I have to go potty!
Avery and I joined Christie & Henry and Amber & Avery, Cayden, & Josie at Out of This World Pizza and Play today. Avery had a fantastic time. She especially adored that Same Avery* would guide her through the play structures and carry her around. I was so grateful for Same Avery, too.
We tried to go potty before we left, however my little girl only goes when she wants to go, not when Mommy recommends it. She goes when she wants to go and there is no forcing her. I can't actually complain in this department since she never has accidents and can hold her bladder for 13 hours. But this point is key to the story: she did not go potty.
Anyway, we finished up after three hours there (seriously, the kids love that place). Avery didn't want to leave, so I had to do a snatch and grab and carry a kicking screaming child to the car. Of course, then there was the car seat battle where I learned I can keep her from sliding down in the car seat if I put my knee on the seat to keep her anchored in place (good to know for future car seat battles). It took me maybe 3 minutes to get her into the car seat. At that point, Avery is screaming bloody murder from her car seat. We drive away and she's asking for water. I give her water. She then says, "No!" and throws the cup (with a lid on it) across the car. Fine. We keep driving. Then she starts with the, "I have to go potty!" cries. I pull over and realize that I don't have the potty in the car. I start driving again and decide we can just go into a store. I pull into the parking lot and go around to Avery's car seat. However, each time I approach her, she'd scream and kick, so I'd back away. Then she'd stop, but if I turned to go back to my seat, the screaming started again. I finally decide to risk a potty accident in the car seat and proceed to drive home. She howls at the top of her lungs the whole time.
We get home. I go around to let her out of the car seat. She's still screaming how she needs to go potty, but she's kicking and screaming as I take her out of the car seat. I get her into the house and take off her pants so she can go potty. She refuses and runs to go back into the garage, but I'd locked the door earlier. So now she's standing at the garage door just wailing away. This goes on for maybe 10 minutes, then I finally hear her go into the bathroom to go potty on her own. It takes me another ten minutes or so to convince her to get off the potty (she's just sitting there). Finally, something switches and she turns into my sweet little girl.
We head upstairs, drink some milk, read some books, have a quick cuddle, and she goes right to sleep. I immediately head downstairs and inhale a huge bowl of ice cream (can you say emotional eating?) Then, I head upstairs and fall asleep.
Avery slept in her room for 1.5 hours. Then she woke up, didn't realize I was in my bed, and decided to sleep another hour on the floor outside her bedroom. Fine by me.
So, yes, I got to take a 2.5 hour nap, but I paid a huge price to get it.
* Josie, when introduced to my Avery, but already having a sister named Avery, started to call her sister Same Avery and my Avery she'd call Different Avery.
Ohhhhhhh
So it never really dawned on me until recently that when people say being a stay at home parent is tough, they don't actually mean it's tough with a baby or a 1-year-old. They mean with the terrible two/three-year-olds. Please don't tell me four is as bad. I won't make it. I'm already clinging to the hope that if your child goes through the terrible twos, they don't go through the terrible threes. I didn't exactly find it easy before, but I certainly didn't find it nearly as difficult as everyone talks about. To be clear, I now find it excruciatingly difficult. It's hard. So.very.hard.
Dancing
To end on a good note for this post, I will share a little dancing story. Before bed tonight, Avery asked to dance to Michael Jackson. She got all ready, which means she had nothing but her tutu on, then requested the music start. Of course, being the tiny dictator she is, she instructed D and me to dance with her. So we did. We were snapping to the music at one point and she could see we were making this noise with our hands somehow, but couldn't snap herself. So what she decided to do was open and close her hands to look like she was snapping while clicking her tongue to imitate the noise. It was a pretty darn cute way to end a challenging day.
This SAHP found being home alone with a *baby* to be really tough. Not necessarily because of the age of the child, but because of the loss of control over my schedule (which I guess was because of her age, come to think of it -- constant feeding, changing, holding, napping, not napping, etc). I think I find it easier now with Nolan because I've gotten used to it and better at it. I have found ways to feel productive, which is key to my self esteem, while I have the baby whereas I felt very useless and trapped before. Babywearing was very liberating for me.
ReplyDeleteThat is a crazy tantrum! Kudos to you for being so active in addressing it. I think I would have just left her in the car and gone in the house out of frustration... potty accident risk and all.
That's a good point, RHG. Different people find different things challenging. I hadn't really thought about it from the perspective of what gives/depletes self-esteem, which also varies from person to person.
ReplyDeleteThinking about it from that angle, I apparently don't derive self esteem from productivity within the house (much to D's dismay, I'm sure), but rather from doing my job well. As a SAHP, I rate myself on how often I'm getting her out to socialize with other kids, how healthfully she's eating, how often we read books or do puzzles, how well she plays independently, how well I provide opportunities to get in good naps, how many new ideas I'm exposing her to, how well how well I handle fits, how well I roll with the punches the various phases deliver. Notice how those last two are suffering miserably at the moment, which account for my extreme difficulty at the moment.
Before she hit two (which basically came at 23 months) = so much easier for me, but conversely way less fun. Thankfully, I do find a lot of aspects of her being 2yo totally fun because I'm not sure I would make it through the day otherwise. A tantrum may only last 30 minutes on the long end of things, but I swear that for every one minute of tantrum/fighting me/being obstinate-for-no-reason, it sucks 10 minutes of energy out of me.
I guess I should amend this to say "my job as I define it." We all define it differently, I'm sure.
ReplyDeleteI don't think I have ever defined my job, to be honest, but if I did, I would probably include productivity in the house (neither way is right nor wrong, just saying for me it's part of my job). I think you do an *excellent* job of being a sahp. You do extremely well at all the first things you listed. You are still above average, I think, on the "suffering miserably" points.
ReplyDeleteThinking about the sahp definition, I don't have as many categories, but I subconsciously grade myself on challenging and exercising her mind, challenging and exercising her body, trying to get her the right fuel (food, rest) for those exercises, and demonstrating my love and care for her. But I also grade myself on my own mental state, because if I am not happy myself, then everything else suffers. Being productive makes me happy.
I read an article once that said a lot of today's generation (meaning, us) needs to be productive to feel happy. The article asked why that was true. Why is it that when we have down time, so many of us think "what should I be doing now?" It is really hard to simplify one's life so it's not a series of tasks. I hope to simplify my life eventually... but who knows when I will have the time to address that. :)
Yeah, I don't have the down time issue of thinking "what should I be doing now?" :) I just think, "How quickly can I get into bed to take a nap?"
ReplyDeleteTo be clear, I do include productivity in the house in my job description, I just rate it waaaaaay lower than anything else. And I am seemingly just fine with not excelling in that area.