Family Life, unplugged

I read a good entry at Ask Moxie today -- thanks 'H' (friend), who has a link to it on her blog, I have been out of the blog-loop for a while, not doing as much online reading, and so I did not know about the moxie blog, it has some great parenting Q&A. So, I posted a way too long comment in response to the issue and realized it would be good to copy onto the family blog here, probably actually better as a post here than a comment on their site that no one wants to read, oh well, sometimes you just want to share with a bunch of cyber-strangers : )

Anyway, the original question was asking for help potty training and switching to a big kid bed while pregnant with a second child, hmmm, sound familiar to our family - YES! - except we had the added bonus of having daddy deployed - genius planning. You can read the whole entry here but this is an excerpt from moxie's answer that covers my discussion...

"You know that whole thing about how people want things cheap, fast, and quality? And you can have cheap and fast, cheap and quality, or fast and quality, but not all three? Well, I think in this situation you can have pregnancy, maybe bed-changing and pregnancy, or maybe potty training and pregnancy, but not bed-changing, potty training, and pregnancy all at the same time.

It's just too much. For him. And for you. You're all overloaded, and that's making him freak out, and you guys feel like it's super high-stakes. But it's not. I mean, what happens if he's not in a bed before the baby comes, but is back in a crib? Or what happens if he's still in diapers? There's no shame, and no medical reason for either one, so if this is causing you this much stress, then why on earth put all of you through it?

So. Pick either the bed, or the potty training, or maybe neither. If it were me, I'd back off both the bed and the potty training, because the pregnancy alone is probably causing enough anxiety for him. He's old enough that he knows something's going on with the baby coming, even if he doesn't understand that completely. Talk to him and tell him that you're going to go back to the way it was before in whichever area you choose. Talking to him and letting him know that you're giving him back whatever you were trying to change is going to help ease his stress...

...People don't usually talk about "backing off" as a valid parenting technique, but it's a huge tool in controlling the situation (instead of trying to control your child). It's the least sexy but potentially most effective way of dealing with change, especially for toddlers."

She totally hit the nail on the head. Unfortunately for our family it REALLY took me a long time to realize the 'backing off' strategy was very a real, valid, acceptable, and NECESSARY tool to use. I know now, that for Ella, I was asking too much of her to potty train while daddy was gone. We thought if we took it nice and slow we could do it, but by the end of the deployment she and I had developed a truly unfortunate dynamic in our relationship - a horrible battle of wills and control. I started yelling at her, I mean REALLY yelling at her, for the first time in our lives, and it was shocking for me. The feeling of complete rage and loss of control was so foreign to me and my surprise and shock over it usually translated to a really fun screaming a crying session. Ugh. I'm sure I'm not THE worst mother in the world, but I'd really like to put myself in the running for putting her through my anger & control issues, during that potty training time, and, well, ever since then.

I am only NOW just realizing that I need to finally work on my relationship with her in a more positive way. During the deployment and pregnancy I thought the problems were just that - daddy is away and I'm pregnant and full of hormonal mood swings, nothing to worry about, right? After every 'angry episode' we'd work past it, I'd apologize, we'd tackle whatever we'd gotten upset about. After daddy got home there was the new baby so any 'episodes' were chalked up to that - learning to share mommy with another kid is hard, I have post partum hormones and mood swings, still nothing to worry about, right? Well, now the baby is getting ready to turn 1 and daddy has been home almost a year so I'm running out of excuses. It seems like Ella and I are in a constant battle of wills over so many issues, and I'm starting to see that I may be forcing incorrect expections/constraints on her. I HATE how 'pokey' she is and we're constantly nagging her to finish up, come along, get in the car so we're not late, etc. So I'm thinking, you know what?, maybe she is just a 'slow' kid (surprise, surprise, MANY preschoolers are 'slow'), and um, last time I checked, I'm the grown-up (hah), so I guess maybe I should structure our days so that she can BE slow, if that's what she is.

Now, I'm not saying we should just let our kids 'be' whatever all the time, hey they'd be tearing our houses apart in no time, coloring on the walls, throwing toys, general anarchy. But I think I need to take a good look at my kid and figure out what her 'real' eccentricities are, the ones that she really can't change. I've always thought I could shape her to be more, I don't know, normal, if there was something I thought was just unacceptable. But I don't think I can really make her faster, when I rush and nag her, we just end up screaming and crying and I'm probably really stressing her out. Hell, I HATE being rushed, why the heck would I do that to her? It all seems so basic, I don't know why it's taken me so long to look at her this way. Poor kid, it really is hard being the first, your parents have to test out every new parenting theory on you, and, well, really fail on most of them. I can only hope that she still won't remember too much of this, but I think at 4, we are definitely entering the 'early memories' stage of her life, and god help me if her first memories of her mama are being screamed at for not finishing her breakfast fast enough so we can get to preschool on time...

Well, this week I'm on day #4 of what I like to call 'ABSOLUTELY NO YELLING AT ELLA!' and I've successfully mastered my total irritation with her several times, taking some nice deep breaths and talking to her in almost a whisper (I think that might be scaring her more than the yelling). I've managed to finally be the 'grown-up' and take responsibility for us getting places on time, and as a result I didn't have to angrily rush her to preschool either day this week, um, seriously people, that was a HUGE milestone for me. And all week I've just been saying to myself, 'just let her be Ella, let her be her' - when she dissapeared for over 30 minutes when asked to go wash her hands, when she stared out the window at lunch and only took 2 bites in 15 minutes, or when I discovered her having a tea party with a necklace, bracelet, earrings and crown on when I just asked her to go put on her shoes. I kept thinking she was a 'sluggish little space cadet who never listened to a thing I said' when I need to see that she's a 'dreamy, measured, ponderous, and imaginative princess who loves to daydream and is always ready to listen if I talk to her the right way'. (thanks Thesaurus.com)

So, if you want to read it, here's my full comment from Ask Moxie and, of course, some pictures of my favorite little daydreamer...

I have a 'backing off' story also related to pregnancy and potty training and, drumroll... daddy's deployment. You think too much for a 2 1/2 year old? Yep.

I got pregnant with our second and we said goodbye to daddy for a 6-month deployment. My eldest was 2 1/2 when he left and had actually been going poop in the potty since she was 2, she just got interested in the potty, got a potty seat and started going, but she had no interest in going pee and never seemed to tell us when she had to. I waited until after he was gone for a little while and tried a variety of rewards systems but she never initiated breaks I just had to make her go. Then about 2 months before he came home she started having poop accidents - yuck - I was furious and let her know - I know, I know, totally wrong, supposed to have NO emotion involved in potty training, but I couldn't help it, she'd been 'poop' trained for a year, I was SO dissapointed.

The original post talked about control and battle of wills, and we definitely had plenty of that, I really 'lost it' more times than I want to admit, it was a truly hard time for us. It was my mother (who is a psychologist, so, pretty smart about this stuff) who was the one to tell me to 'back off' and take a break from the potty training, but I had a really hard time accepting that. Both my husband and I couldn't believe that our exceptional (now) 3-year-old could NOT do something developmentally, I mean, she'd been able to do everything else, right? She'd passed all her big milestones with flying colors, she HAD to be able to potty train too! It didn't help that we kept hearing how early and easily girls potty train and she was 3 and not even close. But as my mother said, I had to come to the realization that she could not do this, could not handle this, was completely overwhelmed and this was how she was expressing it. It was SO hard for me to take a step back, but I put her back in diapers and had to also let her know that I was okay with that (took a while to convince myself and her, she knew when I didn't mean it!).

Daddy came home, we had the baby the next day, moved her into her 'big girl room' a few days later and then daddy wanted to tackle potty training again - WHAT?! I knew he was crazy but I had to let him come to the same understanding I did, and it didn't take him long. I'm proud to admit that we made it through this INSANE time in our lives, she is now a little over 4 and she IS potty trained. I let her take a few more months really slow, very little emphasis on the potty and then I tried the 'potty timer' method and it worked wonders for us. I set a timer every 20 min. and told her when the bell went ding it was potty time, and it wasn't mommy's decision, it was the timer. She went without a fuss at each bell ding and for several days she really had to go each time so I truly believe she had not figured out her bladder 'holding' muscles, etc., she was just always peeing and the timer method helped her finally figure out how to hold it. I know it also helped that it was the 'timer' and not me, we took the control battle between the two of us out of the potty equation, and it worked.

At 4, she and I still have a lot of control issues, battle of wills, etc., and I'm currently going through another phase of 'backing off' with a variety of issues - not taking an hour to do things (she is a pokey kid), feeding herself (she spaces out at the table), etc. It seemed like we were fighting a lot lately, so I'm trying to back off and just 'let her be her'. I think as parents, as the 'bosses' of the family we always do a little over-controlling, thinking we can make our kids do things the 'right way' all the time, and it's REALLY hard to realize that doing things THEIR way is okay too. She ate her breakfast this morning, I just had to spoon-feed her about half the bites so we could get to preschool on time, but I didn't spend all of breakfast nagging her to finish, didn't have to rush us into the car, and got to say goodbye to her with a hug and a smile instead of tears - definitely worth all the 'backing off' she needs. : )

Eleven whole months of Sofia (and Ella) to try to report on, hmmm... So we'll start with Sofia's fantastic babbling skills, hence the clever title of this post!

At eleven months Sofia is a masterful babbler, right on track with all babies, I'm sure, but we, of course, think she is masterfully smart : ) She has been saying 'dada' and 'mama' for some time now, but she seems to finally be figuring out which is which. She is currently mastering 'hi', which she loves to NOT say when you ask her to (in front of a friend, for example), and loves to say on and on repeatedly in the dark of her bedroom after we have put her to sleep - even the thick Italian stone walls do not stop that sweet little voice, I can hear her all the way down the hall as I type on the computer...

She is also currently working on her fabulous princess wave, but is still much better at her chubby little baby finger point, which she has been doing for at least a couple months. I don't know what it is about that little finger, and her sister must have done it too, but it is my favorite thing, especially if she points AT me and says 'mama' - hooray! (most of the time she points at a lot of who-knows-what and says a bunch of baby gobbledy gook - still pretty much the cutest thing ever).

So what else can I say? Eleven months has flown by, right? That's what everyone says, and it definitely goes fast, but I think we have paused to enjoy each stage, month, week and day with Sofia, just as we did with Ella, at least I know we've tried. The first 6 months seemed slower than the last five, maybe because all that early baby stuff (laying around, staring at the ceiling, eating, sleeping) is kind of tedius and slow. I definitely enjoyed just holding and cuddling her, probably more than I did with Ella because I wasn't worrying if I was doing it all right. I've been telling everyone I know who has only one kid to DEFINITELY have more, because it has been just so sweet and wonderful having a second. I mean, yes, I'm tired and sometimes pulled too many different ways, but I had NO idea how much I loved having a baby until I got to do it again, it has been a real gift...

Lately, I definitely feel busy and pulled a lot of different directions, probably because Sofia is SO mobile now. She's been crawling since the fall but now she really enjoys some serious playtime - aka, mommy can NOT leave her for more than a few seconds because she goes in the kitchen, opens up the cabinets and takes out all the applesauce containers!!! She is so much more active than big sister Ella was at this stage. Ella was a quiet studier, liked to really examine all the pages of her books, pieces of her toys, etc., all while sweetly sucking on her pacifier. Conversely, Sofia enjoys grabbing huge handfulls of toys out of the toy basket without barely a glance, pulling all the books off the bookshelf, all while giving each thing she has grabbed a quick slobbery chew because she is SO not interested in using a pacifier... you have no idea how many hours you can kill wiping baby saliva off of things : )

Life seems to be a little bit in fast-forward mode right now, we know we will be leaving Italy in a few short months to move back to the states so everything we do seems to be on some sort of count-down (i.e., better NOT buy that huge pack of toilet paper, we might not use it up in time!). But we're still making time for walks down to the gelato store so I'm still enjoying every moment with my girls. Well, the moment right now is up as I can hear someone's sweet little cries through these thick stone walls and I can't wait to go scoop her up and give her a cuddle...