Momma is CRANKY

[liralen]

Jet and I fought all morning while I was trying to get everything ready to send him to school. I was abrupt, angry, and shouting a lot and Jet was, rightfully, furious with me, but being four he was still interested in just doing what he was doing... right when I finally had everything into the car but him, Jet announced he had to use the potty.

I was grateful that he told me so there was no accident in the car. BUT he then sat down to poop and sat and sat and then started singing...

I just held my head and wanted to scream.

Ahem. Yes. I am, on occasion a very cranky mother.

Jet said, "I don't like it when you're cranky, Mom. I don't like it at all."

"I don't like it either Jet."

And I had to just sit and think about why the hell was I so angry?? I'd been like this all yesterday afternoon and evening, and I was equally grumpy while putting Jet to bed. I'm covering for something. And I poked around and sure enough, yesterday, at work I'd been in a conversation that was morally repugnant to me. I'd said some things that I realized, this morning, that I really, really regreted saying and didn't say some things that I really regretted NOT saying. And I was really angry at the others for assuming certain things and really angry with myself for letting myself down.

I then said to Jet, "Momma's cranky 'cause of stuff at work. It's not you." He nodded and then wiggled to his own internal music.

I left Jet to his peaceful bowel movement, and just breathed for a while and planned my apology. Then we got him to school, half an hour late, which the teachers didn't really seem to mind, and Jet slipped right into the stream of things after getting a promise of a root beer float when Daddy picked him up.

I went to work and wrote the apology and sent it along with a coherent argument against the concensus I had found wrong. There was a rather inflammatory reply by one of the guys, which I expected, and I wrote a reasonable reply, I think, cutting out inflammatory stuff.

I am calmer, now. I have, written on my public white board, "Jet sez, 'Phyllis is cranky.'" There have been a few good laughs at that. I hope to treat Jet more fairly tonight. We'll see.

Comments

[kathrynt.livejournal.com]

You are such a good mother, Liralen. I'm so impressed that you're able to apologize to your child, and that you've raised him to be able to call you on unpleasant behavior.

[liralen.livejournal.com]

*sniffle*

Thank you.

I've been very thankful that he does and can call me unpleasant behavior on my part, and he does it pretty frankly, without any blame game. It's too darn easy to fall into "it's your fault" kinds of games, and I've rather severly sat on that kind of thing on my part so that he doesn't pick that up on his.

What really floored me was that last night, while I was cranky, he was cranky too, and he was acting out and I asked him, "WHY are you doing that!?" He frowned and thought, "It's 'cause you're doing it, too." And after having said that he stopped destoying thing and was in a MUCH better mood.

So he's actually discovering the benefits of self-appraisal, too. Whew.

[incandescens]

(hugs) That was very balanced and reasonable of you, and I admire you for working through it.

[bwb-archive.livejournal.com]

My god... What a great mom you are. Thank you so much for this, because it reminds me of some of the reasons I love you and gives me hope that good moms and dads are out there.

Dis(Mis)placed anger. Know that one. Working on that one. :)