Mum’s the World: Parenting at Your Wit’s End
Friday, July 24, 2015
My daughter, Lia, has developed several creative ways of either disobeying or simply being naughty.
Last weekend, I smiled as I watched Lia twirling in the living room while she sang a song. Since I wasn’t familiar with the song, I put down the book I was reading to listen closely to the words.
“I want to punch Mommy in the face.”
Ah yes, the anthem of childhood.
Of course, I immediately told Lia to stop singing the song. What do you think my sweet daughter did? She changed the tune and kept the lyrics saying, “Do you like it now? I changed the way it sounds, Mommy!”
I suppose I should be glad that it’s possible I may have given birth to a burgeoning, Top 40’s musician. However, I was definitely flabbergasted wondering if I had somehow allowed Lia to watch something that she shouldn’t have. Or maybe I’d taken her to an underground boxing match in my sleep.
Yet children, shockingly enough, have minds of their own. Despite our best efforts, they seem to operate under what seems to be the mantra of Miley Cyrus, “Think of it. Do it.”
TIME recently covered a story that occurred last week in Portland, Maine. According to TIME, a family of three was vacationing in Portland and popped inside a diner for pancakes. Due to the wait time and because he was a toddler, the child of the parents apparently caused a disruption. The disruption led to the owner of the diner allegedly yelling in the child’s face to “shut the hell up,” according to the mother’s public response.
TIME handled the subject well by acknowledging the fact that we can’t always blame the unwanted behavior of children on the famous disease of “bad parenting.”
In fact, the writer of the piece, Belinda Luscombe, concludes, “So apart from segregating all parents away from non-parents in any enclosed environment, there’s nothing to do but cut each other a little slack… As for the kid, he or she is probably no worse for wear. Unless it was really scary, toddlers don’t have much of a memory. They’re a bit like social media that way.”
Despite the story being about a relatively commonplace event in the life of a parent, it was comforting to me that the author of the piece implored readers to have compassion instead of judgment for the parents of “naughty” children.
I remember another time when Lia’s shenanigans took place in public at a local grocery store. I told her that I wouldn’t buy her a pair of Frozen sunglasses that had caught her eye. I expected for her to be disappointed, but I did not expect the resulting tantrum that was significantly more terrifying than a scene from the Exorcist.
I carried my kicking and screaming child outside. As we sat on the sidewalk, I watched young couples hurriedly pass by, avoiding eye contact with me. Seconds later, more rude and more audacious strangers passed by and literally shook their heads.
All the while, Lia was still wailing, and I crumbled on the inside feeling ashamed that I couldn’t get my daughter to stop crying. Suddenly, a woman in her fifties walked up and said, “I had one just like that. And guess what, she starts college this fall. Your daughter’s going to be just fine.”
Of course, a stranger’s words of kindness didn’t immediately end the twenty-minute tantrum, but it did give me the strength to get through the experience with patience.
This week, I don’t have a lot of advice for parents who like me, find themselves at their wit’s end. Though I do have this one reminder: Don’t focus on the critical looks or words of others who either have never had kids before or may have just forgotten what it was like to have kids. Instead, lock eyes with the one compassionate stranger who passes your way.
Related Slideshow: 5 Secrets for Surviving Toddler Tantrums
Here are five secrets that I have found help with dealing with toddler tantrums.
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