Mar 9, 2010

Bad Mommy

Thursday Oliver vomited.
Friday Oliver had pink eye.
Saturday Oliver's boogers started again.
Sunday Oliver fell at the park and got a bloody nose.
Let's just say it's been a hell of a week. For everyone involved.
And back at school today, Oliver was cranky, but really can you blame him?
However, he's definitely regressed a bit.
See it took a couple of weeks to get Oliver to stop throwing his sippy cup 
clear across the room when he finished. He thought it was hilarious and I 
clearly didn't. I refuse to raise a kid with bad manners so the rule became, 
"you throw it...you lose it." And it worked. For the past month he's been 
handing me the cup when he finishes or he places it carefully on the table.
But not the past few days.
No he's pissed. And he's taking it out on us.
He's pissed about the eye drops we have to put in his eyes in the morning.
He's pissed we have to wipe his nose every 5 minutes.
He's pissed we had to give him a bath to rinse off the blood.
Clearly he has reason to be pissed. We are terrible uncaring parents.
So today while picking up a new shirt at a favorite store of mine where hip 
young single thangs work, Oliver decided to chuck his sippy cup. 
What did I do? 
I took it away. This set off a tantrum of epic proportions which I ignored. 
He was simply pissed I took the sippy away. Anyone could see that. But as 
I paid for the shirt, the two stupid young thangs were looking at me in horror 
for not giving the cup back to my baby. They glared at me and the whole time 
I could see their thoughts flashing in neon above their perfectly plucked 
brows "What a horrible mom she is!"
Now it was my turn to be the pissed off one.
Here I was, being a mom, teaching my child a lesson on manners 
when he was CLEARLY misbehaving and I was being judged. After this 
whole past week of taking care of every possible bodily fluid of Oliver's, 
I was being judged by a sippy cup. The rest of my day I carried a chip on 
my shoulder to everyone.
Tonight at dinner I let the chip go. You know why? When Oliver wound 
up that arm of his to chuck the sippy. I glared at him, as only a mom can 
do, and you know what? He got it. 

He carefully unwound that arm and set the sippy on the table.
Those girls can go to hell.

5 comments:

  1. Kim O'BrienMarch 09, 2010

    You are one tough, awesome Mama, and the best revenge that you will get on those girls is that Oliver is going to grow up into a gentleman--something sadly increasingly rare in this society that doesn't understand that manners are taught and learned and practiced over and over until they become second nature. Glare on!

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  2. lesson learned!

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  3. i love your honesty! we all have these kinds of situations. so much so that we have dedicated a blog to them -- www.mymommymanners.com -- just so you know you're not alone. just smile at the judgmental ones and remind yourself that you're living the dream (or nightmare depending upon the day)

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  4. @kim: thanks! I need to hear that over and over! I love you're pointers so keep'em comin!
    @jodi: thanks for stopping by, I loooove your blog! Great job! You should feel so proud! I'll be stopping by often!

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  5. Grammie JillMarch 09, 2010

    Proud of you...I'll say!
    Grammie Jill

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