One of the top 5 favorite books in our house is :
As I was coping with my emotions yesterday, I found myself writing a similarly rhythmed story of my own.
When you're finished explaining that you're only here for 1 thing and that you don't want to push one of those bulky, awkward, heavy carts around for just 1 thing,
she'll ask again.
Then she'll wail,
to make sure her wants are painfully clear.
When other shoppers look at you,
they might notice you're ignoring your wailing child.
She'll probably just continue on at elevated volume and ask to ride in a cart again.
When you've finished walking the ENTIRE length of the store cause you parked at the wrong end,
she'll want to try and stop you from carrying your 1 item.
(Cause she wants you to put it in one of those darn carts.)
She'll start pushing you. (Literally, not just mentally.)
She might get carried away and push her sisters too.
She may even end up making you wish you had a darn cart cause your 1 item ended up weighing 50 lbs!
When you're done walking your mini-circus through the store and you reach the check out,
you'll probably realize that she needs a nap and you'll regret letting her play the the park for so long earlier that day.
You'll have to do your best to just get through the checkout process.
She'll keep wailing, make her wants known, and repeat herself a few times.
She'll probably continue to ask you to get a cart even as you're leaving the store.
So you'll just keep walking towards your car, (which is clear down at the other end of the building remember) and she'll keep asking for a cart.
When an associate looks at you carrying your 50lb bag with your wailing child following behind you, she'll say "Good job for maintaining." Your child will ask for a cart, again.
You'll wonder to yourself, "What does 'Good job for maintaining' even mean?"
When your excruciating walk to the car is finished, and you load that darn 50lb bag, you'll want to finally let your child know that their behaviour has been unacceptable.
Then in a last stitch exhausted effort to not feel ignored or powerless, your future-leader-of-the-free-world 4 year old, will want to stop you from getting into your vehicle.
(Thankfully you're not longer holding that darn 50lb bag.)
Which means it's your strength verses hers as you move her and load everyone into the car.
She'll struggle and resist, but in the end, it has been made clear that her behaviour is unacceptable and she tearfully climbs into her car-seat.
Looking on all the while is an elderly lady sitting in the car next to you. . . .
who rolls down her window.
To say . . .
"You're doing a good job."
You'll think to yourself:
"What is she saying???"
"How could that have been a good job?"
"She just saw me discipline my child. She has a phone in her hand. She could have filmed the whole thing. Is she secretly planning to call C.P.S. on me?"
(I've heard about people who are nice to your face but then turn around and call the cops on you.)
You'll have a good long cry before the day is over.
At the end of the day, that same little 4 year will asks, "Do you still love me?"
And chances are, you'll still say "Yes," and you'll give her a tearful hug to go with it.
I am sad to report that you've described many of my own shopping/public experiences to a "t." Have I ever told you about the time one of my children hit a national Washington Post reporter in the leg while she was interviewing me on election day? Or the time one of my children swung at an investigator sitting in front of us in church when she turned around and smiled at said child? I drove the child to the juvenile detention facility around the corner and was fully prepared to turn them over to the first police officer to appear from inside. I kid you not. Oh. Oh. And the time I hauled one out of the gym over my shoulder because that child had a complaint meltdown, screamed and threatened they wouldn't go to the same class they'd been attending happily for four months, while another friend looked on and shook her head disapprovingly (because her children were still too young at that point that she could continue to bask in the mistaken idea that consistent, patient, firm parenting invariably leads to perfectly behave dchildren)? My mother had a keychain she used when I was growing up that said, "Motherhood is not for wimps." How right that is!
ReplyDeleteCall me the next time you have a day like this and we will split a chocolate bar and share war stories and feel better.