Wine, chocolate and the fireplace channel: sometimes it’s the only cure for parenthood. Today was just one of those days -- you know, the kind no one likes to talk about, but everybody has? It started out innocently enough, despite the convergence of a Halloween hangover and the daylight savings farce.
“Let’s go to the mall and get a banana chocolate chip muffin!” Little did I know those were fightin’ words to a toddler. You’d think I’d just suggested she eat a bowl of Brussel sprouts or walk out of a toy store without taking every single stuffed animal off the shelf.
One day she’s all super-cute in an owl costume, skipping through the neighbourhood charming everyone she encounters, the next’s she’s like an emotional bat out of hell. Today’s prolonged, overwrought outburst can only be described as a super-tantrum. It made the the usual screaming and thrashing fit look like a walk in the park.
Smacking. Scratching. Hair-pulling. The both of us crying.
Eventually (after a hysterical eternity), the fight went out of her and she just stood before me, a little girl sobbing her little heart out. You know you’re a mother when your child’s psychological comfort becomes more important than your sense of personal insult.
I told her I was sad and that she should say sorry. She held her arms up and hiccuped her way to calm. After a few minutes, she brought me all her favourite balls, carefully piling them in my lap, a toddler’s version of a make-up gift.
“Let’s go to the mall and get a banana chocolate chip muffin!” Little did I know those were fightin’ words to a toddler. You’d think I’d just suggested she eat a bowl of Brussel sprouts or walk out of a toy store without taking every single stuffed animal off the shelf.
One day she’s all super-cute in an owl costume, skipping through the neighbourhood charming everyone she encounters, the next’s she’s like an emotional bat out of hell. Today’s prolonged, overwrought outburst can only be described as a super-tantrum. It made the the usual screaming and thrashing fit look like a walk in the park.
Smacking. Scratching. Hair-pulling. The both of us crying.
Eventually (after a hysterical eternity), the fight went out of her and she just stood before me, a little girl sobbing her little heart out. You know you’re a mother when your child’s psychological comfort becomes more important than your sense of personal insult.
I told her I was sad and that she should say sorry. She held her arms up and hiccuped her way to calm. After a few minutes, she brought me all her favourite balls, carefully piling them in my lap, a toddler’s version of a make-up gift.
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