Being a Parent is Hard and You Deserve a Pat on the Back

Without fail, this has been the scene in my house the past three days at 7am: Me, bleary-eyed, getting ready for work. Kid #2 announces he wants to brush his teeth. Kid #1 immediately decides she also needs to brush her teeth at the exact same time that Kid #2 is brushing. They are both short. The sink is tall. There is one stool between the two of them. Reader, what is the end result of this equation? Did you say, “Get another stool so that they can each use one!” If you did, that tells me you have never spent an extended period of time with two un-self-regulated, brain-still-in-the-works human beings.

This is the end result: Throwing ‘bows, screaming, intensely tortured sobbing. A two-person mosh pit on the stool, with all the aggression, but none of the music and none of the fun. Uncaffeinated me brushing my teeth with one hand, the other hand palming the top of Kid #1’s head like a basketball to hold her off beating the [beep] out of Kid #2. Kid #1 is about double the size of Kid #2, and she uses that to her advantage if left unbidden. The sound in my house is that of 100 mourners keening and wailing at a funeral. Or of two people having their fingernails slowly being pulled off. Maybe three, if you include me.

Every fiber, bone, cell in my being wanted to rage, yell, get in their faces and scare them into being quiet. Because that would get the chaos to stop. When you grow up in a household where control, force, and fear were used to get things done, your brain and body are wired for it.

But I know the consequences of being scared into compliance. A part of you begins to believe you’re bad. That no matter what you do or how you grow, you aren’t worthy of love, gentleness, and kindness. My biggest parenting fear is that one day, my kids will carry this same belief, and it will be because of me.

There are many times I’ve yelled and gotten scary. In the moment, it feels like relief and release, but those feelings never longer than a minute. The feeling that ends up haunting you is guilt. Fear. So, so much shame. “Am I repeating the same mistakes on them that were made on me?” Then it replays, over and over in your mind: That scene where you were the person they wouldn’t go to when they were crying - because you were the one that made them cry. And this feeds right into the part of you that thinks you’re bad/failing/inadequate/terrified/[fill in your blank].

You didn’t think I would leave you here on such a grim note, though, did you? No, never! There is so much hope in the world for those who want to heal.

This morning, I didn’t rage, yell, or get scary. I picked Kid #1 up and told her, “I won’t let you hurt Kid #2. I know you’re having a hard time not hurting Kid #2 and I won’t let you. If you can’t control yourself, I will bring you to your room.” I did and said all this fairly calmly, given that I’d woken up just 10 minutes earlier. I am not wired to respond this way and it took every ounce of will I had to do it. It felt exhausting in the moment, like I was holding desperately onto a rope that was being pulled just out of my grasp. In the end though, I held onto Kid #1, husband took Kid #2 out of the bathroom, and the entire house exhaled a sigh of relief.

In the quiet that followed, I thought, “I need someone to tell me I did a good job just now.” Being a parent means that you are constantly thinking of the things you’re doing wrong and the ways you’re screwing it all up. The times that you’re doing it right tend to get downplayed or go unnoticed.

But here’s why it’s important to notice: I want to make sure I don’t pass this belief of being bad on to my kids. This starts with me knowing that I’m trying my best and recognizing the times I get it right. So, I gave myself a pat on the back for getting it right this time. I will always work on getting it right and being good enough for them. It will never be enough and I will always try. This act is my lifelong love letter to them.

Today, no matter if you’re having a good or bad day, pat yourself on the back. Parenting is hard and you deserve a pat on the back. Recognize yourself for your wins - they are important and need to be noticed. Hug yourself when you are struggling - you are worthy of love, kindness, and gentleness on those days, too.

The Ways We Pinch Our Noses

As with many parents in this weird period of time we call COVID life, I found my daughter in need of a COVID test. She’d come home from school the previous night, threw some tantrums, fell asleep on the couch, and didn’t wake until the next day. She hit a fever of 102F, complained of tummy pain, and missed all her nightly cartoons - very unlike her.

She’d previously had a COVID test done before, so she knew what was coming: Cotton swab waaaay up the nose and some painful burning up where no cotton swabs (or other objects) should ever go. As the lab tech came out of the building and began working his way down the line of cars, she began to flail in her car seat and wail.

“Mommy, I’m scaaaared! I don’t wanna do it! I’m so scared! I don’t wanna, I don’t wanna, I won’t do it!”

Of course I lied to her and told her it would be just fine, and then I lied through my actions and acted calm. And this part, the validation of her feelings, not a lie: “Sophie, I know you don’t want to, I know you’re scared. Mommy doesn’t like to do it either. But sometimes we have to do things that we don’t like because it keeps other people safe.”

Aaand… none of it helped. Because of course it’s one thing to soothe and validate feelings in a therapy session, and another thing entirely when the “client” in question is your terrified and strong-willed 5-year-old daughter, who is apparently resistant to what other (sane, wise, incredible) people pay money for.

We next moved to bribery and screen time. I turned on the Amazon app, typed in “stuffed animals” in the search bar, gave her my phone, and told her I would buy her ANY toy she wanted after the test. Now, this did the trick. Are you taking notes? This is therapist gold right here!

As the line of cars pulled up and our turn arrived, the flailing and wailing intensified, and this time she mounted a new defense: She began to firmly pinch her nose with her very tiny, weak fingers that any person with an ounce of strength could open in a millisecond. Um, did she realize how ridiculous this was?!

I looked back at her and felt the strongest mixture of laughter (a little uncontainable) and sadness for her fear. And then it dawned on me - isn’t she just as absurd as the rest of us? The pinching, the flailing, the wailing - these were all attempts at controlling an outcome over which she effectively had no control.

How often have you overanalyzed, regurgitated, rehashed something over and over again, as if by doing it, you can actually change the outcome? I wish I hadn’t said that awkward thing - then people wouldn’t think I’m so dumb. Maybe if I phrase this in just the right way, h/she won’t leave me. If I can plan out everything to the minute, I’ll be less stressed! If I choose the thing that other people want me to choose, then they’ll love me. If I do enough research and pick just the right [dress, house, car, partner], then I’ll finally be happy.

In truth, none of it matters, because no matter where you go - there you are.

What actually does help?: Connection (with people who get it and care), perspective (that all good/bad/painful/joyful/transcendent/etc. experiences and feelings have a shelf life and expiration date), and knowledge of self (am I upset just because of the current situation or is this tied to something deeper in my life?).

In the end, Sophie’s little fingers were pried off her nose. By me. She put up a good fight, but ultimately, that swab was going to do its thing regardless. Afterwards, she bawled, “Mommy, I’m saaaaadd!!!!”

I know, sweetie, I know.

As we drove away, her sobs turned into sniffles, then thoughts about what toy she should get, then dwindled lazily into our usual conversation.

And, as it turns out, I didn’t lie to her after all - things actually and truly did turn out just fine.

How are you pinching your nose?

Bamboo

We have this swath of bamboo in my backyard that is beautiful. It is tall, green, and grand. Looking up at it when the sun hits it right makes you feel small in just the right way.

We hacked down some of the bamboo this summer because 1) around this area, it is considered an invasive, uncontrollable weed, and 2) we wanted to grow some nice-on-the-eyes grass, something a bit more palatable in our piece of suburbia.

We declared success as we laid down sod, the days went by, and nary a sign of bamboo threatened the peace. Phew.

Until. There it was - a tender and strong shoot of bamboo, proudly sprouting right through the damn grass. What the?! I spotted more of them. I tried pulling them out. No dice. Husband tried next. No luck there, either. In the end, he cut them down using the machete we found in our yard when we first moved in.

I continued to check on it in the weeks after, hoping that our efforts had won out, but again, the bamboo won out. We went through this cycle a few times: Cut-grow, cut-grow, cut-grow. The chant that began playing my head each time I saw it went: That fucking bamboo!

But even as I cursed it, there was something that I grudgingly admired about it. It was a worthy opponent. The nerve of it! The persistence! How dare it keep growing?! This tenacious plant, forcing me to look at it and be awed by it, despite it being, by all accounts, a damn weed.

It’s a lot like the human spirit. We can be cut, pulled from our roots, even disappear from the naked eye - and at the end, we are just like that nervy, persistent weed. Tender, strong, grand, and ready to make a comeback, whether we realize it or not.