Chill Pills

On a relatively good day I sometimes ask myself “What am I doing wrong?” and there are days where the question is “What am I doing right?” because I feel like I’m doing everything wrong. Today was a “What am I doing wrong day”, thankfully. Things I probably did “wrong” include yelling at Auggie to stop yelling at me. Letting him get away with things because timeout was inconvenient at the time was also one. I’m pretty sure I used foul language several times today too. Those are things I’m conscious of; The things I try to work on so that I can be a better mommy. What made me ask myself “What am I doing wrong” is something new. It worries me. It makes me feel like we may have screwed up on a whole new level. The hubs was also very concerned. 

It all started during a ruckus over naptime a few days ago. I sang to Auggie and rocked him for a minute as always and put him down for his nap. He was happy and didn’t fight it. I went outside to do my chicken chores and change the laundry. When I came back, he was asking to poop from his crib with mild urgency. I took him to the potty and started washing up and patiently telling him to go or at least try to or he was going straight back to bed. He was goofing off, asking me “Long leg go?” and trying to play the game we normally play on the pot where he makes funny faces and gestures that I copy. I told him that the daddy long legs are likely taking a nap as he should be, and that I wasn’t going to play right now because it was nap time. He continued to rope me into playful banter yet I held firm. A fly landed in his hair and he tried to catch it accidentally pulling out a hand full of hair. I told him “Oh no, that must have hurt! Be careful, honey.” 10ish minutes total passed and I had to carry him kicking and screaming back to his crib. 

He began screaming as if I was torturing him and pleading “POO POO PLEEEEASE!” I had to walk outside where I could still hear him but I could calm my nerves and think. I’d give it 5 minutes and assess if he had calmed down at all or not. He hadn’t so I went back in. He had climbed out of his crib and was shaking the door still pleading. So I opened it, got on his level and told him he could go, but he must get to business quickly. 

He went immediately. Then he faked it for another 10 minutes. I was patient and was wiping his tears, calmed him down, and told him it was time to go back to sleep (if he had ever really fell asleep in the first place). Each time I tried to lead him back to bed, he would cry for the potty again and so I would put him there and tell him to hurry and try. I tried leaving the bathroom so he would get bored. Yet, the playing prevailed. Then he started pulling out hair again! I calmly told him not to do it. He then did it again. At my wits end, I tried to take him back to bed once more to no avail. I looked at the time, it had been an hour and 45 minutes since he originally went down for said nap…I gave up. If he needed my attention so bad that he has resorted to hair pulling, I thought, then so be it.

Fast forward to tonight. I’m rocking him and singing his nighttime song, Somewhere over the Rainbow, after Daddy has played cars with him and read him 2 books. The normal bedtime routine. He’s smiling at me and then BAM, rips out a handful of hair again. Smiles at me, then looks at his hand to see just how much he got…I said “Why would you pull out your hair? Doesn’t that hurt? Please don’t pull out your hair.” He never stopped smiling and I caught his hand before it made its second grab. I got mad and did my best to not yell so it came out like that scary growly voice that moms do so well. “Do NOT do that again, it’s BAD. You will get in trouble if you do it again.” Then went right back into my happy rendition of Somewhere Over the Rainbow. I was watching him lay there with that “OK, I’ve snapped out of it. Yeesh” Look on his face, wondering what we could have ever done to make him want to hurt himself like that… I have a new found guilt for a few things I did as a teen and how my parents must have felt.

Daddy heard it all go down. He was waiting to find out what Auggie had done. He said “I hope he’s ok…” My immediate response was “Why wouldn’t he be? It’s probably just a phase. He’s 2, another ploy for attention probably.” But my other half had a powerful rebuttal “How much attention does he need? He gets SO much attention!” Well, it’s true. I’m a stay at home mom. I give him as much attention as I can every day. Yet lately he has been very needy. He screamed at me to hold him for 5 minutes as I made his lunch today (remember when I said I had yelled at him not to yell at me?) There’s only so many times I can calmly tell a child that I have to cook him lunch because he did after all just get done crying about being hungry. I’m not perfect. No one is. 

So why is my baby boy yanking hair out then? This is something I’d be googling if the internet wasn’t down right now. He gets a lot of attention. He gets one on one with both me and Daddy several times a day. We read him 4 books a day. He gets at least an hour of outdoor play a day. He gets as much free play as he wants on top of that(which is a lot lately). He could be getting his top 2 year molars, yet I don’t think that would cause pulling hair. Especially not with a smile on his face…Maybe it is just to stall; to cause a ruckus to prevent the inevitable nap? Hopefully. I’ll have to settle on that for now. It’s only happened twice. It may not ever happen again. Yet, it’s one of those things a parent has panicked thoughts about and stays up late worrying over. So let me just recap today’s highlights instead:

Bareback riding: After asking Auggie to pull up his undies and pants after peeing, he decided it was easier to take them off completely. This was fine since we were home for a while. He rode his huge plush horse around the house sans pants and took it off of sweet jumps(like a pile of blankets). Some of which he did not land well and quietly exclaimed “oh nooooo.”  He’d roll around and assess his horse before getting up and moving on. “Two, threeeeeee!” He’d say as he jumped his pal over toys in his room. 

Dance party: We danced for the better part of an hour. Twirling, giggling, and romping around like…well, children. He impressed with new steps and gestures and enjoyed running through my legs. There were several minor injuries and Daddy said to calm it down. We didn’t listen. Baby Phoenix enjoyed the show, especially when Mommy got the muslin blanket and flung it about in an almost keep away dance game with Auggie. He was also, still, sans pants. 

Those are the bits that remind me to take a pill, of the variety chill, and rest easy knowing I’m doing my absolute best.