Every once in a while I really lose my cool at my kids. Like, I yell so loud that I can feel the adrenaline pumping through my veins and maybe my throat even hurts a little.
I hate doing this, but at the same time if feels kind of good in the moment. One minute I'm breathing deeply telling myself that the best way to hold my kids together is to hold myself together, and the next minute one of my children has completely ignored my request to put on her shoes - for the fifth time - and the yell just explodes out of me in a torrent of bottled up frustration and impatience. It scares the crap out of them and the shoes are on in a jiffy. The tears take a little longer to get under control.
And then I just feel like a jerk.
But I'm hopeful that in the big picture they won't remember this. (Especially since I work really hard to not do it.) I'm hopeful because they ask me to tell them stories about my childhood all the time and I'm kind of shocked by how little I remember. And what I remember. Here's an example - I can recite the telephone number of my best friend in 4th grade right this minute, but I don't remember a single thing about any birthday before about the age of 13. I remember that I went rollerskating almost every day after school, but not how I learned or when I even got my own pair of skates. Considering that I once aspired to be a professional roller skater you'd think that the actual getting of the skates would have been a big deal.
Memory is a funny thing. Undependable. Easily revised. Precious in its ability to transport us to a different time and place, or show us ourselves as a completely different person.
It's okay if my kids remember I yelled at them. But I also hope they remember that I loved them fiercely. Kissed them greedily, even when they were pretending to be too old for it. Let them lick the spoon when we made brownies. Hugged them every day. Genuinely loved the necklace from the dollar store.
And let's just hope they forget about how I flatly refused to make guacamole for the 2nd grade Cinco de Mayo party, picked the mold off the edge of the bread because the other loaf was frozen, pretended that we were too busy to have a playdate with the kid I don't really like, yelled at them to stop yelling.
Because those parts just don't make me look so good.
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21 comments:
memories are so unreliable and fickle just like you said.
I too, hope that my kids will remember the good parts ;)
I know they will remember the good parts. I know because I remember the good parts. I came from a very LOUD household (I am sure your yelling is nothing compared to my father) and manage to hug tight to all the good things I learned there.
You are doing your best. : )
I am a yeller and I try to stop myself most of the time. But sometimes I don't. I know that there is more good than bad, so I hope she remembers it that way too.
I absolutely adore this post. In every single way. It is glorious. It is honest. It is insightful.
I wish I had something extremely profound to say but you've said it all. And I've lost most of my words by this time of night (memory shot? fingers tired?). So let me just say I could have written most of this. Really. Truly. And the comment I had thought of leaving when I was halfway through the post completely changed when I reached the bottom. Because you saw what I was seeing all on your own. And in such a beautiful way.
I think licking the brownie spoon makes up for lack of guacamole, anyhow. ;)
I wonder so much about which things my kids will remember-- and which things they've already forgotten! Time will tell, I suppose...
This is such a sincere and honest post. I love it.
I do remember my parents yelling. But I also remember the love, the cookie making, the bike riding, the family vacations. The good memories far out weigh the bad.
I truly hear you on this one, mama.
same, same.....I totally lose it on my kids, then feel like a jerk, then hope they don't remember as I barely remember a thing from my childhood. It's good and sad all at once. I want them to remember the good, forget the bad, or at lease not let the bad live on in them.
I'm so glad that I'm not the only one who gets to a breaking point....and blogs about it!
Just found your blog btw. love it.
I also have hardly any memories from childhood. I try to remind myself when something "big" happens to my child that they may not remember how awesome it was 30 years from now. That reminds me to just enjoy it, and them, and let memory take its toll.
Also? I may one day pay their therapists to tape some of their sessions so I can find out exactly how badly they remember me.
But we keep it real. And that's what's important. Thanks for this post -- I love it!
I love this post and linked to it today on my blog. Hope that is okay!
That last paragraph is my favorite! So real. We all know what those little acts of love are like.
The thing with yelling - in my humble, non-parent opinion - is to use it sparingly. Only yell when you really need to, and then it will be incredibly effective. My mom yelled way too much and it really lost its punch. We all kind of rolled our eyes at her instead of shaking in our shoes!
Great post. Found you via Momalom's Five for Ten!
I loved that, "yelled at them to stop yelling!" That is me exactly. One time one of my good friends said that any characteristic I see in my children that I don't like they probably got from me. Well, gee. Thanks a lot. Of course, true. I've raised mini mes. How disconcerting!
I don't know how I missed this the first time around (probably because there were one hundred posts!) but I'm glad momalom directed me to it today!
I hear ya.
And if my kids caught on to every time I pretended we were too busy to play with an annoying kid, we might have to change schools!
What a treat to get some many wonderful comments. It's fascinating to me that we are all sharing this same experience and, in many cases, are having the same thoughts about it. But we don't share these thoughts face-to-face enough. Thanks to all of you for not judging, making me laugh, letting me know I'm not alone and most of all for reading!
Can we call this post HOPE? Because I really needed this reminder that what my kids will remember mostly is the really great stuff. Just beautiful, so articulate, that which so many of us have niggling at the back of our minds!!
Just made my way over form Momalom and I am SO GLAD I did (I could woop in joy of this post). This is a reminder that I needed and I perspective I think I knew but never fully considered. Thank you. It is so VERY VERY true.
Sarah and Jen were right--this post is golden. A little too close for comfort, mind you...but then again, that is why it made me smile.
What a gift to find, unexpectedly on a Saturday afternoon, that I am not alone. Or awful.
To making it through with less screams than singing.
Lord, I pray that only the good is what my son remembers!
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