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Patience Please
After years of struggling to have a family, it can be devastating when your beloved child makes you so angry that you lose it. But it happens to us all.
By Marybeth Lambe When Bo sits on my lap, explaining the drawing he has just created. "Here is you, Mommy. See? We are sitting in the rocking chair, and you are singing." He studies the picture for a moment. "You are always singing, aren't you?" He tells me shyly, "You always love me.” My eyes fill and I hold him tight. “Oh, yes, Shen Bo. I love you always.” Parenthood is about moments like this. Love bubbling up in my heart until it simply overflows and washes over all of us. What could feel any better? How is it I am so blessed? Shen Bo takes the gooey cupcake, topped with caramel icing, and hurls it. He aims right for my head. It hits me on my glasses, and crumbs explode everywhere. Naturally, I have just finished washing the kitchen floor. It was the last cupcake, and I had saved it just for him. Before I can blink, he has rushed over in his stocking feet and stomped on the sticky mess, spreading iced sugar and spice cake all over the still-drying floor. He spins out of my grasp and races up the stairs, leaving footprints everywhere. To be honest, I want to take him and pin him against the wall and scream obscenities. I am, to say the least, furious, seething, enraged. This too, is part of being a parent. How is it that children can take us from the heights of love to the depths of irrational fury in a matter of minutes? I will say it again. Children are life's greatest blessings. They bring a magic that has enchanted my entire world. But raising them is the most terrifying, most exhausting job that exists. Parenthood wrenches out emotions I didn't even know I had. I didn't know how much fury I held inside until my children brought it out in me. A sad truth, but there you are. Parenthood forces me into honesty like nothing else. Caring for an infant is particularly stressful. As a family practice doctor, when I see parents with new babies, one of the first questions I ask is, “Have you felt like opening the window and tossing the baby out yet?” They often gasp at such a query but finally, laugh and nod their heads, relieved that such feelings are normal. Many of us struggle through years of infertility and failed dreams before coming to adoption. We work so hard to get to this moment—this child in our arms. Because of this, we often feel sheer horror at our reactions of anger at our child. “We tried for seven years to get pregnant, and then three years more passed before we finally adopted Millie,” Donna tells me. “And here I was, with my baby—finally! But night after night, she wouldn't sleep. And my husband and I would scream at each other, and then, in the middle of the night, I would scream at little Millie. ‘Shut up and go to sleep. Why won't you go to sleep?'” Donna starts to cry as she says, “Yelling at a little baby, can you imagine?” All of us parents can well imagine. For most of us it brings shivers—memories when we too, have lost control. Anger isn't pretty. It isn't something we easily share and discuss. Our rage shames us into silence. But parenthood isn't just about good times, joys, and rewards. Oh, those are many and they sustain us in the day-to-day drudgery of caring for children. Still, we owe it to ourselves and to each other to talk about the other side of parenting, the exasperation and resentment almost every parent has experienced. Successful parenting is not about having only good feelings about your child, it is about mastering impatience, exhaustion and fury. First, then, it is important to understand where the anger we sometimes feel comes from. It seems obvious that anger bubbles up more quickly when we are tired, when we are parenting without relief, or when we are under other stress—job, marriage, financial. Our fuse is short and we are already feeling cross. Perhaps, on an easier day, a conflict with our child would seem minor, but on this day it is the last straw. Yet we have little control over these frustrations. When you feel you are about to explode, it's important to take some steps before you lash out (see Before You Lose It, below). A Matter of Control Sometimes anger occurs because we no longer feel we have any control. Your crying, thrashing toddler is in the grips of a nameless panic. A child in the midst of a meltdown is like a plane heading for a crash landing. Faced with such a scene, we often revert to infantile emotions, too. More times than I care to admit, I have taken a tired toddler grocery shopping with me. Our son, Brendan, collapsed frequently in public when he was little. We would get to the checkout line, just as he could take no more—falling into a pile, weeping, and kicking. I used to alternately scold and cajole him, embarrassed by this public display. I felt as helpless as Brendan must have felt and my loss of control and my embarrassment fueled my angry feelings. It took me a long time to understand that he wasn't trying to manipulate me—he had simply lost all control. Oh how I longed to plunk myself down beside him and weep and kick too. Then I took a moment to think. Simply understanding the feelings of helplessness his behavior aroused in me made my anger vanish. Brendan was our first child. By the third or fourth, I became more adept at recognizing when my child, or when I myself, was out of control. Instead of plunging through the store, I now walk away from my grocery cart, step outside to sit on a bench while my toddler and I regain our equilibrium. To deal with our anger we must change the way we understand our child's motives. Sometimes it is as simple as examining our own mindset. Starting Over Sometimes, especially with an older child, it is very difficult to get past an angry scene. Feelings stay hurt and each of you feels wounded. A technique that works well in our house is what we call a “start over.” Each person realizes the anger cannot be unraveled and that residual bad feelings are clouding the air. Without assigning blame, without replaying the inflamed words, we move past it all—we start over. Most of all, we give each other support. We encourage each other and share our coping techniques. We must take the time, for ourselves and our partners, to care for our spiritual and physical health. We must find the time in our day to laugh, to rest, and just to be, gloriously, without any agenda whenever possible. Our children forgive our occasional lapses, and we must be ready to forgive ourselves as well. We owe it to our children as their role models, we owe it to ourselves, and we simply must forgive—if we are to be the parents we all so very much hope to be. Marybeth Lambe lives on a small dairy farm with her husband, Mark Levy, and their eight children. When she is not milking cows, Marybeth works part-time as a family physician and freelance writer.Before You Lose It 1 Take a deep breath. Remember, you are the adult. 2 Close your eyes and imagine that you are hearing what your child is about to hear. 3 Press your lips together and count to 10, or better yet, to20. 4 Give yourself a time out. Think about why you are angry: is it your child, or is your child simply a convenient target for your anger? 5 Telephone a friend or write your angry thoughts down on paper. 6 If someone can watch your child, take a walk around the block to clear your head. If you cannot get out, walk around your basement or backyard. 7 Splash cold water on your face. 8 Punch a pillow. 9 Turn on some loud music and sing along at the top of your lungs.Yes, I want to order Adoptive Families Magazine:
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