What a Day

I could just cry. I could scream. It was the worst day in awhile and it has me all tied up in fits.

The head start home visit wound C up. She was a mess the half hour before we had to leave for acro jazz. She doesn't pick fights, but she'll do something super annoying over and over again and Alaska will ask her a dozen times to stop and she'll keep doing it and then Alaska wigs out on her and she wonders what hit her. It's aggravating. And it's not even something that would be super annoying the first time, it's just that her filter for controlling herself is gone a lot of the time and it just happens. I don't feel like she does it to get a rile out of Alaska - she does it because she doesn't know when enough is enough.

C was holding the reclining chair down in the living room, trapping Alaska in the corner. Alaska asked her to stop and she didn't, I sent her to her room, but more like had to pick her up and dump her in there because she wouldn't go. Bad, I know. Steven gave me a talking to about being more patient and getting her attention and talking out the situation rather than just straight wigging out. You don't reason with a 4 year-old, though. But I suppose that is what this counseling appointment is about. It can hardly come fast enough.

Anyways, she was in her room, screaming her head off. Which is so not ok. Steven wanted to take acro jazz away from her for the day because she couldn't pull it together. And of course, my reaction to that was, "It's her responsibility to show up for acro jazz. That's not something you can take away." And off we went. Bad, bad, bad. I think if I had a super power, it would be to see one hour in advance. So we get to acro jazz and she won't sit on the chairs to wait for the teacher. She would much rather race up and down the hall. I pulled out one of my better tools and I gave her a choice. "This chair? Or the chair over there?" Her face actually lit up in a smile after being turned in a frown about having to sit. Win for me! And then her teacher showed up and she was out of her seat, clamoring for attention the way that she does. Talking the loudest, pushing the closest and oh my goodness child - relax! She wouldn't sit down, her teacher says, "You need to listen to directions" and leaves. Lucky her. Still C won't sit down and I give her hand a little pull, which she whips away from me as if I have bitten her. The sweet girl sitting beside me who is in the older class says, "You can sit next to me." And C grudgingly sits down, but she sits. I tell her, "I need you to sit here for a little bit to make sure you can follow directions" and she bawls. A lot. And I say, "When you can pull yourself together, you can go to class" More tears. But she pulls herself together and doesn't give me a backward glance.

I don't want to go home. I am still high on all the hard work I put into it that morning and Steve was up at his parents house helping his dad with a truck project. Nothing much to go home for. We drove through the Taco Bell line and got some food to eat somewhere. I didn't want to be rude and take food up to Steve's parents' house without getting them some, too, and I hate it when people bring food to the play ground, so we went to this dog park area that has a table and is pretty vacant. I was still mad about the scene C had made at the dance studio and had her stay in the car for 5 minutes.

When she got out, everyone was happy and we played hide-and-seek and were having a great time. Tamera was driving back from doing activity days and stopped by. Everyone was so happy to have her there and Alaska had discovered little buds on the evergreens and was excitedly showing Grammar.  C walked up and swiped it out of her hand. She doesn't often do this, but it was timeout worthy. She swiped it out of Alaska's hand, kept walking, and then turned around when I said, "Umm, that's not appropriate. Get to the car" Which of course, no way was that happening. I took her hand to lead her there and she dead-weighted. So I picked her up and she was grabbing all over the car for something to hold onto to keep herself from getting put inside. It was ugly. And then when I did get her in, she opened the door and kicked it open. Holy! Did that just happen?

I left her there, crying and hollering for 5 minutes, went and checked in, and set the timer for another 5 minutes. She calmed down before that second 5 minutes and Tamera suggested I go get her while she was calm. She was happy for awhile and then was being immature and while I was talking to Tamera instead of watching her like a hawk - she picked up a handful of gravel and flung it - hitting Tamera's car. How much can a person take?!?!!?!? She was in the car again, same kind of episode as before. I lost it this time. My stamina was gone and I had been crossed one too many times. And we left. Baths for everyone and stories for those that weren't in the bath at the time and then rotating so that by the time everyone was out of the bath, everyone had had stories and it was time for brushing teeth and prayers and laying down with C and Alaska for 5 minutes each, as we always do.

I layed the love on thick - kill them with love. Read stories with C and held her close while Alaska and Talmage were in the bath. Also, I felt bad for losing it and wasn't what I wanted the highlight of her day to be. She is so easily distracted. When I asked her about today while laying down with her she said nothing about it. Which doesn't mean that it won't come up later, but at least I know I did my best to be gentle for the rest of the night. Extra soft voice and lots of hugs.

Probably me losing it wasn't the worst part. It was more the feelings that had to build up in order for me to pop like that. That was the bad part. I think I have more of a stubborn streak in me than I ever realized. Instead of throwing in the towel before acro jazz like a smart person would have done, I pushed through. And kept pushing.