Things That Make Me Ashamed - Shouty Mom

The truth is, I haven't been liking myself very much lately.

I've been letting things slide, I've been missing opportunities, I've been slow to react, and slow to finish things, if they get finished at all. I've ignored this blog, ignored writing altogether for probably the longest stretch of my adult life. I couldn't figure out why I cringed every time I thought about sitting down to put my thoughts in order.

Then I figured some stuff out, and it's not pretty at all.

I have some baggage about being ignored; being made to feel less than.

No four year old is really great at listening. The Imp, energetic and full of questions and entranced with all the shiny things is not good at listening at all in the morning rush before school and work.

He's a great kid. He's thoughtful, and generous, and sweet. Affectionate, whip-smart, and curious. He gets excited about every little thing, and greets each day with a let's go! attitude that I often envy.

But he's not so great at listening.

And I'm not so great at being not listened to.

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It happened gradually, but I started shouting at him sometimes, to get his attention. After six times of asking him to do something with no response, I'd increase the volume to let him know I meant business. It was effective for a while, then it faded into the white noise of Imp's life.

So I started shouting to get his attention a lot of the time.

Then instead of just being a question of volume, a note of frustration crept into the shouting. Then the frustration turned to resentment, and soon it felt like I was shouting all the time, angrily barking orders at Imp every time I needed him to just do something.

I became Shouty Mom.

The morning excitement in Imp's eyes was turning to resistance and resignation, and that's when I realized that I didn't like myself very much. That I hadn't liked myself very much for quite some time. I was horrified by the parent I'd become without noticing.

Three days ago I hit critical mass. After a particularly difficult morning, I cracked. I just could not stand the idea of starting one more day fighting with The Imp about all the minutiae of our daily routine; breakfast, getting dressed, picking up his toys, getting his for-the-love-of-all-things-holy shoes on so we could just get out the door.

I could not, as a human being, spend that much time frustrated, angry, and living my life at top volume.

So I stopped.

And it's been hard. Not the stopping shouting, that's the easy part. It's a relief, to turn the volume down, to dial back the anger, to just get really quiet. I've kept my demeanor calm, my tone reasonable, and my voice low. Instead of shouting, I speak quietly enough that Imp has to get close to me to hear what I'm asking him to do.

The hard part?

(I'm ashamed, deeply ashamed, to admit this.)

The Imp's gotten used to the shouting. The Imp doesn't know how to deal with the not shouting.

The shouting is awful, but it's been consistent enough that it's comfortable for him, even if it's all kinds of wrong.

(I've been on the receiving end in an abusive relationship. The echoes of that here are enough to make my fingers shake as I type this.)

Because the dysfunction (temporary, it hasn't been going on that long, and I'm self aware enough to have caught it, for which I am eternally grateful) is what he knows, this sudden change to quiet, even-toned, non-shouting Mommy is discomfiting for The Imp.

He's flailing, striking blindly, lashing out at me to try and provoke the reaction he's accustomed to. It's been awful, seeing him escalate and escalate really bad behaviour because he wants me to shout at him. He's even asked me to shout at him. I've been handling it - we've been handling it - by limiting attention to inappropriate behaviour (make sure he's safe but ignore the outbursts) and lavishing attention on him when he's well behaved. Today there was a lot of progress, and I'm as proud of that as I am ashamed of why it was needed.

I've been crying a lot. A lot.

But I haven't been shouting.

Things That Are True - Echoes

The second he woke up this morning, The Imp came striding out into the living room where I was curled up with a book, looked at me very intensely, and made the following announcement:

The Imp: I am taking away all your treats.

(We use the phrase "take away your treats" to keep his behaviour in line.)

Me: Really. Why are you taking away all my treats?
The Imp: Because you said no tv. So I'm taking away your treats.
Me: Why do you think I said no tv?
The Imp: I don't know.
Me: Because you were shouting and hitting last night at bedtime. Am I shouting? Am I hitting?
The Imp, reluctantly: Noooo.

It's so interesting to hear my own words echoed back to me by my child. I'm fascinated, watching him figure out how much power he has, how much power his words have. He's figuring out his place. He's crafting his worldview. And when I hear my words come out of his mouth, I'm keenly aware of how much influence I have on that.

I was reminded of this again later this morning, after breakfast, as we were getting dressed for daycare. He wasn't cooperating, and I told him if he didn't get dressed rightnow there would be no treats after school. He looked at me, dejectedly looked at his feet, and quietly said, "Fuck."

(Well, yay for using it in the correct context, I guess?)


Me, quietly: What did you say?
The Imp: Fuck.
Me: Honey, we don't say that word.
The Imp: You say it all the time.

(Um, yeah. He had me there.)

Me: You're right, I do say it. But I shouldn't. It's not a nice word. How about if I don't say it anymore, and you don't say it anymore either?
The Imp: Okay.

So we finished getting him dressed and got him off to daycare. There were no horrified stories of dropped f-bombs on pickup this afternoon, so I'm hoping that's the end of it. For now, anyway.

And I really do need to get a handle on the things I say. There's an echo in here.

Things That Are True: The Body Knows

There seems to be a theme to my October so far - it's like the gods I don't believe in* summoned up all the flotsam and jetsam of my past, washed it up on the beach of my consciousness and said, "Listen, sister. Deal."

Beach flotsam I just happened to catch on camera last weekend, English Bay

Yesterday, after three days of agonizing writing, reviewing, rewriting, and crying, I sent an email that almost killed me to write. I don't know how it will be received. I don't know how or if it will change some pretty important relationships in my life. But I'm just so done with some of the stuff the email's about, I had to send it. I had to reclaim my belief in myself. So now I sit, angst-ridden, simultaneously stalking and avoiding my inbox, wondering what the fallout will be; what kind of nuclear winter we'll have to suffer through before we can move on.

So that's fun.

Also yesterday, while sitting enjoying a perfectly lovely hot chocolate in one of my favourite haunts, I saw him. He was just walking by, he didn't see me, there were a few metres and half an inch of glass in between us, but still, my stomach instantly tied in knots, and I immediately felt like throwing up. After fourteen years, just seeing him at a distance can still make me physically ill. It affected me so much I had to interrupt my conversation with my coffee pal just to process it.

He was my first serious relationship, the first person I lived with, and the first (and only, I might add) person to hit me in the name of love.

It was textbook: he dazzled me, he made me feel like the best thing ever, and then he gradually, so gradually I didn't notice it was happening, undermined my confidence, estranged my friends, controlled everything I did, and hit me, telling me it was my fault. I think about it now, and can't believe it. How did I, the me that I am today, allow that to happen? (That's probably an entire post or five all on its own.)

Anyway, that relationship ended 14 years ago. I've seen almost nothing of him since, just chance encounters. Our social circles don't really intersect, our professional lives don't inhabit the same space. In the years since that horrible relationship I have very purposefully revisited spots we used to go to together, and replaced the bad memories with good ones. And I have never allowed myself to sink so far into a relationship again that physical abuse was somehow okay.

But it's the week for insights, and things I can't unknow, it seems. After I got home yesterday, one hit me so hard I had to stop moving, stop even breathing for a second.

The Imp is at a stage where he hits when he's frustrated. Since he's two, and testing every boundary, pushing every button, and still learning to communicate, he gets frustrated a lot. So he hits a lot. More precisely, he hits me a lot. He doesn't hit at daycare, he doesn't hit HWSNBN. He hits me. A lot.

The physical pain from these little two-year-old attacks of fists and feet is minimal, and transitory. I'm the grown-up, and I act accordingly. The Imp spends some time in the naughty corner, as he and I both get control, and as I tell him "calm down our bodies". There are times when it is really difficult for me to reign in my anger at being hit. There are times when my anger is all out of proportion to the assault. I've never lost control, the intellect has always prevailed in these situations. A couple of quiet minutes, a calm discussion of why we don't hit, a warm and loving hug, and on with our day.

But I realized yesterday, all in a heartbeat, that it's not the two-year-old hits I'm reacting to. It's the fourteen-year-old attacks that send me into a towering rage, that make me struggle to keep my voice calm, to explain why We. Don't. Hit. That make me need to take a quiet moment behind a closed door before I can give The Imp a hug and go back to reading stories, and playing games, and enjoying all the mind-numbingly beautiful moments of parenting, that happen all the time, every day, mostly when we're not looking.

The anger towards The Imp is an involuntary physical reaction, just like the stomach tightening and nausea yesterday when I saw my old flame. The body still reacts, even when the mind knows better.

I'm hoping that knowing this, processing it, figuring it out, will help me be a better parent. Will allow me to let go of this anger I didn't even realize I've been carrying around all this time, after all these years.

This morning, The Imp, as if looking straight into my brain at breakfast, said, "Hitting makes people sad." Yes, honey, hitting makes people sad. And not just the people being hit.

Then he wrapped his arms around himself, beamed at me, and said, "Hugging makes people happy!"

I must be doing something right.



*I don't believe in God. But if I did, it would have to be Loki. Because, well - just look at the world out there. It's the only explanation that fits. (With a hat tip to my Uncle David, who first mentioned that to me years ago, and it's stuck.) Either Loki, or some well-meaning but harried old chap in the sky. When I worked in the film and television industry, we used to joke: Good, Fast, or Cheap - pick any two. The God I most often hear described, despite his reputed omniscience, seems to be a variation of that: All-Loving, All-Knowing, All-Powerful - pick any two. That's my personal opinion, and I stand by it, but it doesn't prevent me from having, and more importantly, hugely respecting my friends and family who are devout in their faith.

Things That Are Surprising - Friday Confession: Dishes

A couple of days ago, The Imp was being most helpful in the kitchen when we got home, taking groceries one by one out of the bags and handing them to me to put away. When that was done, we moved on to other tasks. He was very excited to carefully take each dish out of the dishwasher and put it on the counter for Mommy to put away. I was in a blissful state, enjoying this quiet, cooperative time with my little boy, and feeling more than a little mama pride at how happy he was to be so helpful. It's possible I wasn't paying quite as much attention as I should have been to what was happening to each dish between dishwasher and countertop. With ninety percent of the dishes out of the dishwasher and the job almost complete, I noticed that The Imp was carefully, so carefully, licking each dish before he put it on the counter.

Confession?

I put them away anyway. I just couldn't face the job of remembering which dishes would need rewashing. And then rewashing them. And then rewashing everything else too because I wouldn't want to miss one. So I just sang "Lalalalalalalalala" to myself and firmly closed the cupboard doors, and went and read stories to The Imp before dinner.

Don't tell HWSNBN.

Wanna come for dinner?