laugh

when all else fails, laugh?

my children {c} are driving me crazy! i actually started crying today after they ripped a $20 bill in half as they fought over it after i told them not to touch the money. i was rushing to get the car seats loaded back into my car after my husband had so kindly left them sitting in the garage. c was already late for school because i made him vacuum the basement after he took scissors to the poor rocking horse, again. there just wasn't any other way to react. i've been screaming and yelling and whispering and ignoring so crying was all that was left in me. who would have ever thought a five and four year old could make me cry? i've been in some gnarly situations with grown adults and didn't cry so what gives? why do i have so many pairs of scissors in this house, pairs i don't even recognize. where are they coming from?

lately it seems that they might as well carry around a baseball bat and beat me with it all day. most days, from the moment c wakes up, our home is not a happy place until he's off to school. the two of them start their day out as mortal enemies and then gradually work together to team up on me.

i got desperate and took my cousins recommendation for an accountability system hoping it would help and it's worked pretty well for brookyn but she's not the one we got it for. c is such a challenge for us. for all of us. it just seems like every effort to make things easier for him and for everyone around him, is a lost cause. he sneaks and lies. he opposes everything i ask him to do. he pesters and pushes people until they snap and lose it. he does mean things to people and i cannot figure him out.

at first, this accountability system was exciting to him. he loved to see what was next on his "chore chart" and earn special rewards for doing what he was supposed to but then he quickly became lazy. he'd say his room was clean so i would go and check and he just shoves everything under his bed and in his closet. he lies about brushing his teeth and washing himself when he's in the shower. today, when he was getting in the shower i told him to go potty first and he said he didn't have to go so i told him if he pottied in my shower i would take a ticket away (the tickets are the rewards for doing their chores which they can turn in for special privileges ... i know, i always made fun of kids who had to follow such rule systems growing up). guess what he did right when he got in the shower while i was still standing in the bathroom?! yep. so i go to take a ticket away and what do you know, he doesn't have any tickets because he hasn't been doing his chores right and/or i've been slowing taking one by one away for various un-acceptable behaviors. sis, she has at least 15 tickets and never trades them in for special privileges and very rarely gets one taken away. she's content knowing she's done what she's supposed to and all i have to do is tell her i'm proud of her.

three days this week i have dropped c off at school with both of us angry at each other. it kills me to watch him walk into the school with his head hanging. i am so stressed out and exhausted and he just makes everything so much harder than it needs to be. i don't know what to do about it. i want so badly for him to feel good about himself and feel loved but he makes it so hard. even when we try to do something nice or ignore behaviors that make me want to throw my head through the wall, it always backfires. he's never satisfied.

today is just a hard day. tomorrow is a new day.