Last week started off really rough. My kids were being super naughty and pushing all my buttons. It was feeling like I spent each day just yelling at them for one thing or another. On top of that Tyler had 3 finals Thursday so he was super busy leaving me alone and stretched to my limits. And then in addition to that, I had a really awful tutoring experience Tuesday night.
This student is usually difficult, I think he has ADD, but it wasn't the lack of attention that brought me to my melt down. It was the fact that he began to argue with me (just like my kids had been doing with me all day). It all started when I told him he was writing the info in the wrong box on a chart. He then got mad and said that I wasn't filling out the chart correctly. I told him I was a teacher once and I knew how to fill it out so he retorted "Were you in the classroom with me when my teacher told me how to to do it?" Then he refused to do it because he said I kept changing things (which I hadn't). And then he got upset saying it didn't matter if he did it because I was just going to tell on him anyways. In the end, his mom arrived, he cried and then there were many apologies from mom (not him) when she learned about his behavior.
After picking up my own kids, I got home and just wanted to cry. I was tired of feeling so mad and frustrated with kids all day. I was wondering if I should stop praying for patience because all that seemed to do is give me more situations for me to lose my patience in.
Then as I was sitting on the couch feeling totally miserable I got a text message from my sweet visiting teacher saying: "This is totally random but do you need me to pick up anything for you at Walmart?" I didn't need her to but I knew it wasn't random at all, I know who was making her think of me at that time. It was confirmation of truths that I forget so easily, Heavenly Father knows me and loves me. He has a plan for me.
And then I decided I needed some help learning patience so the next day I went out and bought a book that I've been thinking I should read for awhile now. It called Screamfree Parenting and I am so glad I got it. I don't think it has any revolutionary ideas like it states it does but it has a lot of kind of "duh!" stuff that I needed to her. And so far it has been helping to make our house more calm. Here are some of my favorite "duh!" ideas I got from it...
-I need to calm my own anxiety over my kid's choices because they are there choices not mine and I can't force them to be good (I am responsible to them not for them)
- I need to be consistent about enforcing consequences for their bad choices and I need to pick consequences that I am willing to enforce (I need to keep my promises)
- When my child has a problem I need to say "gosh that stinks! how are you going to fix it?" instead of always fixing it for them (it's helping with Ben)
- I need to take care of myself first (sounds weird I know but it's the whole oxygen mask in crashing airplane sort of idea- put it on you before putting it on your child)
Anyways, I still have issues and I still yell every once in awhile but things are definitely better in the Hatch home :)
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