kids in the class that are nice to everyone...from the little ESL boy who doesn't speak any English to the chubby kid everyone else teases to yes, even the bully who is mean to them.

It broke my heart yesterday to hear certain kids in their preschool class say "I'm not giving Valentine's to Thing1 and Thing2".  And I wondered, what in the world would make a child at 3, 4, or 5 years old already be so mean?  Do their parents know their child would say something like this?  Would their parents care or chalk it up to "Oh, you know kids..."?  To me, this is unacceptable behavior.  If Thing1 or Thing2 ever said such a thing about one of their classmates, I would tell them they gave out cards to everyone or no one.  Because I feel strongly that we are teaching our children right now how to treat others.  Are the kids who are exclusionary of their peers in preschool the ones who start hate-campaigns on Facebook as teenagers?  The ones that are cliquy and backstabbing as adults?  Or is it merely a stage all kids go through and will simply outgrow?  I don't know, but I'm not taking that chance with my kids.  "Do unto others as you would have done unto you" is something I strongly believe in and am determined to teach my children to observe.  And that means that not everyone has to be your friend, but you still have to be nice to them.

I'm just glad that right now Thing1 and Thing2 are too young to truly understood the whole Valentine's Day thing.  They didn't seem to hear the offending statements, or at least understand or care, nor notice in the mass confusion of card giving if they were missing a few from certain classmates.  They were perfectly happy handing out their cards with treats to ALL of their classmates.  Which made me happy and proud of them.

And if being concerned about my 3 year olds' feelings over something as trivial as Valentine's Day cards makes George Carlin categorize me as a "Child Worshipping" parent, than bring on the religious car emblem, because I'll display it proudly.  Right next to my "My child is nice to your Honor Roll student" bumper sticker.

Mean Mommy

When Superman and I talked about having children, and what kind of parenting theories we ascribed to, we were on the exact same page.  Neither of us believed in corporal punishment, aka spanking.  We both preferred to use alternative discipline measures, such as positive reinforcement (praise, rewards, etc. for good behavior), redirection, and consequences (time-outs, losing privileges).

Superman was never really spanked himself.  He said he recalls being spanked once in his life.  He says his mom was a yeller, but never really at him.  He was a good kid.  Quiet.  Polite.  Respectful.

I, on the other hand, am surprised I don't have a permanent tattoo of my dad's hand on my ass.  I don't know if my parents "believed" in spanking, but I sure know they used it.  A lot.  And when I was too old to be spanked, I got smacked across the face.  Now, I'll admit my parents never hit me for no good reason.  I had a smart mouth on me.  Not insolent, but sarcastic.  But I can't say that that is why I got spanked so much, because my brother was more like Superman, very quiet and never talked back, yet he got hit just as much as I did.

I don't have a particular aversion towards spanking.  I don't think it made me a bad person or ruined my life.  A lot of my friends openly spank their children, and I never try to dissuade them from their parental choices.  I just personally do not like the concept and prefer not to do it with my children.  For starters, I feel like spanking sends a negative message: if you don't like something someone does, use a violent response to solve the issue.  I find it especially contradictory if you spank your child for say hitting their sibling.  "Don't hit your brother.  Now bend over so I can show you hitting is wrong."

But like many things about parenthood, what you say B.C. in theory might not always line up with the action.  (One of my favorite quotes about motherhood is: "I was a much better mother before I had kids.")

Now that I am a parent of three year olds, I can say that I understand why many people spank.  Sometimes you are as mad as hell because your kids have dumped what seems like the entire contents of your fridge on your dining room floor.  You send them to their time out chairs and they sit there laughing and giggling.  Laughing and giggling!  You scream at them to be quiet.  They still laugh and giggle.  You are cleaning up the mess (because while you believe in making the kids pick up their messes, that doesn't apply when there is butter and mayonnaise involved, because that would lead to an even bigger mess!).  And they are laughing and giggling.  So you send them to their room.  In the dark.  And they are still laughing and giggling.  Whispering to each other.  You yell for them to be quiet.  You are seeing red!  You can't remember the last time you've been this angry.  You want to literally smack the smiles off their faces.  You want them to be as upset about it as you are.  To transfer your feelings onto them.  To give them something to cry about.  So you spank them.

And for a moment, you do feel better.  They have quit laughing.  Now they know that you are mad.  Now they know that they should feel bad.  They are crying.  Hard.

But are you happy?  I wasn't.  I just felt worse.  I had to resist every urge to pick them up and apologize. To hold them and cry with them and say I'm sorry and promise to never hit them again.  I didn't do that, because at that point I figured, what is done is done.  I won't confuse them now by following their first spanking with tender loving care.  I'll make the best of the bad situation and let the spanking stand, as a punishment.

The problem.  It was a fairly effective punishment.  So effective that for weeks later, I could still get them to modify a behavior by just the threat of a spanking.  Because even though I wouldn't ever threaten spanking when I'm calm and rational, when I'm mad and frustrated I feel my resolve completely disappear and those words "Do you want a spanking" find themselves tumbling out of my mouth.  Although now, enough time has passed that the threat is wearing off.  The boys are calling my bluff.  And I have to decide what to do.

I don't want to spank.  I don't want to yell.  I want to get my temper under control so that I can learn to deal with my frustrations in a more constructive manner.  I've watched Super Nanny.  I know what you are supposed to do.  But it's easier said than done.

I bought a book recently that was recommended to me by another parent, Setting Limits.  It talks about the three parent types: the authoritarian (yelling, hitting, spanking), the permissive (giving lots of warnings with delayed or non-existent consequences), and the combined.  I'm only a few chapters in, but so far I've surmised that the combined is the worst because it is inconsistent (and if there is one thing I know about kids, it's that they thrive on routine and consistency).  So, guess which one I am?

I really need to find the time to finish reading this book, because I want help.  I want to be the better, more consistent, non-spanking parent that I know I can be.