Have you ever lost your cool than about midway through the madness regained your senses?
Recently, this happened to me with my nephew. Up until then, I was really proud of the way I had been handling tough or frustrating situations. I had been learning new ways to talk to my children and how to appropriately handle conflicts without becoming overwhelmed or yelling at them.
Let me give you the background information first.
Every morning I tell the children what I am planning on making for supper that evening. I do this so that while I am cooking, I don’t have to hear complaints and can focus on what I need to do. Well, this particular day we were having quesadillas, yellow rice, and a salad. I had informed the children their choices for fillings were ground beef and cheese or chicken and cheese. Each child chose what they wanted, and we wrote it down on a notepad for later.
So after a long day at work and school followed immediately by taekwondo we were finally home. I get everything cooked and have the boys set the table and wash up for supper. I serve them, and we sit down.
In my house, we have a few mealtime rules.
- You don’t have to eat what is in front of you, but you must sit with the family for at least 20 minutes.
- If you ask for more, take only what you can it.
- If I cook something you ask me to (or the way you ask me to), you have to eat at least three bites of it. It was made special for you; I am fully expecting you to eat it.
- If you do not eat most of your meal, you will not get a snack/dessert later
So, here we all are sitting at the table eating.
My nephew takes one bite of his chicken and cheese quesadilla, throws it on his plate and screams “That is DISGUSTING!! There is too much cheese in here!” I looked at him and said you told me you wanted a lot of chicken and a lot of cheese, that is how I made it.” He pushed his plate and began telling me I didn’t know how to cook, the food was awful, and so on. I explained that he asked me to make it that way, so he had to eat at least three bites. He proceeds to scream in my face about how he hates it at my house, everyone and everything here is stupid and so on.
That’s when I lost my cool.
Right there at the table, I just began yelling right back at him. Now the two of us are going back and forth with each other. Meanwhile, my boys are just sitting there watching the exchange between the two of us. I can only imagine that they were horrified by both of our behavior at that moment. After a few minutes of this screaming match we were having I finally said to him:
I am the ADULT. You are the Child.
And that is when everything all of a sudden became clear again. I am the adult; he is the child. I need to behave like an adult, not like the child. Here I am, having a screaming match with a child, instead of following through with the consequences for misbehaving. I was so worried about keeping control that I actually lost control of the situation the second I let his actions get the best of me. Now that I had regained my senses I sent the other two boys to their bedroom to play, and I attempted to send E to the living room to serve his time out.
I then went to calm myself and regain my own strength and composure.
I went to the laundry room and literally talked it out with myself. I must have said “I am the adult, he is the child.” a hundred times. Each time I reminded myself of a different reason for his behavior. He had just moved here from another state, he left a lot of his belongings behind, all of his friends and people he knew and cared about where there, he hardly knew me at all except for phone calls and pictures. Once I was completely calm, I brought laundry out to the living room to fold and so that he and I could talk about our behavior.
However, he was not ready to talk to me yet.
So I sat there in silence in the living room while he muttered things under his breath and worked through his emotions. I folded the laundry, looking up from time to time to see if he was ready to talk to me. It took some time, but he finally was able to calm down. I watched as his body relaxed, even his face seemed to relax. He finally looked calm and ready to talk, so I asked him if he, in fact, was prepared to talk to me about what happened at the table. He said he was.
I apologized.
I apologized for my role in the argument and for not keeping cool. I explained that his behavior was unacceptable and that it was not going to be tolerated as well. I promised to work on controlling my temper when he screams at me, but he had to promise to work on handling his feeling better. I told him it was ok to feel angry, but it was not ok to lash out or throw tantrums. I then gave him so ideas on how to manage his emotions by listening to music or journaling how he is feeling. I then reminded him that his actions warranted a two-day suspension from his tablet and moved on to the other two boys who were still in their bedroom playing.
I apologized again.
This time to my two boys. I apologized to them for having to witness both of our behavior, especially mine because I am Mom and I should know how to act better than that. I also apologized for not setting a good example for them about how to handle conflicts. We then discussed better ways to deal with conflict. Once we were finished, I had them come out of their room.
Then, we moved on.
It’s ok to be angry or frustrated, but it’s not ok to stay that way. Life moves on and so must we. Tomorrow is a new day and a new beginning.
