lost it...

14 July

Ok, it wasn’t tear-free, but we came really close today. Zeiva had a serious tantrum hang-over this morning, and I knew in my deepest core that there was no waking her up at 7 am and hustling her through the morning routine. So I just accepted that we might be late, very late (oh, that is sooooo hard for me!), and let her sleep until she woke up on her own. 8 am. The time we normally walk out of the house. Deep breath. But she was in good spirits, though still with a little bit of a headache, and so we walked out of the house at 8:40 am. Time for a taxi! We caught one right away and arrived at the club at 8:56 am. :)

They had a good day at camp and we started discussing how we were going to have an early, calm, easy evening as soon as we got home. I sacrificed everything for an attempt at an early bedtime. No playing games, and worst of all, no weeding with Martín. We ate at 5:45 pm and, no joke, started getting ready for bed at 6:30 pm. Lucas was great – he spent a good 45 minutes reading his Magic School Bus book to himself while Zeiva and I slowly made it through her routine. Cutting her nails – she wants to try. OK! She wants to cut one of my nails. OK! She wants to brush her teeth first and then give me my turn. OK! We had time for her to do pretty much anything she wanted that kept us on some semblance of our track. She was cheerful, kind, willing. Go figure. Then it was Lucas’ turn, and Zeiva would not leave us alone, so Lucas could not concentrate on getting his tasks done. It was now getting to be past 7:30. I tried shutting the bathroom door, but that just led to playing with the door. I excitedly asked Zeiva how many markers she could pick up and how fast, and that kept her busy for….3 minutes. I asked her to look at one of her books while we finished and, for whatever reason, that flipped the switch. She threw herself on the bed and started writhing around, shouting at me meanly to bring her Pelican and Pelicant (one of her books). I immediately told her that I was not going through what we’d done the past few nights, so if she wanted to get upset that was fine. She could cry all night and I would not be listening to her until she was calm and could ask kind questions. She started crying. I left to help Lucas. After some back and forth in between Lucas’ tasks, she actually pulled herself in the right direction and within 10 minutes she was asking me in a very kind voice if I could please get her book. Oh my goodness, I couldn’t believe it. I had no idea if that was going to be the worst of it, but it was. That’s not to say we didn’t have another hour of trying to calm down, stay in bed, leave each other alone and just plain shut up and go to sleep. For example, after Zeiva dozed off, Lucas suddenly realized he didn’t have Remi (from Ratatouille) with him. So he yells, “MAMA, CAN YOU BRING REMI?!” Zeiva of course wakes up and wants her orca. Which is fine, except that Lucas jumps out of bed to come “help” look for them, but instead he starts hanging out in the living room. “I’m bored”. Well, shut your eyes and go to sleep! “Hey, Mama, how much light is in a rainbow?” ARGH! If you aren’t offended by profanity, check out this link: http://www.youtube.com/verify_age?next_url=http%3A//www.youtube.com/watch%3Fv%3DSwwtO5viUDE  Django made me listen to it a few months ago, and it’s pretty funny if you’ve been there. It’s definitely how I felt, after all my efforts this evening, compounded on the previous evenings. If I’m lucky, they nodded off around 8:45 pm. But oh my, was tonight sooooo much better than the past couple. Hallelujah!

15 Julio                       

Well, it’s been an exhausting week. We went backwards tonight and I finally lost it. She wanted a braid but then wouldn’t sit up for it. When we finally negotiated sitting up for it, she wouldn’t sit still for it. Then she wouldn’t choose a book, but didn’t like my choice. While I was reading, she continuously moved so that she couldn’t see the picture, so she could be upset that she couldn’t see it. Lucas was an unbelievable trooper – he wanted to read our whales book, but Zeiva said she didn’t want to. So he chose the Thomas the Train book that Zeiva loves, which has three different stories. He chose one story and Zeiva started crying that she didn’t want that one. He switched for her. She cried through the entire story and at the end threw an extra fit because she wanted the story he’d originally picked. Lucas went to go the bathroom, and she flipped out because she didn’t go first. Lucas said she could go first. But of course she wouldn’t. And then the last straw. It’s her turn to sleep in the roll-away, and she refused. I told her she had to sleep there, she said no and started down the road yet again of how we all three could fit in the big bed. I told her that I would move her after she fell asleep and she said no. She told me to sleep in the roll-away. Fine with me, so we discussed a new arrangement where we EACH take a turn. Except as we were talking about it, she turned over and was rolling around face down on the bed. For the past week I have occasionally raised my voice, but I have not yelled at her and I haven’t touched her except to hug her or pat her, etc. But I grabbed her arm and flipped her over and screamed right in her face that she was going to sleep in the roll-away bed on her turn – DID SHE UNDERSTAND??!!! (that’s so effective!). The last hour has been all downhill from there. She was just out here screaming that she was hungry. I told her to eat. She could have a banana, yogurt, I really don’t care what she eats. Hungry? Help yourself. Screaming at a higher pitch: But then I would have to brush my teeth!!!! Yes, you should brush your teeth again, or you could just go to bed. Slightly higher pitch: But I can’t go to bed with dirty teeeeeth!!! At some point in there she was yelling at me to give her a hug. I reminded her that I’d be able to understand her words when she asked a kind question. She said she forgot how, so I said, “Me puedes dar un abrazo por favor, mama?” She came up with some other distraction to cry about and then remembered she hadn’t gotten a hug.

“You need to tell me again how to ask because I forgot!”

“That’s an interesting statement.”

“Mama, can you please tell me – “ OH. This is where she realizes that if she can ask me kindly to remind her how to ask kindly, she should just be able to ask me for the hug.

Anyway, you get the point, again. Only this time I’m completely screaming at her right in her face about how she can do whatever she wants, eat, not eat, drink some water, not go pee, talk a walk outside (will you come with me?? NO! But then I’ll be scaaaaaareeeeeeddd!!), I don’t care, she just needs to do whatever the hell she needs to do in order to go to sleep. So she finally says, “but I need you to HELP me!” So I pick her up, take her back into the bedroom, throw her on the bed and yell at her to shut her eyes and go to sleep. But my CROOOOOCS are still OOOONNNN!!!” I rip her crocs off and throw them on the floor. I walk out and shut the door. She screams – not cries – but screams for about one minute, and then there is silence for about a minute. Then a quiet, kind voice, “Mama, can you please give me a hug?” Good thing that between us the 4-year-old can diffuse the situation.

Here’s the best part. I hug her, she says I love you, I tell her I love her very much even though I was upset and that I’m only every frustrated by her choices and that I always love her. And then I say, “Zeiva, while you’re falling asleep, can you think of ways that we can have a better evening so we don’t fight and cry every night and we can talk about your ideas tomorrow?” And she says, in a sassy, angry voice:

“I’m NOT going to tell you!”

Sixteen days down, 46 to go.

I did have a highlight today, and it’s hard to see it in the photo below because no matter what lighting I tried, the screen didn’t show up well. So I played with it in iPhoto to make the screen visible, at the expense of over-brightening skin tone. It looks even darker again uploaded. But Zeiva is deep in conversation with Shy Kitty, for whom Django is providing the most hilarious, high-pitched sing-song voice. It was awesome. We always try to tell each other our favorite moments of the day during bedtime (this was mine). Tonight when I asked, Zeiva whined, “why do we ALWAYS have to DO this – I don’t LIKE it!” A tortured life she leads….

Zeiva and Shy Kitty catching up on the day's events (pre-meltdown, of course)