I’m SO Much Smarter Than My Kids, But It Doesn’t Really Matter

I recently wrote a post about the need to be more patient when learning to communicate with anyone from preschoolers to spouses.

I told a cute little story. I wrapped it up with a tidy list of tips on more clearly understanding and talking with friends and family.

I fully stand by my list. But I should out myself.

I totally stink at it sometimes.

When my twin boys decide that I turned the bath water off at the wrong time or gave them the wrong color sippy cup (or it shouldn’t have been me but Mommy who should have given it to them in the first place) or that I should have let them pull the tissue out of the box not I on their behalf, I simply can’t be awesomely patient.

No matter how well I lay out the logic that these things don’t matter, they insist on having meltdowns.

When our sweet four year old daughter requires a snack and a drink 3 minutes after she ate 2 bites of her dinner and then asks for it with machine gun rapidity whilst I change a half-potty-trained 3 year old boy’s pull-up, I also cannot be awesomely patient.

When I explain to her that I’m busy with some poo and she’ll have to wait, she explains, beginning with my favorite phrase, “But Daddy… I want a snack and a drink.”

Ah… the world shall stop until thy crackers are delivered!

I Blog Because I’m a Sojourner, not an Expert

The fact is that for all my musings and suggestions and opinions and helpful bulleted-points, I am just a guy whose keen rational insight and logical deductions are useless in the battle of wits I find myself in with my kids.

Our Sweet Little Angels (Photo Courtesy of Kimberly Herbert Photography)

In the end, I have to put myself in a time out. I have to confess my insecurities and my poor fathering to my wife. I pray.

I’m coming to the conclusion that parenting does not follow bulleted lists. We follow are routines as best as we can and we create structures to encourage growth, but preschoolers (the extent of my experience) don’t angelically acquiesce to our systems.

The two approaches to the world clash: They are searching and ramming their heads against the safe and hopefully life-encouraging boundaries we try to create.

I might, in the end, be able to control what color sippy cup goes to whom, or whether I’ll respond to the unexpected tantrum that orange vs. red elicits.

But I can’t control whether or not they have the tantrum. And giving in to them every time just creates more tantrums because they’ll decide that tantrums work.

I just need to learn to stick to my guns while taking a mental trip to my  happy place if or when the screaming commences.*

There are no big lists at the end of this short post. It’s simply a confession that there are moments when having three kids under five years old absolutely confounds me.

*Lest it seem like we live in a madhouse, we don’t. We are extremely blessed with sweet-natured, healthy little ones. They’re just doing what little ones do from time to time.