Shining parenting moment
So last night I called OmegaDotter a “selfish little pill”.
Normally, I try very hard to say something like, “You are behaving like x, y, or z”. The idea being that phrasing it like that makes it so she doesn’t think she is the embodiment of x, y, or z, and emphasizes that she can change her behavior. But last night, all nicey-nice phrasing went out the window, with my temper.
She wanted Daddy. At 1:30 a.m. So daddy went. She wouldn’t lie still, so daddy left. She wanted Daddy. So daddy went. She wouldn’t lie still, so daddy left. She wanted Daddy…etc.
Finally, at 2:30 a.m., Daddy had had it. He informed her, very sternly, that if she wanted him to lie down with her, she had to let him sleep. But that otherwise, she was stuck in bed by herself.
She howled. Daddy stayed in bed with me. She proceeded to travel the house, shrieking angrily like a little tin whistle, the kind of shriek that makes your ears ring. This was not “scared” shrieking, it was “how dare you leave me when I want you here RIGHT NOW” type shrieking. It was extremely loud. Finally, I had had it, scooped her up off the floor outside our bedroom, carried her into her bedroom, plopped her on her bed…
And called her a “selfish little pill”.
At which, I got an indignant and soggy, “I…am…NOT…a…pill!” with sobs in-between as a response. And, “We…don’t…call…people…PILLS!”
I explained to her (angrily) that mommy and daddy needed their sleep. If she wanted to cry and wail and carry on, she could do it in her bedroom. That she was not all alone, because we were in the bedroom, or in the living room, or in the office, and we were always there. And that we always love her, no matter what, but that behavior like that was just selfish.
Then followed a long time of cuddling a small, hiccuping child in my arms.
But then this evening, we did dinner at the Mexican restaurant, just the two of us, and I shared my churros with her and she shared her soupy ice cream with me, and she selected a stretchy plastic monkey from the pirate’s treasure chest, and everything was all better.
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