telling the truth Archives

The Fuck-You Fours

December 9, 2012 by Farewell Stranger ·

A friend of ours noted that it’s not the Terrible Twos parents have to worry about, it’s the Fuck-You Fours. I couldn’t have said it better myself.

The word “fuck” is not one you will see me use often on this blog, but in this case there’s really no other that quite does the topic justice, because lately pretty much everything Connor does seems like a gigantic Fuck You, Mom. I don’t think it’s a result of adjusting to a new baby; I think this is just the phase he’s in right now. And I don’t like it.

Let me pause to say that I hesitate to write this for fear it’s going to be taken as a post, accessible online for all eternity, saying I don’t like my child. But I’m pretty damn sure most parents go through this sort of phase with their kids sooner or later, so let’s just acknowledge that we all love our kids and get on with the rant, shall we?

Four is not a fun age. Two wasn’t bad, and in fact, while we had our challenges, there are many things about two-year-olds (or mine, at least) that I thought were just awesome. At the time, everyone told me three was worse, and while three had its own challenges it really wasn’t awful either. But four. Oh dear lord. Some days I want to lock him in the basement.

Connor has always been very much his own person. We learned early on that if he wanted something he would do everything in his three-foot-tall power to get it. And if he didn’t want it? You’d better have been prepared to have it thrown back at you. Something about this attitude must have worked for him, because as a four-year-old this is now very much his MO.

I’ve thought a lot about our interactions with him and whether we need to be taking a different approach. And honestly, sometimes we do. Some of his behaviour is because he’s bored, and some is because we don’t give him enough time with something, or enough warning that it’s time to stop something, or enough autonomy. And some of it is because he’s hungry. Or tired. Those issues are all theoretically easy to fix and, at times, practically impossible.

I will admit to not having done a lot of reading about parenting philosophy. I don’t have the attention span and I find too much “should”ing counterproductive. But a large part of it is due to having come across so much advice that I just don’t find useful.

Proponents of “gentle parenting” seem to be everywhere these days. I get the concept, and a lot of it I agree with, though the amount of condescension in much of it leaves me blinking in disbelief. (This gentle parenting article (Update: which has now been deleted – hmm…) is especially annoying. The first three paragraphs, which assume that some people either completely ignore or rudely yell at their children, make me really quite cranky. If there’s a gentle parent out there who has never lost her patience with her child I would like to meet her and find out what medication she’s on.) But some much-touted gentle parenting practices are downright farcical when attempted on a child like mine.

The classic “give him a choice” approach is a perfect example. This is how it tends to go in my house [not an actual conversation, but the typical outcome of many real ones nonetheless]:

“Would you like soup or a sandwich for lunch?”

“I want a hog dog.”

“We’re not having hot dogs today. You have a choice of either soup or a sandwich.”

“I want a hot dog.”

“That’s not one of your choices.”

From here his response goes one of two ways:

A: “Well, that’s what I’m having.” [Feet stomping, pout big enough for a bird to land on.]

B: Meltdown that makes Chernobyl look tame.

Giving him a choice is not a parenting or communication strategy that works.

I still try. It’s not as though, having been unsuccessful with this approach, I instead turn to dictatorial parenting. I try to determine what he actually needs (as opposed to what he says he wants). I work hard to summon my patience from the reserve tanks when my (admittedly limited) supply has run out. I try to remember that he’s only four.

But, oy. Four. I do love my child, and most of the time I really like him too. But to Four I really have only one thing to say:

Fuck you.

Filed Under: Conversations with Connor, Hard things, Motherhood · Tagged With: telling the truth

Write On

August 21, 2012 by Farewell Stranger ·

I got another email the other day, this one from a friend-of-a-friend sort of person. She had found my blog thanks to Reader’s Digest naming me one of Canada’s top mom bloggers (and yes, that was unexpected, but what I was especially happy about was that it was my writing about postpartum depression that they highlighted). The email was of the thank-God-I’m-not-alone types from someone who previously dealt with postpartum anxiety and is now struggling with antenatal depression and just really isn’t sure where to turn.

When I got the email I was just closing my computer to take Connor out for some fun with my sister and my dad and he was getting impatient. But I saw the name and the subject line and I paused, hoping I could put the excited child off a moment longer.

I keep every email like this that I receive – the ones that say thank you for sharing and for being so honest. The ones that say can you help me? And the ones that say I just didn’t know and I thought it was just me.

Because I know. I know what that feels like and I know how sometimes it’s impossible not to reach out and say thank you (like I did with Katherine after I found Postpartum Progress). And when I get those emails it affirms that it’s okay to write about these things, which is a reminder I sometimes need, especially lately when I’ve been feeling like I lost my words.

I’ve been feeling a little bit vulnerable. Before the Reader’s Digest thing, but especially so since. I’m so, so honored, especially given some of the other bloggers on the list. But that’s the sort of thing that tends to get spread around. I posted it on my own Facebook page (and I rarely share blog content or related things there) and it got shared by my family and some friends. Which is how the friend-of-a-friend thing tends to happen.

In this case it actually went beyond that. I work with my brother who, evidently, is friends on Facebook with a bunch of other people we work with. Who now know about my blog. Some of them said, “That’s cool! I’ll have to check out your blog,” (and I thought oh god…). Some of them did read it and said only nice things like, “It’s great that you’re so open” and “You’re a great writer.” Which are lovely comments, but there’s always a part of me that wonders if they’re really thinking, wow, you are messed UP.

But you know what? That’s okay. Some days I’m totally messed up, but so are most people in one way or another. And I’d rather be messed up and working on it and, better yet, helping others in the same boat than holding it in for fear of what others think. I did that for too long and it backfired, making me more messed up in the short term and causing this to be more of a long-term problem than it would otherwise have been.

So I’ll write and whoever wants to can read. And if one of those readers finds something helpful here and sends me an email, so much the better.

Write on.

Linked up with Just.Be.Enough

and Things I Can’t Say

I’ve also got a post on Just.Be.Enough today about some awesome lyrics by a great Canadian band. Come visit!

Filed Under: Better world, Postpartum depression, Writing · Tagged With: antenatal depression, blogging, community, spreading the love, telling the truth, we're not alone

Passing On Pink

June 5, 2012 by Farewell Stranger ·

Somewhere deep in our basement, in a box that’s still packed, is a small book. It’s pink, mostly, with an angelic baby face on the front. It’s about baby girls.

I bought this book when I was in my last year of high school. Some friends and I had gone to Vancouver to shop for grad dresses and I came across this book in a shop. I’m not sure what possessed my 17-year-old self to buy it, but I did, because I always assumed I’d have a girl and wanted to start soaking it in then and there.

I found that book again when we were packing to move last fall, and I paused for a moment when I saw it again. A short moment of regret ringed by a sliver of hope. At that point, Connor had been talking about his baby sister for months – before I was pregnant, before we had really started trying, and certainly before we had talked to him about the idea of a sibling. He brought it up unprompted and spoke of her as though she existed. “My baby sister.” He was so sure.

I was pretty sure too, because I always thought I’d have a girl. Not because I wanted a girl, but that’s just what I saw myself with. She felt like a real presence to me. I even wrote her a letter.

I was so sure.

When we found out Connor was a boy, I had a little cry. I couldn’t imagine myself with a boy, which is why we decided to find out at the ultrasound. I figured then that if we were having a boy I’d rather have time to adjust to the idea. Which was a good thing, and I did adjust. And then, of course, when he was born he was mine. He was so clearly the baby we were meant to have that I didn’t even think anything of it anymore.

And now here we are with number two.

I had sworn I wasn’t going to find out whether this one is a boy or a girl. I wanted a surprise. I wanted something to be “traditional” about the birth in case I end up with another c-section. I wanted something to be what I imagined this time and figured a delivery-room announcement of “It’s a… ” would do the trick.

But Connor was so sure “his baby” was a girl. He had my mom convinced. He had my sister convinced. He had me convinced.

And I worried that a delivery-room announcement of “It’s a boy!” would lead to a never-intended and always-regretted moment of disappointment.

So in the end I caved. We found out, in spite of the fiasco of not having the information provided to us as promised. (The universe didn’t take my husband’s determination into account when deciding to mess with us.)

So it won’t be a delivery-room announcement, and we won’t be keeping it a surprise. Instead, I will announce it here:

It’s a boy.

I know this child is just as much meant to be ours as Connor is. I know he will be a great big brother to his little brother. I know there are so, so many good things about this.

But just for a little bit, I’m going to grieve a baby girl I carry in my heart and thought would be in my life but who apparently doesn’t exist.

Filed Under: Hard things, Motherhood, Pregnancy · Tagged With: admissions, expectations, family, telling the truth

No Joy

April 25, 2012 by Farewell Stranger ·

I kept waiting for my first trimester to be over so I’d stop feeling sick and start experiencing the euphoric energy I’d felt the first time.

That energy never came; I only became more and more fatigued as the pregnancy progressed. I started to develop insomnia so bad that I’d only sleep two or three hours a night. The lack of sleep started to get to me; my moods fluctuated wildly, and I had to quit my part-time editing job due to complete apathy towards the work.

These are not my words, and yet this is my story. I just didn’t know it until I read it.

You may have gathered from yesterday’s post that things are slightly less than peachy here. I’ve been struggling for a while, but I thought it was just the natural progression of having moved away from family and friends and settling (or not) into whatever’s next. It was a new job and a longer commute and wondering where certain things are after our move. It was a pregnancy and a reduction in my med dose and a subsequent bump back up when that didn’t work. It was a small boy who’s almost four and all the challenges that come with that.

Except that’s not all it is.

The excerpt above is from a post called Robbed of the Joy of Pregnancy by Alexis Lesa on Postpartum Progress. Something lurking at the back of my brain took me to the antenatal depression tag on that site over the weekend, where I read one post and then another. And then I came to that one.

I know this is an issue for me. I just didn’t know it. It was an issue during my pregnancy with Connor too. I even did a Google search for antenatal depression, thought “huh” and then moved on. And was surprised when I got postpartum depression. (It’s okay – you can roll your eyes.)

The only thing in the above quote that I’m not experiencing is insomnia. I’m having the usual pregnancy-related trouble sleeping, but for the last few weeks I could happily have slept all the time. And, to be frank, some days I did. Wanting to stay in bed all the time is usually a huge light bulb for me, but I put a blanket over that light bulb and went back to sleep.

The thing is, though, that once I read that post the light burned bright again. I confessed to the problem to my #PPDChat group and a very dear (real life) friend of mine started looking up resources for me in this new city. She found a counsellor and a women’s mental health clinic and that was really all I needed to get me back on the right path.

Could I have searched those things out myself?

Yes.

No.

Yes, I’m on a first-name basis with Google. No, when the ground is coming up at me I don’t have the resources to find resources.

But I do have people who will do that for me, as long as I can muster up the courage to ask.

Image credit: GregRob on Flickr

Filed Under: Hard things, Pregnancy · Tagged With: admissions, antenatal depression, call for back-up, depression, meltdown, telling the truth

A Serving of Working Mom Guilt, Please

January 23, 2012 by Farewell Stranger ·

I’m struggling tonight.

I’ve started a new job, which I love, but I’m playing the Working Mom Guilt Game, which I hate. And tonight I lost.

Last night, after a fun and busy weekend, I stood at the kitchen counter to make my lunch for today. Connor came over and asked me what I was doing. “Making my lunch,” I said. “Why?” he asked. “Because I have to go to work tomorrow.”

And then came the face.

“I thought you didn’t have to go to work every day.”

I hate that face.

We’ve had this conversation several times in the last couple of weeks. He wants me to play with him in the morning or sit with him while he eats his breakfast. I want to do that too. I love mornings with him. It’s quiet, I’m not thinking about all the things I have to get done, and it’s just me and him. But weekday mornings are too short, and more often than not lately he isn’t even up when I leave for work, which steals at least half an hour I’d otherwise get to spend with him. When he is up I inevitably get, “Do you have to go to work today? [sad face]” So as we approach weekends I get to do the “Guess what?!” thing and tell him I don’t have to work. We talk about the things we’re going to do and he gets that excited, I-get-my-mama face.

I love that face.

What I don’t love is the other end of the day when I come home after a day—preceded too often by too little sleep—from a new job that makes my brain tired. When I have spent all day in an office full of people, talking and laughing and working and learning, and my inner introvert just wants to sit in my quiet bedroom by myself for a while.

3-year-olds don’t let you sit in your bedroom by yourself for any length of time. At least mine doesn’t.

So I come home after working to a little guy who wants his mom to play with him, which, as the last thing I feel like doing, induces massive guilt.

Working Mom Guilt.

I’m not here when I want to be and when I am here I spend too much time wanting something else. It sucks.

This is what I missed while I was at work today.

This is especially tough right now because I’m working a slightly longer day than I used to and I work farther away, both of which slice into my momming time. And he’s going to bed later, which slices into my me time.

Nobody’s winning here, people. (And don’t even get me started on all the blog reading and commenting I’m not doing.)

Maybe I’ll get used to it. Maybe we all will. Maybe we won’t. In any case, tonight my working mom guilt came with a side order of the Monday tireds and some irrational, the-toddler-is-chewing-too-loud annoyance and I had to leave the room to take a deep breath.

My mama mug spilleth over, and I don’t know what to do about it.