Tuesday, May 31, 2011

The case of the Mondays on a Tuesday

I woke up at 7:30 and went on the computer to check out Facebook, gmail- my usual routine. Around 8, I went into jamie's room and gently woke him up, peeling the blankets from around his sleepy head. "I found him! I found the sleepy boy!" I usually say. He mutters and whacks my hands away. I tell him he needs to get up and put his school clothes on. I proceed to pull out a pair of underwear, khaki pants and a green polo shirt, depositing them on the couch. He eventually creeps out of the bedroom and wraps his blanket around him as he curls up on the couch. Thinking of skipping the brown sugar today, I instead pour the contents of his meds into a spoonful of key lime yogurt. Sitting beside him on the couch, I offer the spoon, letting him know I've changed it to yogurt and reminding him that he likes key lime flavor. He scrunches his face, a small hint of a grin and shoves my hand away, "No!".
Every morning, it's the same routine. A five to ten minute battle to get him to take his meds. The capsule is too large for him to swallow so I've been emptying them into spoonfuls of brown sugar. At first, he always took it, no complaints. But lately, he seems to relish saying no, whenever possible.
I admit, after pleading for five minutes and him finally spilling the yogurt on himself, I lost it. I was angry and tired of this nonsense. "Look what you did! UGGHHH!!! Why can't you just take it?!" I'm raging mad, trying not to raise my voice but I know it's getting louder anyway. I try to flip him over to spank him but he twists and I smack his hip instead. Frustrated, I throw the spoon into the sink, walk back to the couch and yank him to his feet.
"Stand there," I pull him to the kitchen and attempt to load up another spoon. By now, he's trying really hard not to cry- me too. I offer the spoon and curtly tell him to take it. He opens his mouth and it's finally over. I'm starting to calm down and I tell him that I'm sorry but he needs to stop telling me no and do what he's asked. Eventually he gets dressed and changes back to his perky self.
I'm still kind of angry over the whole ordeal. I hate doing this. I feel like my child deliberately says no and acts up because it's me. He seems to do fine with most other people. I'm convinced he hates me somedays. Anyway, I felt I should write it down and maybe tomorrow things will be better.

2 comments:

Paul Bauman said...

Don't beat yourself up... He doesn't hate you. He just knows he can test you (I know how infuriating that feels).

Scout behaves this way with me too, though the testing comes in waves. She also never does this with anyone but myself and Zak.

Christine said...

I try not to. I just remind myself that I was a total brat as a child and I turned out okay... relatively speaking :) Thank you for the encouragement. :)