This is a companion to this thread, to remind us of what’s good in life right now.
My therapist has pointed out that I tend to get over a problem, then immediately take that state as the status quo and stress over the next problem, rather than savoring the victory. So these days I try to notice the things we pretty much don’t have to deal with anymore, or things we’ve achieved with the kids. It’s also part of knowing that I’m not having any more kids - I get to say, “I never have to do X again,” and do a happy dance.
So, for us:
6 year old: is generally an incredibly sweet and well-behaved child. Even when kids around her misbehave, she usually does what we want her to. She loves school, makes friends easily, and adores her little sister. She has mostly gotten used to doing chores. She still likes the kid shows on PBS, hardly knows anything about Hannah Montana, and isn’t in too much of a hurry to grow up. She takes care of her own toilet activities, which is something I thought would never happen!
2 year old: sleeps for 12 hours straight at night. Really, that is such an achievement, I hardly need to write anything further. She lets me leave her at the gym daycare, even if she does cry for a couple minutes. She can even do without me for a weekend, which means **Dark2Phoenix **and I get to go on our first kid-free vacation in three years this month!
If we can get here with them, everything else should be smooth sailing!
Sleeping through the night, diapers, making friends in preschool, entering big kid school, riding the bus, not making the team, making the team, friends moving away (5 of #1 son’s friends left in a 2 year period), girl cliques (ugh), middle school for 2 of them (#2 son is just in 6th grade now), losing competitions, winning competitions, getting into Gifted Program/not getting into the GP, invites to parties, only one not invited to parties, friends lying about and to you, close relatives dying, learning how to drive, pets dying, close friend dying, grandparent dying, getting into college, getting a PT job, being accused of plagiarism and successfully defending innocence, traveling to Europe, living with strangers at camp and college.
I’m tired just listing it all. And not all of my kids have achieved all of these yet. As Daughter likes to say: “I’ll be out of college before #2 son is even IN high school.”
Drug & alcohol experimentation. Marriage. Divorce. Car-jacking. Wisdom teeth removal. The Marine Corps. Active duty in Iraq. Pregnancy. Near-fatal car wrecks. Mental illness. Death of a parent (my step-kids’ mom).
I remember being firmly of the belief that my children would never use the potty. They are now ten and eleven and have been successfully diaperless for YEARS.
We were also recently discussing how annoying they can be about noise in the car. But thank god the random screaming from the back seat has stopped.
Sleep issues. Dweezil had the worst sleep patterns of any baby I’ve ever heard of - it became actively frightening at times. Refusal to sleep on his own (we had to let him scream it out at 12 weeks old). Constant nighttime awakenings until he was 2+ years old. Night terrors until he was 3. Moon Unit was better as an infant but did not reliably sleep through the night until she was at least 4.
Toileting issues. Moon Unit was relatively easy - trained just past the age of 3. Dweezil had zero - I mean ZERO - interest in the topic; when we finally bribed him out of daytime diapers at the age of 5, he quickly developed encopresis. This led to years of soiling and constant daily doses of stool softeners. I think we were finally able to stop all that when he was 12 or so. In our defense on the diaper thing, it’s not just that we’re ineffective parents, the kid actually has autism.
Behavior issues. See above for Dweezil and autism. Years of therapy and while he still clearly has social issues, he’s actually the easy kid. Seriously. Friends of ours lost a baby at 4ish months (SIDS). In a conversation a month or two afterward, the husband said to Typo Knig “You must have felt this way when Dweezil got his diagnosis”. Typo Knig thought (but did not say, obviously) “yeah, but the difference is… we got our kid back”. And now I’m at my desk and sniffling, dammit.
Behavior issues redux: Moon Unit was a pretty nightmarish toddler and elementary school kid. Violent tantrums, destroying things, screaming… if we hadn’t already been working with a therapist because of Dweezil’s issues, I truly think we’d have resorted to beating her. There were times where it seemed the only possible / logical thing to do (which was incorrect - the handful of times we tried spanking her, SHE DIDN’T NOTICE). She still has issues and drives us nuts, but a LOT of the time she’s a hysterically funny, witty child who brings us great joy.
Sigh… as I said to the pediatrician once, “Smart, cute, easy… pick two”.
Yarp. We’ve gotten through the first two months, and I think she’s mostly gotten over her colic. Three nights ago, she was waking up every TWO HOURS. Last night, she slept eight and a half hours straight!!! It’s too early to celebrate, of course, but damn that felt nice.
Sigh.
Actually, I should point out that the teenager has, I think, gotten through the worst of the teenage years, and is beginning to show signs of maturity, which is a nice change. We don’t have to have knock-down fights to force him to shower, brush his teeth, or change his underwear every day any more. He wakes himself up for school every morning with little or no fuss. He generally stays out of trouble, and though we could certainly wish for him to improve in a few ways, like say taking homework seriously, overall he’s doing pretty well.
It’s always something. It never ends. When they turn 21, a whole NEW set of worries. It’s always, always something. Such is life. I was once told “good times don’t stay good, but bad times don’t stay bad”. You take a deep breath of relief when a crisis is over, and here comes another crisis! Such is life!
My mother sent three children off into the world, fairly succesfully, believing us to be relatively happy, healthy and well adjusted.
A few years ago we discovered my baby sister had been abused by her long term live in boyfriend and was an alcoholic. It was about two years through her journey to something like health, but for two years it was a nightmare for my mother.
A year into that drama, my other sister was diagnosed with breast cancer at 38 with a three year old and a six month old.
Everyone is relatively happy, healthy and well adjusted now again.
Potty training and homework…those are the easy problems.
18 year old: She finally got her driver’s license! She didn’t want it at all, told us she couldn’t-wouldn’t-shouldn’t, failed the test several times, but by cracky she’s got it now. Y’all be careful out there.
13 year old: Survived our divorce and the subsequent death of his dad. Smooth sailing? crosses fingers
Three years ago in March, he was at a guy’s house playing poker. Around midnight he went on a beer run, taking another dude (whom he had just met at the party) with him. The other dude went into the store. My son was outside waiting in the car when a strange man got in, claiming to be dude’s friend. He directed my son to drive around for a little while (getting him lost) then pulled a gun and demanded the keys. When my son protested the man somehow hit him with the gun and somthing on it also cut him. He left my son standing bleeding in the street in a unfamiliar neighborhood.
A good Samaritan happened along and gave my son a ride back to the party. That’s when he called me. I went down there and one of the guys said that an unknown street guy was there saying he knew where the car was. I called my daughter to come take my son to the hospital while I drove some of the guys to the 'hood to get the car. The street guy took us to the place, we gave him $20 and he disappeared. I called the cop, and although he did not believe me about the carjacking (said he thought it was a drug deal gone bad), he called a wrecker which towed the car home.
Back at the hospital, they did MRI scans of my son’s head and said he was okay. He had to get some stitches where the cuts were. That bill was $4000 which I had to pay out of pocket. Later I was able to get reimbursed from a victims’ fund which the State has.
Although I supplied the police with cell phone records and bank records (the thief got my son’s cell phone, ATM card and also a box of checks which was in the glove box), the case never went anywhere. One eerie thing: a call was placed from the cell phone at the exact time I was standing in the street arguing with the cop (about 3 am) - to the house in front of which we were standing.
Or as my mother said to me when we called her to inform her of her first grandchild (Daughter)… “As they get bigger, their problems get bigger.”
Gee, thanks mom. Baby and I are doing just fine now–she’s one hour old! :rolleyes:
But she is right. But she also failed to mention how much fun kids are and how much they give back to you just by existing. I am enjoying getting to know my adult daughter in a whole different way.
That “cute, smart, easy–pick 2” is the truest thing ever written.
Bad, bad teen years with my daughter’s depression and anxiety are starting to clear up these days.
My five year old…I’m glad we’ve made it through three years of diagnosing what’s going on with her and she’s finally able to communicate with us anything other than anger.
And not all of my kids have achieved all of these yet. As Daughter likes to say: “I’ll be out of college before 