Sigh.
2 weeks ago this girl was almost 100% cute.
Just last week she was cracking me up and melting my heart by calling out "Heavenly Father loves me, mom! Heavenly Father loves me, mom!" when she woke up in the morning and from her nap. Yelling, at the top of her lungs.
This week, she is choosing to act the 2-year old part very well. To the fullest. A fully fleshed out 2-year old character.
She's always been quite a character, a lot pf personality. She's always been stubborn and opinionated. But now, she is in full force. She wants to do everything by herself, her way, on her terms. She does not take kindly to any suggestion, request or compromise.
Tantrums and timeouts abound.
It's no accident that parenthood is an essential part of our development, purpose, and exaltation. There are so many lessons that cannot be learned any other way. There is no other relationship that can approximate the parent-child relationship, and I say this all from my vast 6 years of experience as a mother. But seriously, in only 6 years I have learned (or more likely just begun to learn) lessons and character traits and patience that I couldn't have learned in any other way. Parenthood is a crash course in many things including selflessness and compromises and it is not for the faint of heart. So naturally, I daily feel that I am not up to the task and there must be some mistake in allowing me to be responsible for the raising of these children.
Fiona is putting me through the ringer right now. It is making me examine every request and directive that comes out of my mouth and constant assessment of my priorities and what is really important. I am choosing my battles, as they say. The problem is, I am stubborn like a 2-year old myself. I want to fight all the battles. I want everything to be important to me. I want to take stand on every issue, to teach a lesson, a value, a skill, to make a point. Unfortunately that is all more than counterproductive with Fiona, it is damaging and threatens our sanity. I am having to let a lot of things go, relinquish control, disregard what others might think and take a lot, a lot of deep breaths.Basically, I am having to overcome all of my natural inclinations.
Is it nap time yet?
(That is, until she finally learns to climb out of her crib. Say a little prayer for me.)
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4 comments:
Been there, been there, been there! I too, I'm not looking forward to the day Rhea learns to escape her crib. Somedays it's all that keeps me sane.
I can attest that she was nearly 100% cute very recently! Sorry things have taken a turn for the worse.
One thing I know for sure: without being a mother (and a mother to these children of mine), I would never have learned patience and sacrifice the way that I have. I don't think I would willingly give everything that I have if it weren't demanded of me.
And, seriously - you can't fight all the battles. You just can't.
You may need to look into buying a crib tent to help contain her if she starts climbing out of her crib.
I feel like every day is a struggle to keep myself in check so that I don't crush my kids' spirits. Even though my kids aren't super difficult, they are still different from me (especially Whitney) so we butt heads and have very different idea about what "clean" means. I live in fear that I'm missing the forest for the trees when it comes to parenthood!
Thank heavens, you and Michelle were extremely tractable children...then there was Ryan!
Oh, dee. You just have to pray for this to pass. Surely your blogging fan base can offer support!
She has been a true entertainer until now...I'm pretty sure you'll find some book soon to help with an approach! Prayer couldn't hurt.
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