A Big Ugly Mess Just Wishing for Silence

Me. I’m a mess. Or, I was last night. We had an extra kid in our house and it as chaotic and, well, I didn’t handle it nearly as gracefully as I wish I had.

Not only was there another child added to the mix of dinner and conversation, Alyssa had more homework than usual and Olivia had the usual homework. As I helped Olivia with her homework she lost her little mind and turned into the biggest brat around.

Seriously, what happened to my easy-going, delightful, docile little girl? Just under a week until she turns seven and suddenly, she’s insane. And she’s taking me down with her.

After we got done with homework, which took much gnashing of teeth and more threats than I’m proud of, Olivia decided to get naked. Big deal, right? She threw off her clothes but grabbed a blanket and snuggled beneath it. So yes, not a big deal. Except that she refused to put her clothes into the basket designated for dirty clothes. They were strewn across the living room and she laughed at me when I told her to put them in the basket.

At that point, I gave myself a timeout because, damn, that child was pushing every last button.

So you have bratty Olivia, Alyssa fighting with fractions and Jaxon following me from one room to the other, talking, talking, always and forever talking.

I realize that as the mother of a child who could very well have been non-verbal I should be thankful for every word my children and my nephew utter but…I’m not. I can’t be when the chatty child following me doesn’t just desire to talk, he wants to converse, which means he wants, needs, demands a response from me for every sentence he chirps. I know that when you’re talking it’s nice to know you’re words are being heard but if I heard, “Right, Tommie? Right?” one more time last night, I was going to stab myself in the ear.

Hence the timeout I gave myself. Though, sadly, it didn’t last the entire fifteen minutes to which I’d sentenced myself because Jaxon got bored and had to come find me.

Thankfully, the little kids were asleep by 8:15 and Alyssa was out by 9:00. I read in bed until 9:45 and felt ever so much better.

Ahhh, silence.