I know this is going to sound totally arrogant, not to mention completely insane to my nearest and dearest, but this week the first thing I want to say I love is some stuff I've done this week. I've gone to the gym every day this week and killed myself on the stairclimber (I don't know why it's 50x harder for me than the elliptical, but it is). I've written a post I really liked. And oh yeah - I also stopped yelling.
Cold turkey.
Not even up the stairs.
It's been something I've been toying with every since I first broke my "pregnant with my first kid and I'm going to make up idealistic parenting rules" no yelling ideal, probably the first time I took two year old Ironflower and newly walking ten month old Lovebug to a playground. It might have been before that, actually. I am loud. Hot Guy is loud. The kids are loud. It became so easy to just go with, "s/he who is loudest" wins. But when your 4 year old thinks it's okay to yell all the time, you realize your plan isn't exactly working the way you wanted it to.
Hot Guy hasn't yelled either, by the way. He really initiated this whole thing. His desire to be the best version of himself inspires me to be better. So I especially love him this week too. :)
The no yelling thing has also been inspired by The Orange Rhino Challenge blog. One post I recently read talked about taking time to organize - "It is necessary to do what I need to do to stay calm."
That quote, and one by Abraham Lincoln that I recently read on Pinterest: "When I do good, I feel good. When I do bad, I feel bad, that's my religion," have been really helpful for the past few days. I also love Pinterest, by the way. But not for all those complicated recipes and crafts.
More inspiration this week came from Tia, who blogs about life with an invisible illness so poignantly and honestly.
And finally, a woman who has been a real life inspiration since we were teenagers, but who has eschewed social media until now, has joined Twitter. She's a genius and one of the best mothers I know.
Showing posts with label yelling. Show all posts
Showing posts with label yelling. Show all posts
9/13/2013
10/08/2009
Karma. That Bitch Has A Twisted Sense of Humor.
I am a yeller.
I didn't think I would be. I never yelled (okay, except for that one time, but that class totally deserved it and it's just wrong that my principal happened to be giving a school board member a tour that day) as a teacher. I am much more likely to mutter obnoxious comments under my breath, or write them during meetings to the amusement of my colleagues.
But then my kids started to, you know, bite each other. And I discovered yelling was effective.
I realized recently that I may have been doing a little too much of it, as I've had to get really loud for them to notice. Though that may be because once unleashed, my yelling voice has also appeared in traffic and around customer service representatives. So I decided to quit yelling. No matter how naughty the kids were, no matter how frustrated I was, I would not yell.
Today was Day 1.
I awoke at 5am to hear the boys talking to each other. Not that ChunkyMonkey talks, but he sure makes noise. I tried to ignore them, because I've discovered that I can't force them to sleep and that when I talk to them at 5am I am tempted to yell.
By 7am, I had discovered that Lovebug had clogged the toilet with too much toilet paper . . .and pooped on top of it.
At 7:45am, a huge, full, glass jar of salsa fell onto the tile floor of kitchen. While I tried to clean up, Lovebug and Ironflower got into a wrestling match and knocked ChunkyMonkey over.
At 9:05am, a man began tailgating me and flashing his lights at me after I dropped Ironflower off at school. I was doing 36 mph in a 35 zone and he was in a hurry, I guess.
We avoided problems in the grocery store because I bribed the boys with toys and food. My grocery bill was $20 more than it should have been. (Does this mean my children would be well-behaved if we were rich?)
10;45 saw us driving home from the grocery store, with Lovebug yelling, " I have to pee right now!". We were 10 minutes from home and I did not want to clean up pee in addition to the poop and salsa, so I pulled over on a side street. This caused ChunkyMonkey to wail loudly as he wanted out too. I brought Lovebug over to a tree. I reviewed how to pee standing up because he generally likes to sit down. I don't know why. Because of that, he kept trying to squat and I kept trying to make him stand up straight. Eventually he peed .. . . .correctly. . .onto my shoe.
12:00pm Ironflower, in her frustration over having to leave school, threw a rock in her brother's general direction.
It's now 2 and I am proud to say that I have not yet bitten though my tongue.
What do you do about your frustration?
PS If you happen to be a person who links to me - all three of you - could you please, please change your link to jerseygirl89.com? Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you.
I didn't think I would be. I never yelled (okay, except for that one time, but that class totally deserved it and it's just wrong that my principal happened to be giving a school board member a tour that day) as a teacher. I am much more likely to mutter obnoxious comments under my breath, or write them during meetings to the amusement of my colleagues.
But then my kids started to, you know, bite each other. And I discovered yelling was effective.
I realized recently that I may have been doing a little too much of it, as I've had to get really loud for them to notice. Though that may be because once unleashed, my yelling voice has also appeared in traffic and around customer service representatives. So I decided to quit yelling. No matter how naughty the kids were, no matter how frustrated I was, I would not yell.
Today was Day 1.
I awoke at 5am to hear the boys talking to each other. Not that ChunkyMonkey talks, but he sure makes noise. I tried to ignore them, because I've discovered that I can't force them to sleep and that when I talk to them at 5am I am tempted to yell.
By 7am, I had discovered that Lovebug had clogged the toilet with too much toilet paper . . .and pooped on top of it.
At 7:45am, a huge, full, glass jar of salsa fell onto the tile floor of kitchen. While I tried to clean up, Lovebug and Ironflower got into a wrestling match and knocked ChunkyMonkey over.
At 9:05am, a man began tailgating me and flashing his lights at me after I dropped Ironflower off at school. I was doing 36 mph in a 35 zone and he was in a hurry, I guess.
We avoided problems in the grocery store because I bribed the boys with toys and food. My grocery bill was $20 more than it should have been. (Does this mean my children would be well-behaved if we were rich?)
10;45 saw us driving home from the grocery store, with Lovebug yelling, " I have to pee right now!". We were 10 minutes from home and I did not want to clean up pee in addition to the poop and salsa, so I pulled over on a side street. This caused ChunkyMonkey to wail loudly as he wanted out too. I brought Lovebug over to a tree. I reviewed how to pee standing up because he generally likes to sit down. I don't know why. Because of that, he kept trying to squat and I kept trying to make him stand up straight. Eventually he peed .. . . .correctly. . .onto my shoe.
12:00pm Ironflower, in her frustration over having to leave school, threw a rock in her brother's general direction.
It's now 2 and I am proud to say that I have not yet bitten though my tongue.
What do you do about your frustration?
PS If you happen to be a person who links to me - all three of you - could you please, please change your link to jerseygirl89.com? Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you.
Labels:
bad mommy,
family,
karma,
motherhood,
parenting,
therapy avoidance,
yelling
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