Wednesday, November 4

Reset

Sometimes I don't know what to do with my kids. I think any parent with any amount of honesty would say the same thing. Sometimes they're hard to be around or upset or angry and the motions of a little are a force to be reckoned with, even when they're happy.

Caroline is especially difficult at times. When she's upset she gets wound up and does a lot of wailing and lashing out. It might be something as simple as telling her she can't have a piece of her Halloween candy or getting on to her for hitting her brother. Whatever the impetus she takes the feelings inside her and lets them expand until they explode in a shower of anger and self-righteous misery. When she is upset everyone knows it.

Caroline is her mother's child. Embarrassing, but true. You'd think I'd know how to calm the tempest in her, but really her tempest has a tendency to stir my own. In the best of circumstances I have to clamp down in order to control myself, but when I'm tired or not feeling well, or I haven't had enough time alone, I have a very difficult time holding on to myself and riding out her storm.

Lately I'm making it a practice, when I don't know what to do, to default back to the most basic thing that I know she needs: Love. Maybe she needs discipline or calm or some sort of reality check, but in that moment I'm not always sure, so I try my best to just love her.

It's a principle that I try to extend to myself as well. In those moments when I'm out of sorts or wanting things I can't or shouldn't have I try to reset and show myself the greatest amount of love possible.

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