First the rant then… and before I even get started it is probably only fair to recognise that this is about me and not about them but the kids are driving me MAD! I started today with good intentions about getting our educational resources, doing worthwhile stuff with them and being patient and loving and kind (a Mary Poppins type if you will!). Wrong! They don’t actually want to sit and sing about spoonfuls of sugar, do workbooks and other educational stuff, they want to run around the house shrieking, empty all the toys out in every room, wipe sticky hands everywhere and woe betide me if I think for one minute I am going to sneak off to the computer to delete comments from Texas Holden and maybe even have a peep at my online course (which looks rather good BTW!).
In sheer desperation I sat them down with a slice of our rather good cake each infront of Toy Story (their request – the TV has been off all day so I don’t feel too bad about that!) and escaped! They have just come out of the lounge having eaten all their cake (so that’s no tea for them tonight then!) with Davies wearing Ady’s shoes and pushing a baby buggy and Scarlett wearing my shoes and walking along beside him carrying a handbag! Davies keeps saying ‘Nic, Nic’ to Scarlett and now he has just mimed getting in his car and going to work – hilarious:-)
Anyway, the worst part of it all is Ady keeps ringing me today (some days he just does that a lot, sort of to chat because I am sure he gets bored driving around all day long, and I think he’s stuck in traffic) and on his fourth and final call when I complained about how the kids don’t want to do any of the ‘activities’ I keep bringing out he expressed concern on how that was going to work for HE then? Sigh! I think he thinks he is being supportive and sharing my concerns, and when I gently (oh beware the softly spoken Nic!) explained that it is probably more because they are 4 and nearly 2 than any other reason he agreed that by the time they are actually both of school age that is very unlikely to be an issue but it didn’t help anyway 🙁
I rarely worry really about being able to provide the education the children need, or whether they will end up as ‘weirdos’ because they don’t go to school, infact I don’t seem to spend half as much time worrying about how the children will turn out or fare due to HE as I do pondering on getting out the other side with my own sanity intact! I truly believe this is an ‘early years’ issue for me though – I was not keen on the ‘baby years’ and although I know it is going to be a reflection of what I put into them and do with them now that will play a big part in the older children they will become I truly think as they get older, slightly less reliant on me for everything, and able to meet at least their own basic needs I will calm down a lot. It is the mundane side of being a SAHM to two small preschoolers that I struggle with TBH – the nappy changing, the routine of feeding and drinking, ensuring they are eating as balanced a diet as I can persuade them into, wiping bottoms, coercing them into bed at a certain time so I can snatch a few hours of grown up ness before falling asleep exhausted by doing not a lot all day really, ready to be woken in the night yet again by a small person wriggling next to me.
I am not wishing their lives away – although I know it probably reads a bit like that, and I do get lots of pleasure from seeing all the firsts and milestones as they reach them…. I guess to out it in perspective if I were to be a teacher, I would rather have the juniors than the infants! Whilst I am sure that every age has it’s ups and downs I feel my personality is better suited to doing stuff together like the museum trips to London (where we were very hampered by the pushchair and other assorted baby paraphenalia) than a trip to a toddler group – I am longing to do stuff with them instead of doing stuff for them or to them. I have been reading lots about children;s behaviour (and their parents) of late and I’m not sure whether that helps – as it does make me realise the children are just exhibiting totally normal behaviour or makes it worse – as these books tend to make you feel like it is you who is getting it all wrong. I know I have faults, as a person and as a parent – and I’m not sure whether to beat myself up over ‘working on them’ or accept I am who I am and that is who my kids are dealing with. I am pretty impatient and shouty generally so it stands to reason that I will be like that as a mother – I do try not to and I have this idea that I might start tickling them instead of shouting to break the standoff but we’ll see how long that one lasts 🙂
As usual I have blogged myself out of my black mood now so I will be off!
Did he comment before you posted???? wow…
Anyway, the clouds outside are lifting, and I can feel my spirits lifting with them….I’m just not suited to long november days in a small room with two small children.
Other than that, I pretty much know where you’re coming from. Isn’t that a surprise! 😉
Oh, and me too. We had a good day today but I have had so many like that. I do think it gets better as the youngest gets older, if that’s any help. I’m looking forward to having seniors, never mind infants or juniors!
I know where you’re coming from too. There’s nothing worse than seeing an opportunity when they express an interest in something and for you to spend ages thinking stuff up to do, and then for them to be totally uninterested. But I keep thinking that as Alex gets older it is slowly getting easier and more interesting. She’s not quite there yet, but she’s certainly at the stage that I can read books with her and talk about stuff and for ehr to be interested back so that’s a good start.
I can so relate to where you’re coming from. We decided to HE when C was 3 1/2, and for the first few months I worried that I wouldn’t be able to get her to sit down and do anything I asked. It was partly just that she was 3, but we bought a table she could get her feet under comfortably, and that helped. I have to say, though, that since she turned 5, she has been so much easier to do things with, she is interested in the stuff in museums, and documentaries, and books. I think it is just a small child thing, and it will get easier
Thanks guys 🙂 The support and ‘me too’s’ I get from here make it all seem so much more achievable, ‘normal’ (which let’s face it when you choose to HE you often cease to feel!) and make the lows not so low and the highs even higher:-)
I guess it is no different to any other parent with preschoolers but they tend to shrug and say things like ‘can’t wait for them to start school’ whereas i can’t!