I am struggling with a way to talk about my day without sounding like a dictionary of clichés, but I really don’t know if that is possible. Or maybe, it isn’t quite possible for my brain to work in a manner that does not rely on clichés to get its point across.
I have talked about my autistic son and our struggles a number of times here, but I haven’t shared much of his sister’s journey. She is not autistic but does struggle with being twice exceptional, or 2E, and being the sister of the child who is different. If you want a refresher on 2E, you can read my post about it with some educational links. She is currently also in therapy to help her deal with anxiety and other coping skills needed to traverse her world as a gifted, asynchronous student. And all that sounds wonderful, today was a dose of the gritty reality.
We have talked about her school day, she seems to have had a good day and is excited because she got to spend money in the “Holiday Shop” at school. Now, this is set up so the students can pick small gifts for their family. She has apparently spent most of the money on gifts for herself. Besides, it isn’t as if she has earned this money, she has to ask us for it. She has eaten, fast food cause it was that kind of day, and has been given a deadline for rest in anticipation of homework time. Every time, I think that will be enough. That speaking to them in a reasonable manner will allay struggles against doing tasks they don’t won’t to do. It felt today as if this technique only works about 10% of the time. Whenever things are going bad, it is hard to see and remember the many good times. The times where you get more cooperation than opposition and more smiles than tears seem light years away, almost as if you have never experienced them. So, it comes time for homework and because I have told her to allow me to get the homework out and bring it to her, she has lost her mind. Screams are heard, bodies are thrown around, pencils go flying and papers are torn. What? Really? Because you can’t get the homework folder, you are now incapable of reading the directions or completing your homework. You need your parents to sit with you, you don’t need to calm down, you aren’t going to your room, you won’t stop screaming at your brother who is only trying to help. Her loving disposition has turned into that of a wet cat cornered in an alley. She is kicking, screaming, and scratching anything or anyone who gets close. She can’t tell help for harm anymore and no rational thoughts are going through her mind.
It always starts so innocuous. We are skipping through the tulips and then BAM! a bull comes out and tramples us under his hooves. That is how it feels. You are doing all the things normally noted to ensure a smooth transition between school and home. Yet, sometimes those techniques don’t do what they are designed to do. She needs more time, but she won’t say that, it is just meltdown over not being allowed to get her homework. Now, you may be thinking, why didn’t you just let her get her own homework. To be honest, I was executing a plan which included them cleaning up the tasks they were working on while I distributed homework. I had a plan and wasn’t flexible fast enough to head off the meltdown. I don’t always get it right. That is the key. I just don’t get it right every time. We think once we are parents that we will somehow be magically equipped with the right response to every thing that happens. The thousands of parenting books we are told we should read in preparation lulls us into thinking that is all it takes, knowledge of what to do when. Well, the real world doesn’t work like that and not just when it comes to parenting. I am struggling like most parents I know, to get it right. Parent guilt is a thing, especially if you are wholly invested in giving your kids a solid foundation for going out into the world. Which, I must say, I think is every parent until proven otherwise. It helps me sleep at night, true or not. I start off with the calm, low voice. You know, the one designed to force them to listen hard and reassure them you still love them. No matter that they have pulled everything off the shelves in Target, you are here, a never-changing bulwark of love. You constantly redirect the behavior, repeat the requirement, and swallow your tongue when she screams “I don’t care” and throws the pencil for the fifteenth time tonight! Then, by time twenty, you have lost it too. You want to let your inner seven-year old out to play and that seven-year old inside you wants to kick and scream to voice their displeasure and show the kid you can do it too. You can meltdown without a care in the world, and while you are doing it, if you are doing it, it feels freeing and fun. Then immediately you feel disgusted with yourself, at your lack of ability to not let an eight-year old drag you down into the abyss. You scream and then you rein it back in, a desperate attempt to re-exert your control. Frankly, it hardly ever works. The only way to really get control again is to apologize for your behavior and take yourself off to lick your wounds. Basically you have to do all the things you tell the kids they need to do in order to change their behavior. Ugh, it is such a bad feeling when your kids make you eat your words. I take this moment to tell them that Mommy needs a time out, then I run and lock myself in my bedroom in a desperate attempt to keep them from following me.
And that is the lesson you have to learn for yourself. Sometimes, Mommy needs a time out in order to be tuned in to the other important things. Because, honestly, the homework was only the straw that broke the proverbial camel’s back. She was obviously carrying around feelings about something else that had taken place in her day but couldn’t really articulate that. A meltdown over homework was her cry for help. Me screaming about the definition of “fair” was mine. So, I calmly told them I should take a time out since I was resorting to raising my voice. Then I pushed them out of my room and locked the door and read a book until I could think about opening that door without screaming.
