Escalator
Today was Thursday pretty much all day and it was my turn to host the Thursday potluck. Now I’m riding high on caffeine and socializing, and instead of cleaning my house I’m blogging. Yay.
As sometimes happens on Thursdays, we did a lot of talking about parenting and how we suck at it. I’ve been thinking about something in particular that I struggle with and I’ve decided to turn over a new leaf. I have a serious problem with regard to how I react to the children when they’re having difficulty with a craft or math or rollerblading or opening a cereal box or a new DS game or a maze or whatever. It’s not the fact that they struggle, it’s the fact that they have to whine about the struggling that just sends me over the edge every time. It finally occurred to me that I have an extremely unreasonable expectation that when they have some kind of difficulty, that they’ll say in a normal tone of voice, “Mother, I am having trouble and I would be ever so grateful if you would assist me.” Instead, they usually use their whiniest voice to say, “I caaan’t doooo iiiiitttt!” and then they stomp and flail. I don’t like that. If I were a mature adult I would hear that and calmly reply, “There, there, let me see if I can help you.” Instead, I have an extremely immature nervous system which reacts with a fight-or-flight response when faced with super-deadly whining. I usually say, “Stop whining and I can help you,” which looks fine in print, but if you heard the tone of my voice and you were a very sensitive lass, you might pee your pants from the fear that my words were actually going to choke you. This is my least favorite thing about myself. First of all, it just escalates the problem and, most importantly, it goes against everything I believe in as far as emotional health. I would never tell them to stop feeling mad or sad or anything like that. In this house, we share our feelings and our feelings are respected. But when it comes to their whining because of having difficulty with something, I feel like they should understand that it’s ok to struggle and they should have an attitude of, “Huh. This is hard. I guess I’ll have to ask for help.” When in reality, nobody acts like that when they’re having a problem. We all whine and stomp in our own way. My asking them to stop whining doesn’t work because then they think I’m mad at them and that freaks them out and then they can’t relax and then they cry and whine more. It’s really quite the opposite of helpful. So I’m turning over a new leaf and I think it’s going to be life-changing. You know, like Jesus and The Secret. Only with less bloodshed. Hopefully.
June 20th, 2008 at 1:47 am
I am miss snappy pants too when it comes to whining. It must be one of the most annoying behaviours ever. Of course that means I never whine myself (it just sounds different in an adult voice).
June 20th, 2008 at 4:28 pm
Good for you. I’m gonna take lessons so I can do it too. It sounds like a fine idea. And yeah, it is yet another way that I show my kids how superior I am over them as in, “See, I don’t whine…I communicate.” That is a lot easier to do when you are in full control over your own life, mind and body. Sheesh. Dumb grown ups!
June 20th, 2008 at 5:14 pm
There there…
Today I screamed at two of my kids because my dog chewed up a gift certificate I had just received for a facial at an Aveda salon. It was obviously their fault for standing there and watching and not doing anything about it when I was out of the room, right? Right? RIGHT?!?!
After I calmed down, I felt like an idiot. Then I apologized. Then I got out the Scotch tape and, see there? It wasn’t so bad after all.
June 24th, 2008 at 12:07 pm
I really need to work on my screeching. It’s the thing I hate most about my maternal self. I am pretty sure my kids don’t like it much, either.