Rough translation: who has the bigger d*ck? See also: a pissing contest.
Yesterday morning was rough. Abby got up, got dressed and fed the cat, all without much complaint or foot-dragging. She got complacently into the car and gave Daddy big kisses when he departed for the train. All seemed good. I should have known it was all about to fall apart.
We pulled into the garage and Abby’s mood changed without explanation. The previously promised blueberry pancakes slowly slipped out of her reach as she spent more and more time refusing to get out of the car. I went inside, made a pot of coffee and ate a bowl of cereal. Then I went back out to the car (where Abby was still sitting stubbornly in her carseat) and informed the child that she now had almost no time for breakfast at all. She needed to take her nebulizer treatment and get ready for school and we were running out of time to do both.
As I turned back into the house I heard “Mommy, I wanna try dat again! I want blueberry pancakes!!” I faced her, put on my saddest mommy-face and said “I’m really sorry you chose to spend your time sulking in the car. Because you wouldn’t come in the house, we don’t have the time to make you blueberry pancakes. Right now we almost don’t even have time to fix you a bowl of cereal. Come in and eat.”
She followed me into the house, sniffling loudly. Then she sat on the floor and refused to pick a cereal, get a bowl or even sit at the table while I finished my coffee. At this point, we had legitimately run out of time. So I scooped her up and brought her into the TV room for the nebulizer treatment.
“Mommy, I hungry!! I wanna bowl a cereal!” “I’m sorry, Abby, you ran out of time by choosing to be mopey. Maybe, maybe, if you sit super still and let me braid your hair while you take your medicine, we can get you a baggie of cheerios to take in the car.”
She sat still as a statue, still occasionally sniffling. I got 2 French braids into her hair and 5MLs of albuterol into her lungs. I calmly poured some cheerios into a baggie while Abby picked out two different dolls. When I told her she could only bring one doll to school, she threw them on the floor and flopped around in a fit.
I handed the baggie of cereal to grandma and waited for Abby to stand up. “You lost those cheerios, kiddo. Sorry, but you chose to have a tantrum instead of being a good girl.”
“Mommy, I’ll be good. I promise. Can I haf the cheerios?”
“Abby, put one of the dolls away and walk over here. Then you can have the cheerios for the car.”
She meekly put the doll down, and stood by the door. By the time her seatbelt was on, she was laughing and smiling and ready for school. I don’t know for sure what changed between the kitchen and the garage to cause such a turnaround in attitude, but I’m thinking it had something to do with finding a boundary, not being allowed past it and feeling safe and comfortable in her world again.
This morning, she had another mini-fit about where to sit to eat breakfast. I simply told her that her pancakes (she’d earned them back) would be at the table and when she was ready to sit there, she could eat them. It wasn’t a whole minute before she was happily munching those Eggos.
I think she figured out that Mommy’s got the bigger… you know.
Hilarious! Thanks.