Momfessional #47: Freaking out

Posted on by
1

stay-calm-and-carry-on

I was reading 46 reasons why my three-year-old might be freaking out the other day, and I couldn’t believe how accurate it was. The post was hilarious, and, while sharing on my Facebook wall, I added a few things that especially cause K to freak out these days:

  • The TV is not a touchscreen like the iPad or my phone
  • Her “plain pasta” has a speck of sauce on it
  • She wanted to choose her own orange vitamin, out of the bottle that only has orange vitamins left.
  • Her nose has a caterpillar in it (AKA it is stuffy)
  • I was squishing her when I laid in bed with her
  • I didn’t lay in bed with her
  • The (sleeping) cat tripped her
  • I didn’t warm her pants up with my hairdryer before she put them on
  • I won’t let her wear underwear, even though she refuses to use the potty
  • Her brother is looking at her
  • Her brother isn’t looking at her

The list goes on, and on, and on.

Continue reading →

Momfession #46: The other side of bullying

Posted on by
7

Every Monday evening, our entire family attends a program for boys with behaviour challenges. Gabriel goes to a “boys group” and they play games and work on developing strategies to deal with their anger and frustration that don’t involve violence, expletives, or hurling large items at their teachers. Mike and I go to the parent group, where we learn parenting techniques to help assist us in raising our challenging sons. And Kailyn goes to the daycare, where she makes crafts and dances. It is difficult to make it there for 6pm every Monday; the kids eat “dinner” (PB&J’s and goldfish crackers) in the car while I fight rush hour traffic and Mike acts as mediator between two very tired and cranky children who would rather be home. But, over the last two months, we have seen some positive changes in both ourselves and Gabriel, and albeit small, they are enough to keep us going.

Tonight, our topic du jour was bullying. Perfect, I thought…this is something that I have been wanting to discuss. How do we get our kid NOT to pick on other kids at school, when at home he is a loving, empathetic child (most of the time)? Surely, since this was a program for kids with behavioural issues, we would be discussing the “other side” of bullying: what do you do when your kid is a bully. But, the discussion didn’t go that way. Instead, we discussed how to find out if your kid is being bullied, what to tell him, and how to advocate for him. And, while I believe that those are all very important things to learn, it left me wondering: what about us?

Continue reading →

Momfession #45: WWMD (What Would Mommy Do?)

Posted on by
Reply

There’s been a lot of talk about Jesus in our house lately. Which is odd, since we are not Christian in the least. In fact, we balk at any idea of organized religion. My husband and I are both products of Christianity: he attended a Baptist church when he was younger, and I spent my formative years in a Catholic school and heavily involved in our local church. But I became disillusioned with the church and my faith once I got old enough to realize that it didn’t fit with who I was and what I truly believed. I could write a novel about my feelings on religion, and Catholicism, but I will leave that for another day. Suffice it to say that when my kids started coming home talkin’ ‘bout the J-man, I was slightly uncomfortable.

I mean, I knew it was coming. We made the decision this fall to take our daughter out of home care and put her in a local preschool. A Christian-based preschool, mind you. But,  we had heard great things about the staff, and I got a warm fuzzy feeling from the moment I walked in, so I did my best to ignore the CD of Bible songs that they gave us when we enrolled, and the “Jesus Loves You!” signs in the hallway. When she came home telling me how “Mary Angel” was her friend, I just nodded and smiled. I even thought it was cute when she decided to say grace before dinner one night, and finished it off with “Ahhh-mek!” (she wouldn’t believe me when I tried to tell her it was Amen).

My son attends an after school program at the same center, and he’s been diligently practicing for their Christmas concert at home. When he came home with the song sheets and I noticed a song about– you guessed it– Jesus, I tried to act normally. But inside I was squirming. On the one hand, I felt guilty that he was singing about something that we completely don’t believe in. But another part of me feels guilty because I haven’t introduced any sort of faith into my kids’ lives.

Growing up, religion wasn’t just about the prayers, hymns and Bible stories. In fact, that was such a small part of what I remember about church. What I really loved was the community aspect of it all- working together to clean the church on weekends, baking treats for the annual bake sale, volunteering to give back to the community, and seeing my friends and their families every Sunday. I have realized that my kids don’t have anything like that in their lives. I mean, they have a lot of close family members and friends, neighbours, and schoolmates, but nothing quite like what I had. And I wonder if they are missing something by not having that. Will they feel less grounded and secure if they don’t have some sort of faith to fall back on? Will they be less empathetic and generous if they don’t belong to a community that encourages morality and altruism?

It’s a tough question, and I am sure I am not the only parent who has pondered it. I suppose the best thing I can do is to keep teaching my kids to be open-minded, and to respect different beliefs, cultures, and traditions. And to have love and compassion for the world and everything in it. After all, no matter what religion you practice, there always seems to be one simple, common theme: love one another. And really, what more do you need?

Momfession #44: Let’s (not) talk about sex

Posted on by
Reply

The other night, my son walked in on us. Like, you know, WALKED IN. While my husband and I were…otherwise engaged. We don’t have a lock on our bedroom door, but since my son usually falls into a deep sleep pretty quickly (at night, I often put laundry away in his room with the light on!), we didn’t think twice about it. That is, until the door flew open unexpectedly and we scrambled for cover. He looked a bit confused at first, and we tried to play it cool. “Mommy, why aren’t you wearing any clothes?” I told him I was getting ready to take a shower. “But why are you in bed then?” I responded that I had gotten cold and decided to warm up in bed. “Uhhh…but why is Daddy with you?” he continued. Oh, well, of course, Daddy was being nice and trying to warm me up. “But WHY is Daddy naked too??” Man, that kid asks a lot of questions. My last answer to him was so ridiculous I couldn’t believe that it was coming out of my mouth: well Gabriel, sometimes Daddy and I take showers together, to save water. And he bought it. Or it could be that he decided he was tired of asking questions. Either way, he headed back to bed after that. But I was left wondering why I felt so compelled to lie in that situation. After all, I tend to be a pretty honest person, even with my kids. So why lie about sex? It is a natural part of life; why should I hide it? Won’t that give my kids a complex later in life?

I grew up in a fairly modest household. We didn’t walk around the house naked. We didn’t really talk about sex. I went to church on Sundays, and Catholic school during the week. The only times I heard about sex were when I was being told not to do it. It was something that happened behind closed doors, between a husband and a wife, and if you did it before you were married, you were a bad person. And while I turned out fine and am a fairly well-adjusted adult, I sometimes wonder what it would have been like to grow up not associating sex with feelings of guilt and shame.

So perhaps that is why I felt a twinge of guilt for lying to my son when he caught us in the act the other night. Because it is something that I don’t necessarily want to lie about. But how do you come up with an age-appropriate explanation of sex for a 7-year-old? And if I do try to explain it to him, will THAT scar him for life? Maybe there’s some “how-to-not-give-your-kid-a-complex-about-sex-when-he-walks-in-on-you” expert out there that I could consult. Or maybe I should just get a lock for our door. It is certainly less expensive than sending my kid to therapy down the line.

Momfession #43: Psycho

Posted on by
Reply

mom_yelling_at_kidThis weekend, we took a bike ride to the park. It was a gorgeous, unseasonably warm October afternoon, and our kids needed to get out of the house. After a 10-minute-long bike ride in which my son moaned the entire way that his legs hurt! (it turned out that his tires were severely deflated, but being the awesome parents that we are, we only figured it out after we yelled at him to “keep up, slowpoke!” about 20 times), we dropped our bikes and headed for the playground.

About five minutes into our playtime, I noticed a rather loud woman yelling periodically at her kid from the bench behind me. Her son appeared to be the same age as mine (about seven), yet she was screaming at him to “watch out for the swings!” and “don’t run so fast!”. I immediately began to judge her as some overbearing helicopter parent. But I stopped quickly, reminding myself not to be so swift to judge others’ parenting techniques. And then, she did something that I just couldn’t ignore.

Two 12-year-old boys walked into the playground. The woman immediately called her son over and very loudly told him, “not to look at, or talk to that boy Stephen.” The boys looked a bit rough-around-the-edges, and I recognized one of them as being a former classmate of my son’s (in his special behaviour class), so I figured one of the kids must have given her kid some trouble at some point in the past. Then, the woman (also very loudly) added, “and don’t say, ‘hey there’s that kid with Aspergers!’” Hmm, I thought. OK so she knows the kid has special needs…not sure why she thought she had to tell her son (and the whole playground) that. I immediately got edgy, but I kept my mouth shut.  Things quickly started to deteriorate when she began telling the other parents in the playground that the kid was a BAD KID (“I even heard he broke some girl’s ribs this summer!” she shouted, “and that friend of his is in a special violent offenders class!”), and then moved on to provoking the kid by yelling, “you’d better watch yourself” across the playground. The incident ended with the kid throwing sand at the woman and her son, my husband intervening and attempting to calm him down, and me very sternly telling the woman to leave.

The entire event only lasted about 20 minutes, but it had such an effect on me that I just can’t shake it from my mind.  I can’t help but think that there must be parents that have said similar things about my son. A small part of me even worries that our son will end up like those boys when he gets older. But the thing that really bothers me is that I am not sure if I would be much different from that woman, if I didn’t have a child with his own challenging behaviours. Of course, I would never resort to calling a 12-year-old a psycho (she seriously called him that) or taunting and provoking him. But if that kid had bullied my kid in the past, I could sort of see where she was coming from.

My husband and I have spent the last four years in various therapy sessions, parenting classes, and doctor’s appointments in order to try and help our son. But what we have realized is that it has also helped us a great deal. We have become more open minded, more tolerant, more loving, and more honest with our kids. We have learned to celebrate the tiny successes, and that bad days will pass. Most of all, we have learned to accept our child for who he is, challenges and all. Although the days are hard and progress is slow, I don’t think I would change this experience for anything. I truly believe we are better parents, and people, because of it.

Momfession #42: Forgetting

Posted on by
2

When I was pregnant, I was told that after I had my baby I would gradually forget about the pain of childbirth. But the funny thing is, I still remember every detail: all of the excruciating contractions, every gallon of sweat, each “I can’t do this!” of my seven hour (natural) labour and birth. But there are things I forget about the early days of motherhood, and sometimes, I feel downright terrible about it.

I forget how to hold a baby properly. When it’s your kid, you don’t think twice about holding them. You don’t worry that you’re not supporting their head or that they’re in an uncomfortable position. I remember holding my two-month-old baby in one arm while doing “tree pose” during mom and baby yoga, and not giving it a second thought. But now, when someone hands me a baby, I feel awkward. How is it possible that I spent the equivalent of months with a baby in my arms and now I can’t remember what it felt like?

I forget what my daughter looked like. I mean, of course I know what she looks like…now. But I can’t for the life of me remember exactly what she looked like when she was a baby. Even looking at baby pictures is strange…I know that it’s her in the photos, but it just seems so surreal that she was ever so small. On the rare occasion, when I go in to check on her before I go to bed, I’ll see her sleeping face and I’ll get a flashback of the moment she was born, seeing her tightly closed eyes and pouty lips for the first time. But then it is gone.

I forget that being on mat leave wasn’t always a joyride. I often look back and wistfully remember days filled with long walks, playdates, coffee shops, and mommy friends. What I don’t think about is the boredom, the constant vigilance, the longing for adult interaction, the stress of spending an hour trying to put baby down for a 30-minute nap just so I could have a moment to sit and eat lunch.

There are a whole lot of things that I forget, from what it feels like to breastfeed (how could I have spent a year doing something for a few hours a day and completely forget how it feels?), to what it felt like holding my daughter’s hands as she learned to walk, to what her little voice sounded like as she spoke her first words. Forgetting all of that makes me sad, like I’m a terrible mom for not being able to freeze those moments in my mind forever.

So I wonder, am I alone? Do you forget things too? And if so, do you feel guilty about it??

Momfession #41 : All you need is love (I think)

Posted on by
2
child giving thumbs up

G and K give love a “thumbs-up!

This morning, I was sitting in the waiting room at the dance studio while my daughter was “doing ballet” (realistically, she was shaking her bum to the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse soundtrack while wearing ballet shoes, but whatever). We are still new to the studio, and I don’t really know any of the other dance moms yet. So, I just sit and listen to their conversations. Today, like most days, they talk about what activities their kids are doing, how well they are doing in said activities, and what else they will be signing them up for in the future. They have their daughters doing ballet, then shuttling them off to swimming lessons right afterward, followed by Sunday morning skating lessons. Their sons are in hockey, soccer, and lacrosse. Their little ones all attend Montessori schools (where, apparently one child “aced” her entrance interview). Oh, and did I mention their girls are three- and four-years-old?!

I always feel like I am doing pretty well as a parent until I hear those conversations. Then, our “crazy” life of karate three times a week, dance once a week, and a special after school behaviour program for my son seems tame. Where do these parents find the time? More than that, where do they find the money?! My husband and I make a pretty decent income and aren’t extravagant spenders, yet even we feel the budget tightening with every daycare cheque, and monthly karate bill.

As a parent, I try to live by two simple thoughts: 1. try to enjoy every moment, and 2. all you need is love. The first one is obviously easier said than done, especially in those really, really tough moments. It is something I constantly work on, and admittedly, some days are more successful than others. The other rule is something I have always believed: that no matter how much money you have, or stuff you buy, or what school your kid attends, or how many baby sign language classes you sign up for, as long as your love your kid, and your kid feels your love, that is enough. That one is something that gets challenged every once in a while. And today was one of those days.

Does all that stuff really matter? The sports, organic food, and extra curricular programs, the Chinese lessons and the special swimming lessons (in salt-water only, of course). At the end of the day, are those kids going to be more well adjusted than mine? Smarter? More successful? I’m not really sure, but sometimes it makes me nervous.

I was re-reading Freakonomics the other day and got to a chapter called, “Do Parents Really Matter?”. The first time I read the book, I wasn’t a parent, so I don’t think I really paid attention to the content. But this time, I did. According to the data, it turns out that, other than genetics, not a lot matters when it comes to parenting. A kid can come from a broken family, live in a low-income neighborhood and go to a “bad” school and still have a similar chance of success as a child in a “good” school who has two parents at home. That’s not to say that I should set out to be a bad parent, but it surprised me that all of the things we do for our kids don’t matter as much as we think they do.

So, maybe my theory is OK after all. Maybe my kids will turn out the same as, or better than, those private school kids that speak fluent Chinese. Or maybe they won’t. There really aren’t any guarantees in this parenting job, are there? The best I can do is stick to my beliefs, and attempt to create a fun, balanced, low-stress environment for our entire family. And fill my heart with more love more than I ever thought possible. My daughter still doesn’t know her ABCs, and my son isn’t devouring chapter books like some of his peers, but they are loved, and they know it.

Momfession #40: So long, farewell

Posted on by
10

The other day, I sat outside for over an hour in a torrential downpour watching my husband play baseball. It was cold and muddy, my ballet flats and jeans were soaked. As I crouched under a tiny umbrella that had seen better days, one of the players said something about how awful it was to be a spectator in such terrible weather. And without thinking, I replied, “Actually, it isn’t so bad. I would take sitting here alone, even in the pouring rain over chasing my kids around any day.”  He gave me a funny look, and I realized how terrible that sounded. But what was more terrible was how much I meant it.

My husband and I, like most parents, don’t get to spend a lot of time alone. We are actually luckier than most, though; we have a very strong network of family who live nearby which allows us one night a week out (usually to play on one of our many sports teams). On the weekends, we rarely spend time alone. After all, we hardly get to see the kids during the week, with a strict commute/work/school/daycare/sleep routine that allows us about an hour of “free” time to spend with them each day (at which point, we are usually so exhausted that it is spent watching Netflix). So, we pack our weekends full of bike rides, splash pads, apple picking, local festivals, and playdates, and make sure we are doing our best to spend every moment building memories that will last their lifetimes. However, somewhere between building forts in our living room and jack-o-lantern carving, my husband and I get lost.

I hate to admit it, but there are definitely times that I forget why I fell in love with my husband. We get so bogged down by the stresses of life and children that our relationship sometimes feels more like a series of transactions than a marriage. I make dinner, he sets the table. I do the dishes, he gives our daughter a bath. He drops the kids off, I pick them up. Days pass before I realize that we haven’t had a “real” conversation (except if you count discussing the frequency of our preschooler’s bowel movements a conversation). It is amazing how lonely it can all get, if you let it.

Which is why this weekend was so amazing. Two childless days, with no responsibilities other than hanging out with my husband, and watching him play baseball (in the rain). When his games were over, we ate pizza and watched TV together. We took walks and held hands. We spent time with some friends. By the end of the weekend, we both felt a renewed sense of excitement and love; and we both agreed that we need to spend more alone time together.

I know some people who have a really hard time leaving their kids. There are some that even admit they have never left their kids, because they would miss them too much. I definitely love my kids, and I do think about them when I am gone. But I definitely don’t pine for them all day when I am away. Am I a terrible parent because of it? Maybe. But I also think that part of being a good parent is taking care of yourself, and your relationship. When they grow up, my kids will probably not remember the weekend or two a year that their parents skipped town. But I am pretty sure they will remember the love that they felt from us, and the friendship, respect, and love that my husband and I had with each other.

Momfession #39: Summer Mom

Posted on by
2

end_of_summerIt’s the last “unofficial” week of summer for anyone who has kids in school. And while I love back-to-school shopping, the excitement of the first day of school, and the promise of cooler days and fall colours in the near future, I can’t help but get a bit depressed. Over the last two months, I have had someone amazing come into my life, and when summer ends, so does our relationship. I’m talking about Summer Mom. You know…the lady who lets you eat freezies every day, allows you to stay up wayyyy past your bedtime, and who says “OK” to playing video games on a frequent basis. I have come to love Summer Mom so much that I don’t want her to leave. I have been thinking a lot about it lately, in fact. What if I let Summer Mom stick around a bit more? What if I became a bit less rigid and more lenient when it came to parenting throughout the year? Would my kids turn out the same in the end? Does it really matter if they play video games, or eat candy? Would our lives become less stressful and more enjoyable?

Sometimes I feel like I am the only person in my kids’ lives who is concerned with ensuring that they don’t become spoiled, entitled, or downright bratty. I know my husband strongly believes in the way we are raising our kids, but even he is more lenient than I. It feels like I am constantly battling against everyone else who comes into contact with my kids, trying in vain to offset the limitless, present-filled, sugar-coated experience that they have with family and other caretakers. But now I am wondering…what if I just hopped on board the “yes” train and went along for the ride? What if I decided to let my Summer Mom mentality continue into fall? What’s the worst that could happen? Cavities?

Other moms, tell me: do you have a summer version of yourself? If so, what do you think about letting her stick around for a while?

Momfession #38: Karate Kid

Posted on by
4

karate_kid_picture

We haven’t had the greatest success with extra-curricular activities. When our son was  three, we started him in a preschool soccer class. It was a frustrating experience: while all of the other kids listened to to instructor and nicely ran back and forth in the gym, our kid ran in the opposite direction. Or hid in the net. And sometimes purposely kicked the ball at other children. I would sit in the observation area, glaring through the window, mouthing “pay attention!” to him through the glass. My husband decided he couldn’t be the one to take him to the class; it was that frustrating. What followed was years of the same; in gymnastics class, he refused to warm up with the other kids. In baseball, he would walk slowly to first base after a hit, and when he fielded the ball, he would just hold it instead of throwing it in. At swimming lessons, he would swim off while the instructors were teaching the other children. In karate, he was pulled to the side countless times for misbehaving and made to do push-ups. As his parents, it wasn’t just frustrating. It was downright embarrassing. No matter how many times it happened, it still bothered me to watch all of the other kids behaving nicely, learning, progressing in a craft…while my kid just ran around in circles. I longed to be that parent who could just relax and enjoy watching their kid in class, instead of the one who was a constant ball of stress.

So that’s why what happened last week was nothing short of a miracle. After three years of forcing him to go to karate every week, something has finally clicked- and he is catching on faster than anyone expected. He spent the last week at karate camp, and at the end we were told that he is learning so well he will be invited to the elite class. We were blown away…our kid, the one who can’t pay attention, in an elite class?!

Yesterday, my daughter and I went to his Saturday morning class. I sat in the viewing area, and a mom sat next to me with her three-year-old daughter in tow. Her son had just started karate a few weeks ago and she asked me which kid was mine. As I pointed him out, I noticed that he had been pulled from the class and was working with a small group of children who were all at a higher level. “Wow,” she said, “he’s really good.” I nodded in agreement, looked down, and noticed that my daughter had slid over in her seat and asked the woman’s daughter if she wanted to sit down with her. Right then, I felt an overwhelming sense of pride. Here I was, watching my typically-behaviorally-challenged kid perfectly demonstrate the third kata to his peers, while my more-cranky-than-not toddler was offering her seat to a child she just met. Maybe we’re not so terrible at this parenting thing after all, I thought. It might take our kid a bit longer than most to shine, but when it does happen, it is sweeter than anything I could imagine, and I wouldn’t trade it for the world.