Simply Mother

I said to my mother-in-law the other day, “I think Jade has had a complete personality shift since Carrie was born.” Her response, while witnessing my once mild, accomodating, agreeable child running wildly around the room, emotions high-strung, and thrashing/swinging/hitting anyone in range if she got the least bit frustrated?

“Yes.”

Her conclusion is that Jade is realizing she’s in the middle. When I asked her, desperately, what do I do, how do I reverse this (!?!) she just asked, “Don’t you think she’ll just outgrow it?”

Will she? Really? I don’t know, it seems more involved then a simple matter of maturation, but maybe. I mean, I suppose at some point she’ll gain more impulse control and such, but what about all the emotions that are surely tormenting her to the point where she acts like this? Can a disturbed “life story” really be outgrown? Doesn’t it need rewriting?

One thing is sure though, “discipline” (in the sense most people use it — synonymous with “punishment”) is completely ineffective. No, more than that. It absolutely makes it worse.

Discipline “lite” (e.g. warning tone of voice, lightly trying to barricade the target from her swings) only exacerbates the situation.

Full-on discipline (which, in our house admittedly only equates to removing her from the situation to cool off, though in my frustration there have surely been times where this was made to feel quite punitive, and then the results are even worse) only brings out very big, very sad tears because, clearly, she is not trying to make us angry.

Well, perhaps it is not all that clear. But it is after the fact, if I ever get stern enough to finally penetrate her wall and “get to her.”

At those times, I just feel terrible because I can see her poor, sad, sweet and terribly confused spirit — desperately calling out for help (which is what all misbehavior really is — a cry for help) and instead finding herself plunked on her bed by a not-very-friendly mama.

(She’s easier to parent this way than Sarah was at this stage because she does burst into tears. Sarah, on the other hand, would just get angrier — which, while I know it was still just masking other painful emotions, it’s a lot harder to see that when you’re being screamed at rather than cried to!)

So direct attempts to try to change these behaviors are futile, and as I’ve said before I’m not willing to resort to harsher and harsher methods, so I’m definitely getting a lot of practice with the creative route. Which … exhausting!

I’m also rereading Naomi Aldort’s book to help me understand possible sources of her frustration, and find gentle, respectful ways to help her through her emotions. There is a lot of wisdom in this book — I’m seeing even more now that I have a somewhat older child — and I’m enjoying going back through it.

 — 

You know, when my first child was still quite young, and she was the only one old enough to have “behavior issues” I used to hear other people talk about their kids behavior and think, Wow, there must be something really wrong there. I can’t imagine my child ever doing something like that. How can she let her kid go on like that?

Oh how ignorant I was! Now I have a child who is acting very similarly, and while yes, I do think there’s something “wrong” here (in that she’s not really herself in these moments, she’s struggling and this is the only way she knows to handle it,) I also realize these “wrong” things are totally normal. All kids go through rough times — some children just handle them differently than others. Sarah handled things — her own emotions, as well as my responses to her — very differently than Jade does, and that just has to do with their personalities.

So, it doesn’t necessarily mean I’m not being a “good” parent (Aha, yes, I finally understand that, go me!) because one of my children is having a hard time right now. It’s just a signal to step back and take a look at the causes and start looking for a way to help her.

I’m also really beginning to understand something else — something I think is absolutely incomprehensible to grasp before you have children. (Before you have children and actually experience this, you hear people say what I’m about to say and you kind of nod your head and think, Sure, of course you have to say that. But you don’t believe it for a second.)

That is: How you can witness these totally frustrating, utterly stupefying behaviors in your children, how you can spend your nights wondering what went wrong and how you can help, and at the same time, be so completely filled with love and adoration for the very same child. How you can look at her, five seconds after some crazy action, or sometimes even during it if you’re really in tune, and think what a marvelous, awesome, sweet and wonderful little creature you have standing before you!

Don’t get the wrong idea because I started this post with what to you may be a very disturbing image of my little Jade. Yes, she does those things, not all the time, but a lot lately, and she shows no remorse and usually the reason is not apparent at all and it’s all very worrisome and … energy-depleting to say the least.

But? She is also so very, very sweet and so very, very loving, and she still rubs her chubby little hands over my face at night and kisses her sister with a most vehement kind of love and offers to help me at the most perfect moments and sits next to me “reading” the entire story of Thumbelina, almost word-for-word, while I make dinner and … Oh, I have to tell you what her nursery teacher said about her tonight! Except it will have to be in another post, because I think most of you have already fallen asleep!

And I need to do the same because I am up way past my 10:30 bedtime I have actually been half-way managing to keep so Good Night! And please feel free to share with me your stories, thoughts, and wisdom.

Filed in: child development • family • parenting | September 8, 2009