Terrible. Just Terrible.

It’s really funny about the beginning of the terrible two’s. Every other family you talk to laughs good naturedly about those “darn terrible two’s”! When you ask them for advice they just shrug and smile and say, oh they grow out of it! Thanks people. What helpful advice you have. Seriously.

Holy crap, is there NOTHING YOU CAN DO?? She is driving me bonkers! This morning was the worst too!

First she gets up early at 6:15. OMG, can you please give me another 45 min?? No? What about 20? Fine, I’ll settle for 10. We do our morning routine as Papa gets ready and leaves as well. After I’m done getting ready, I start heading for Sam. As she sees me coming, she slides to the floor with a shriek and becomes a wet noodle. I start to reason with her but she screams so I pick her up under her armpits and carry her to the bed. The she tries the disappearing act with wails, shrieks, and seriously, you would think I’m harming the sweet little child. I try reasoning again…

Me: Sam, look, you get to wear a cute skirt today! It has ruffles!
Sam: :Looks Quickly – Thinks about it: Dives for the end of the bed
Me: I pull her by her feet toward me.
Sam: Shrieks and dives again.

Oooh, a fun game. Let’s just jump face first into all the blankets, fun! Fine, I put the skirt on backwards as she’s flopping, hoist her up and distract her while the shirt goes on. Put her down on the floor.

Me: Sam, you look SO CUTE today. How cute do you look?
Sam: Goes to the mirror to preen and strut about how cute she looks!

(She does this everyday – it’s hilarious actually)

Whew. Alright, time to go downstairs. I head for the TV to turn it off but I stop VERY QUICKLY as a wail of terror starts behind me.

Me: Ok, I’m sorry! Can you please turn off the TV and close the doors?
Sam: Does exactly that…
Me: Walk out the door, start to close it… but can’t..
Sam: Cause Sam closes it instead.

Very nice. It’s nice that she’s so helpful. Seriously. She won’t let you do anything cause she wants to do it. That entails the TV, dishes, washing machine, dryer, feeding the dogs, etc. It is really nice though. Cause in 10 years there can only be one lazy girl on the couch while the hubby does the chores. And that job is MINE. She’s already starting to come in very handy! Heehee!

So we get downstairs and Mommy is a little sick of Sesame Street. She just needs a LITTLE dose of the news. Gotta get my morning news fix. I grab the remote and walk over to the TV and call to Sam.

Me: Sammie, come turn on the TV please.
Sam: Runs over to me but stops and just look at me.
Me: Can you please turn on the TV?
Sam: Starts to reach out but then puts her hand back down.
Me: Sweetie, if you don’t turn on the TV, Mom’s gonna do it. (Fakes pressing the button)
Sam: Shrieks! Loudly!
Me: Ok, please turn on the TV then.
Sam: Starts to reach out but then puts her hand back down.
Me: TV IS ON

Damn it. I’m sorry, I gave her THREE CHANCES. I’m not playing this indecisive game. As I go to put the controller back she follows me with her wails and screeching, so I walk out of the room telling her next time she needs to turn on the TV as Mommy isn’t going to wait forever! She follows me, I talk to her a little bit, she calms down at some point. I dunno. At the park the other day one Mom was saying, “Yea, it’s awful when they just repeat NO back to you all the time” and another Mom was like, “No, the worst is the indecisiveness”. Um, yea! How did I skip the NO already? She doesn’t say no. Not that I’m wishing for it or anything. (Fairy Godmother, you can skip that wish please!)

So it’s breakfast time now. Girl’s gotta eat, right? Both girls, damn it. I’m hungry. So the past few days I’ve tried putting her in her high chair. What a drama queen. Basically it entailed me dragging off the top, shoving her in, holding her in, and putting the top back on while she screams. After reasoning many times. I swear. So this morning I tried to save myself that drama and asked her what chair she wanted. She wanted her booster chair. That’s great. (Maybe you will get the chance to hear about why we don’t use the booster chair for her already – thats a TOTALLY FUN GAME too!) So I put her in, and she screams, I lock her in, and she wails.

Finally get out the life cereal and some cheerios. I give her some of each. She eats a Life and I turn my back to start making her pancake and my breakfast and turn around, oh fun, she’s crushing the little life cereal into little parts everywhere.

Me: Sam, you eat your cereal, you don’t tear it apart, please don’t do that.
Sam: Looks at me. Eats a Life cereal.
Me: Thanks baby, isn’t it yummy?
Sam: Still looking at me, seems to agree… as she takes another Life cereal and starts to crush it.

ARGH! I mean, I know we have dogs… but they really can’t lick the whole floor can they? (Yes they can, but Justin hates it – so good wife that I am, I try to avoid it… I don’t wanna clean the floors anyway!) So the cereal goes IN the trash. This was after another warning. My thresh-hold is low already. And it’s only 8:30am.

Of course she screams. And wails. And I tell her that next time she should EAT her cereal instead of crush it. Thankfully her pancake is done and she does love her pancake. And dipping it in syrup. “Di.. di.. di!” As she’s starting to eat and finishing quickly, I’m getting my OWN breakfast ready and about to start eating it.

Of course, I sit down when she finishes and wants to get down. Alrighty. Oh, then she wants to wash her hands. Ok, great. Finally sit back down to eat as as I feel a tug on my chair.

Sam: “Deesh, deesh!” Trying to tug my chair over to the sink so we can do dishes…
Me: No baby, Momma’s still eating breakfast. We’ll do dishes after I’m done.
Sam: DEESH! Goes to another chair to tug it, can’t quite get it around the corner.
Me: I wolf down my breakfast…

Skip forward to Target an hour later… Apparently everything at the store is simply made to entertain Sam, and for her to tear it apart and break it… She had some problems with that as I simply can’t allow her to tear apart the nice cards and bows that I’m trying to buy. There was another child screaming around the aisle and I was thinking maybe we can just put them together and I wonder what would happen?

Skip forward to the park an hour later… We haven’t been to a park that has a swing on it for quite awhile! She loves the swings! Wednesday she was in the swing for about an HOUR. Today she was having tons of fun in it as well. About 20 minutes into it, the Stroller Stride Mommies come up to join the park playdate. Everyone was talking and chatting and Sam decides to start screaming. Oooohh, K! What in the world is the problem?

It was so strange! She didn’t want out of the swing but when I pushed her she would scream louder. My child is screaming and I’m sure these Mom’s are wondering why I’m just sitting here watching her. She wouldn’t let me take her out! I finally grab her and wrestle her out, walk over to a quiet corner and we have a ‘talk’. I finally get her to stop crying and then we walk back over to the park. She taps the swing again! Um, ok?? I just look at her! She taps the swing again.

So I put her back in and start to push her… What do you know? She starts crying again! OMG! This child, this sweet sweet child, is going to drive me batty! Finally… FINALLY I figure out apparently I wasn’t pushing hard enough. She wanted to swing fast. I dunno. We were getting to that point but apparently not fast enough.

I totally don’t even want to talk about how we had to leave the park. With her dragging her feet and me tossing her over my shoulder. Then, we got to the ramp and I put her down and we ran up the walkway, she was giggling, ok great. But when we got to the parking lot… Nope! Yea, she’s just gonna sit down on the parking lot and refuse to move. Seriously, so much fun. Apparently I should be bringing the stroller with those wonderful straps with me everywhere if I don’t want to lug her butt (my purse, her milk bag, and my camera) along with me each time.

Joyful, joyful day. I also don’t want to forget to report the arching of the back and screeches when I was attempting to strap her into her car seat. Yep, totally lost it.

So Papa comes home for lunch. Yea. I was tempted to leave her with him while I went out for some air but decided not to. We put away her laundry and she was a little happier. Until we had to go downstairs. Had to throw her over my shoulder again while she screamed cause Papa was still upstairs. Nice one.

Then we played that ‘Highchair or Booster Seat’ game again. Oh joy, you DO get to find out what happens in the booster seat! (If you are still reading this far – Seriously, I’m impressed!) So I fix lunch. I’m feeling SO CRAPPY at this point. I think the Lactose Free Milk I had in the morning still isn’t cutting it. Anything milky apparently is just gross. So great to know. So I decide to make myself some soup, I make her a sandwich, offer all sorts of things to get her to eat. (She doesn’t really eat that much. Obviously she doesn’t take after me.)

So we are all sitting down to lunch and she starts putting her feet on the table. Um, nope sorry totally not allowed. She puts them back down. (We had an issue with this last week – her butt totally got moved to the high chair after the 3rd warning.) Then she started scooting her chair out from under the table by pushing her feet against said table.

Papa decided to get involved at that point. Momma was too exhausted and didn’t care but had reached a small measure of calmness now that someone else was witnessing this crazy crap.

Papa: :Sounding much more reasonable, calm, and nice than Momma: Sam, you can’t do that, you need to sit under the table in your booster chair.
Sam: Pushing out again.
Papa: No Sam (pushing her in again), it’s not safe, if you want to be a big girl you need to sit under the table in your booster chair. If you don’t, you will be sitting on the floor.
Me: No, she will be moved to her high chair.
Papa: That’s right, we will move you to your high chair.
Sam: Waits a minute or two and then pushes out again.

Papa: :Look at me and asks about time-outs, as he pushes her back in again.

Time out conversation ensues. Where should we do it? Here? No not there? Why not there? Well, this is why. What about something else?

Sam: Pushes her chair out again.

Me: Ok, Sam. Guess what, you get to go in your high chair now.

Um, yea, guess what happens? LOL – Total screams and craziness. No high chair cause she is a crazy person. She wants to go back in the booster seat. Um, sorry, no booster seat for you kiddo. I use the counting down from 5 to 1 trick. She usually stops whatever she is doing when I do that. She did that the very first time I did it, it’s kind of a cool trick! Doesn’t really DO anything though but she does stop screaming. For a second.

Anyway, we end up trying time out in the dining room. It at least removes her from the situation. I guess I need to get one of those egg timers. Maybe that will reinforce the whole ‘timeout theory’ until the buzzer goes.

She doesn’t stop being crabby though. Oh no. But we played for a few minutes as she was pretty calm. Then we went upstairs for a nap. I don’t even want to type out the whole “do you want to read a story? No? If you don’t want to read a story, then we are going straight to bed” argument. Well, that was basically it. Over and over again. Yesterday I spent about 10 min convincing her that she wanted to read a story rather than go straight to bed. Putting her to bed without a story is totally mean but if she shuts every book I open, what am I to do?? Today I totally didn’t even bother. You don’t want to read a story? Cool. You are going to bed and I’m getting a break!

I got a nice break for over 3 hours. I did lie down and take a nap for about two of them. Typed this out for a bit. Sam just got up at 445 and proceeded to show she has not gotten any happier after her nice long nap. Such a shame. I think Momma needs the next time out. And it’s gonna be as soon as Papa comes home!

What a fun day. 🙂 Glad everyone got to read about my fun day (if you’ve made it this far!). I even left out 3 or 4 more tantrums. Lucky you, huh? Feel free to impart any advice!