The Breaking Point

Every parent has those moments when you feel your self-control slipping.  They push you just a little bit further than usual and suddenly you find yourself remembering what life was like without them and wondering whether you ought to have yourself committed for your decision to have children as your temper explodes with the fire of a thousand suns.

I'm not a patient person by any stretch of the word but I take a lot more crap from my kids than I would from anyone else.  Unfortunately there are still moments when the hull of self-possession is profoundly, catastrophically breached.  Tonight was one of those nights.

I'm on leave for a week to look after Charlotte because she's on school holidays.  James is in daycare during the day and, without the little Viking around to initiate  wrestling contests, she's pretty easy to deal with.  We had a lovely, girly day together - watching the Tinkerbell movie, walking to the shops for lunch in the little bakery and she even helped me out with some Spring cleaning.

It was hard to see how the day could turn sour but when it comes down to it, I just don't give my kids enough credit.  First of all James came home in a sooky mood. And not just a "please cuddle me on the couch while I watch some Dora" kind of sooky but the "nothing is going to make me happy, not even an army of tap dancing spider monkeys wielding lollies and chocolate" kind of sooky.  Every word coming out of his mouth is leveled at that perfect ear drum-penetrating pitch and drawn out into a protracted whine designed to drive you insane.

Over dinner my nerves gradually fell apart as Charlotte commenced chewing and spat out every second mouthful  into her hand to examine it because "it's just weird"; James refused to eat the Mongolian lamb he'd asked for, choosing to spread it over the table instead and ask for "more wice" instead; he also got up and down from the table, crawling around underneath in between and then dribbled his milk everywhere, purely to see how we'd react; Charlotte saw what fun her brother was having and immediately commenced whining that she didn't get any milk, only water.  Once I'd gotten up to get her some she suddenly decided she didn't want any.  Both kids topped it off by whining about the lack of dessert in their immediate futures.

At the conclusion of dinner an exhausted Charles announced his intention of having a quick nap and both kids sensed the weakness that was my separation from the protection of the Daddy herd and immediately went in for the kill.  In this particular instance they decided I needed to adjudicate the division of the only chocolate under our roof at the moment - a two-fingered kit kat and three chocolate coins.  Neither child was happy with the Solomon-esque decision handed down so they rapidly did their own little trade and of course, they both felt that was worse than what they'd started with and the world ended.

After making it clear that they were both on incredibly thin ice I left them to it in the spare room and went for some of my own time out.  I'd been chilling for not more than 30 seconds when a sheepish Charlotte appeared with her hands behind her back.
"What?" I barked, eyeing her warily.
"Mamaaaaa...I did something not so good."
"What?" I repeated, rubbing my eyes.
"My necklace broke and all the beads went everywhere."
"How did you break it?"
Shuffle of feet.
"Um...it just broke?"
"Don't say it like it's a question, just tell me how you broke it."
More shuffling of feet.
"Well you know how you told me not to stretch my necklace too much in case I broke it?"
"Yes?"
"Well how much trouble would I be in if I accidentally stretched it too much and broke it?"
"Just show me," I sigh.

Even then I was managing to hold on to my temper.  It wasn't until the moment that I was bent over on all fours, scraping up tiny glass beads from the carpet in the spare room that the breaking point came.  Because a naughty giggle was the only warning I got that my incredibly solid Viking toddler had decided my back was an excellent landing site for his epic leap from the top of the great height that is the spare bed.

On the up side both kids were too busy laughing to take notice of the death threats that were bellowed at them.