I just so happen to be lucky enough to be parenting a child who inherited my stubborn personality. He is, without a doubt, the person who gets under my skin the most in the whole world. Maybe he and my mother are neck and neck, but for the most part my relationship with him is the most difficult thing in my life.
I feel like we are constantly at odds. He is actually stubborn enough to bend my will from time to time, and I am extremely stubborn. I go whole days where I feel bad at the end of the day because I realize that all I have done is yell at him or send him to time out. There are whole weeks where I realize that I have had almost entirely negative interaction with my son. I feel like I will try to do fun, good things with him and it will blow up in my face because it ends in a tantrum.
I love my son. He's funny and smart. He's very people oriented. He loves people and he always wants to make his friends happy. If another kid comes to our home, he offers them a juice box and a go-gurt. He remembers people that we haven't seen in over a year. He loves to read and he tells really good stories. I am pretty sure that he actually thinks he is a superhero and his blue/grey eyes shine when he smiles. He looks exactly like his daddy would look if he had my nose. He's one of the most amazing things I have ever seen in my life. But when he's screaming at me because he wants Goldfish crackers for breakfast instead of waffles, all of that gets lost.
It's like the moment he starts yelling and whining, I tune him out and go into defensive mode. It's not fun on the best of days. It's even less fun when I have no one to relieve me and no break from him at all. He goes to preschool and some days I can't wait to drop him off and I dread picking him up. I don't like feeling that way about my child.
I knew coming into deployment that I was going to have to tackle our relationship head on. I knew that I was going to have to dip into my creative reserves and I was going to have to pour out every last drop of patience and empathy. I was right. We are only a month into this thing, and some days I just don't even know how the rest of the time is going to be possible. Some days, he gets away with murder just because I am so exhausted from fighting with him.
The last couple of days have been better. Today was Day 5 of he and I filling out our "I Like Book." I saw the book on a website that I frequent that offers good deals on baby and children's items and I decided that it was worth a try. I figured that it definitely wouldn't make things worse. The book arrived and I decided that I would start after the New Year so that I could look through it first.
The idea is simple. There are two slots for every day and you write the name of the person who is writing the "like" and then you write a "like." The two slots are there so that both the mother and the father can write something, but since this is my project and my husband is gone I have been having my son tell me one thing that he likes about me. There are extra spaces from time to time in the book for sketching or doing small activities.
Tonight, I told my son that I like when he helps me feed the dog. His contribution was that he likes my smile. My heart melted. I actually shed a tear. For one thing, this activity is so simple that he actually understands what is expected of him and is eager to participate. My son, who I had just had to pull out of the bathtub for dumping water out, likes my smile. My smile brightens his day. He knows how he can brighten my day now.
In only five days, I am seeing a little bit of change in the way he behaves toward me and in my attitude toward him. I look forward to the two minutes we spend "liking" each other at the end of the day. This book could be one of the best investments I have ever made.
I leave you with an oldie, but a goody.
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