Thursday, March 31, 2005

Medicine Lessons

Will I never learn about the evils of Ibuprofen on an empty stomach? Wolf started coming down with a cold yesterday, and of course, Grama and Rachel and I still dragged him off to Jeepers anyway since it was our plan. I’m sure he would have enjoyed it a lot more and made much better use of his wristband if he wasn’t stumbling around in his cold-induced mini-stupor. I gave him some Motrin before bed to bring his little (101) fever down, hoping it would last longer than the Tylenol. He wound up coming upstairs around 2:30 a.m. or so to sleep with (read ON) me, the Mama pillow. We got up together at 6:30 a.m. to watch TV on the couch and get him some medicine.

As I was pouring the Motrin, Wolf said, “My puke doesn’t like that kind, Mama.” I reply, “No, that’s only at night, Wolf.” So what, maybe 10 minutes later, he cries this panicked pre-puke cry on the couch and I frantically shove my hands under his mouth to catch it. Then a little more crying, 85 million “I’m so sorry honey”s and one more ‘catch’ in the kitchen and all the awful medicine was finally down the drain. Now listen to this! NO IBUPROFEN ON AN EMPTY STOMACH EVER!!!!

Sunday, March 20, 2005

MY KINGDOM FOR A COMMENT!!!

Talk about side-tracked! I set up this web page on blogger and can now think of nothing but acquiring a comment. And not just a ‘you suck’ comment or ‘nice site’ either – I actually believe that I’ll receive some apt literary critiques! That someone I don’t know may stumble upon my writing and be struck by one of these deep thoughts that I hide in here all the time. Is that what SAHM’hood has done to me – made me so hungry for recognition?

Well, I suppose it has. Anytime I’ve been pissed at DH it’s usually been over me doing so much and him not caring/commenting/recognizing it. And your children certainly can’t give you adult quality recognition can they? Although Wolf has taken up the sweet sweet habit of hugging me and saying “I love you Mama.” That is the ultimate mom-thrill, even when he’s only doing it to counter you being mad at him for some transgression or other like peeing in his Pull-up.

So, here I am starving: MY KINGDOM FOR A COMMENT!!! Since starting this blog, I’ve spent the majority of my free time (i.e. when the kids are sleeping) on the PC obsessing about feedback. I’ve researched traffic advice, added ads and clicked on a number of other blogs hoping to be touched enough to leave them comments, of course begging reciprocation. But I really haven’t found any that I care about (except all the knitting ones out there – awesome!) I guess that’s the trick to it, I really ought to stick to writing for myself and then perhaps, if I come up with something good, then throw it out there and see what happens but not really care if anyone else likes it or not because I already do.
>^.^<

Wednesday, March 16, 2005

An Ugly Period

I think I’ve subconsciously been avoiding writing about Wolfie’s defiant period because it’s not exactly pretty. But, since this is all about the real Wolf, his defiance is a part of him, one that I have a lot of trouble understanding. It started Feb. 1st over taking a bath. He refused to get in the tub and I wound up forcibly standing him in it and hurriedly dumping water over his crying screaming form – an ugly scene. Since then he’s picked various times and places to assert himself with loud crying and pulling or pushing against you (OMG! A tantrum!?!) – most of the time it’s not in public, except for Walmart by Becky’s house where he decided he didn’t want to go in once we got just past the cash registers.

I thought I was getting a handle on it with time-outs (which really means making him sit alone in his room until he stops crying.) He can’t stand to be alone, so this really registers with him. He’s gone from several outbursts a day to just one or sometimes none. Whew? Still, he freaked last night when he had to come upstairs and put his PJ’s on (not enough warning maybe?) And then, hopefully the last battleground of this period is actual sleep itself. Wolf refuses to fall asleep ‘on purpose’ – he won’t allow himself to be still long enough. He demands that I sit at his bedside, “Mama can I have you for just a little bit?” It sounds so utterly sweet when I write it, but when you’re actually sitting there nodding off yourself and all you want to do is go to bed, you feel a bit differently. Once I said no and left the room and he literally screamed bloody murder for half an hour, while I yelled ‘Go to sleep!’ from the living room – I have no idea how Mattie slept through it – a really ugly scene. AND the remedy was I STILL went in and knelt by his bed!!

I tell him, “Close your eyes or I’m leaving,” and he complies but dances his little hands around in the air ever so slightly – just enough to keep him from drifting off. I plead with him in clear desperation, “What can I do to help you go to sleep?” to no avail. If he does ‘allow’ me to leave (only on the promise I’ll be back to check on him) he just comes out. Sometimes I let him sit with us on the couch for a few minutes thinking that will help. Last night it did not. I finally left his room at 11:25 and he was still awake. I told him that we’re not doing this anymore and tomorrow there would be a spanking if he didn’t cooperate with going to sleep…