The other day I was laying out on my stomach, reading my book while my toddler was playing and my 8 month old DD (darling daughter) was crawling and climbing all over me while laughing. The first thought I had was “she’s not mad at me”, quickly followed by “I thought she was mad at me!”.
Let me start from the beginning…
When I was home during the day, before bed and first thing in the morning, I would nurse my DD but if I was out of the house, or after my husband came home from work, she would get a bottle. Some days she might get 1 to 2 bottles and other days most of her milk intake would be from a bottle (I was never able to pump a lot). My DD has a healthy appetite, and since starting food and having formula she seemed to be weaning herself off of breast feeding. During the hot summer days this didn’t bother me but I still enjoyed the morning and night feeding, and with my first DD I went 13 months breast feeding, and planned on going at least a year with this baby as well. Then, suddenly, my DD just decided she was done with nursing and wanted nothing more to do with it. She would arch her back, kick her legs, turn her head away, and start crying and getting really mad. I tried to push it a couple times, and she bit me!! So I gave up and figured that she was just through with breast feeding, and being just under 9 months old, I knew she would be on cows milk soon enough. (Thankfully for me, she had slowly been weaning herself off up until this point, so I wasn’t left in agony as my body adjusted to this sudden drop in demand).
I was frustrated, however, with this cranky baby (who may or may not be teething), who at times didn’t want breast or bottle, and sometimes just wanted to be held and rocked. And at times, I get frustrated, because, she wants to be held, but at the same time she wants to crawl, climb, pull herself up, and just play. Oh, but don’t let her down or she’ll get very upset!!
I didn’t realise I was hurt, upset and frustrated with my DD until that moment on the floor with her laughing while crawling and climbing all over me. The thought “she’s not mad at me!” made me realise that, for some reason, I thought she was mad at me and that’s why she had stopped breast feeding. But in reality, I guess she just outgrew it faster than I was expecting, and the frustration came from me trying to force it, more than from her stopping.
I believe, for me anyway, a lot of the frustrations that come with parenting is expecting your kids to act more mature, or grown up, than they really are. You forget that they are just 2 years old and this is how 2 year olds act. You forget that, typically, your baby isn’t doing these things specifically to annoy you, they are just being a baby. I have to continually remind myself that “This is normal”, “she’s only 2.5/8months”, “this is just a stage”, “she really doesn’t know any better”.
Yes, you’ve told your child a 100 times not to do this, not to do that, to clean up their toys, to put their dishes in the sink, whatever it may be. Yes, you think “they know better!”, you believe “they should know this by now”, but in reality they need reminders. Even us adults need reminders from time to time.
I think we need to give our kids a little slack. Instead of becoming so frustrated that you have to remind them yet again to do this or that, or not do that, we must take a deep breath and relax!
Parenting is hard, exhausting work, and it takes a lot of time, patience, and repetition to train up our children in the way they should go. Yes, sometimes it’s tempting to let that thing slide, that thing you know is wrong, that thing you’ve told your child not to do 100 times and figure it doesn’t matter if you let it go this once. Yes, sometimes laziness seems like your best friend. But we all know that we need to repeat ourselves as many times and in as many ways as we can until our kids get it. We need to be reminded that it’s normal that our kids need to be reminded. I strive to train up my children in the way God is training me up: with unending patience, unconditional love, oceans of grace, loving correction, and gentle reminders. Have I perfected this? NO!! Am I always patient, loving and gentle? Sadly, I am far from it. But I keep going, keep trying, and most importantly, I keep praying. As God is with me and teaching me, I become a better parent and can raise my children better as well.
4 Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. 5 It does not dishonor others, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. 6 Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. 7 It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres.1 Corinthians 13:4-7(NIV)
