Wowee

Yowzers.  These days.  Not only are they bone-wearying, soul-depleting exhausting days, but I find myself saying things like:

No, I don’t want you to bring a lizard into the house.

Stop raking your sister.

I just sat in pee.  (This was courtesy Benjamin, in the kitchen chair.  How did my life end up like this?)

Homeschooling has hit a rocky patch.  Andy doesn’t want to do it, and he finds every way possible to accomplish that.  From downright refusing to do the work to using every stall tactic he can invent to purposefully getting into trouble so that I’ll punish him, our school days are long and hard.  Do I increase his work load the more he hems and haws?  Serving out his punishment doing chores or in his room doesn’t seem to be the trick.  Schoolwork as negative consequences isn’t exactly the message I’m trying to send either.  So this week, with two days left until Halloween, I’m going to throw down a big mom card.  He either finishes his schoolwork or no trick-or-treating.  Which will be TERRIBLE!  But as I will tell his older self, I feel he’s left me no choice.  Doing things like repeatedly bringing lizards into the house.  Or, as he’s serving out his punishment of raking the yard to work out all his aggression, he decides to literally, rake his sister.  This was of course, after he spit in her hair. 

Benjamin also hit a rocky patch.  After 12 hours of him pulling on my pants and screaming at me in frustration, I am so emotionally spent that its no wonder I’ve yet to record the latest milestones (for my reference, Andy lost his second tooth and Benjamin calls himself Benja).  We blame everything else on Benjamin and the lack of sleep in Mama he’s responsible for – let’s blame the neglected blog on him as well. 

The thing about Benjamin that separates him from the first two is his persistence.  Mind you, the other two were no walk in the park at this stage of life.  They pitched fits and fell to the ground in a puddle of frustrated tears because they couldn’t communicate clearly. Benjamin, however, seems to lack the good sense to know when he’s beat and to just give up the fight.  You would think after the first time he cries himself into a frenzy that ends in vomiting that he’d get the message.  No matter how upset he gets, no matter how hard he pulls on my pants, Mama is not going to get him a cookie every time he wants one.  And yes, I am the mean mom who lets her distraught two year old work himself up to the point of gagging.  You see, Benjamin has always lacked the ability to soothe himself.  He has to ride the storm out.  And if it ends in throw up, so be it.  Even as a tiny baby, we’d get on this crazy wheel.  Nothing, and I mean nothing, would calm him down or pull him out of his fury.  Eventually Mama learned enough about this high maintenance baby to be able to prevent these upsets, but now, short of spending every minute of my day ruled by a two-year-old's whims, its happening with more frequency.  Poor baby.  He does it to himself, he just doesn't know any better.  And poor Mama is having a hard time teaching him how to work through this.  

So future Mama-self, when you are missing your littles, here's a picture of everyday life in all its glorious messiness.