It seems that these days my posts are more like pages in a diary filled with lamenting and regret, problems and sorrows, rather than happy memories and great tips.
When I set out to write this blog I felt like a confident Mom that had things figured out. The kids were small, I had structure and routine, I had the “cool and collected” mindset and I was on top of the world.
So what happened? How did things get to this point, where I’m miserable, my kids are clearly not happy chaps, I am constantly stressed when they’re around, to the point where I’m physically ill, and to top it all off, I have to put up with the rudeness of my eldest, the worst attitude I could imagine, where boundaries of respect and decency get pushed on a daily basis?
Yesterday was a breaking point for me. My eldest “smuggled” a bunch of junk food/drinks into the house (which she says friends gave her) and then proceeded to corrupt my youngest, swapping a piece of her sandwich for some Pringles later. I caught them doing the deed in the bedroom when I was looking for something else. A bunch of Pringles in the corner of the room behind the bunk bed, on the carpet, which they quickly hid when they heard me coming.
It wasn’t the deed that tipped the scales. It was the attitude after. I was furious with the situation but I was still keeping calm. But she was screaming out of her lungs with me. And when I instructed her to sit down she simply refused, saying things like “you can’t make me”, and making those faces that I don’t even have a name for.
After a lot more screaming, I lost it and screamed over her. I then proceeded to call her Dad to ask him to come get her. As it happens he’s not in the country so his Mom came to get her. I told her she cannot live in my house and disrespect me or not follow my rules and instructions. She retorted “good, I don’t want to live with you anyway, in this living hell”. I won’t easily forget those words.
After all my sacrifices, after all my efforts to raise these kids, to give them a healthy, safe, loving start to their life, this is how she puts it – a living hell.
I am so so tired. I didn’t manage to sleep at all, the guilt I feel, blaming myself for what my child has become, and not knowing where to go from here.
I feel like a failure, and not worthy of writing about anything really, because what advice can I offer other parents when I myself am struggling so much?