One of the lessons I’ve had to learn about being a parent is how hard it can be to play the bad guy and how necessary it is. I love my kids and want them to love me, but I often have to do things that REALLY piss them off. This seems to be coming up mostly with Mandy lately since she’s at that age where she will just mess with you for the sake of messing you. But the other night I had to endure making Sam hate me, even if it was just temporary.
She and Mandy had been playing “let’s take everything out of everything else and put it everywhere” in their bedrooms, and while this is fine they have to clean up. I set Mandy to picking up in her room, but for some reason Sam started moaning and crying.
“Sam,” I said. “What the heck? Clean up.”
“Help me.”
“No, you made the mess, you clean it up.”
“Daddy! Whenever I have to clean up alone it makes me feel sad inside.”
“Oh, I am totally not buying what you’re selling, Sam. Get over it and clean up.”
Maybe 10 minutes of crying and floundering followed, during which I sat on the edge of her bed and occasionally poked her with the butt end of a hobby horse.
Finally she sat upright and glared at me. “You’re not my friend anymore!”
This actually stings every time she says it, but I stuck to my guns. “Uh huh. Clean up.”
“But you’re really hurting my feelings.”
“Because I’m asking you to clean up the mess you made? That should not hurt your feelings. You need to suck it up and get tougher feelings and CLEAN UP.”
“But my blessings book says God knows how I feel.”
“He also said ‘Obey your father and mother.’ BOOM! OWNED! I had more years of Bible school than you can count, Sam. Clean up.”
This went on for some time, and I only finally got her to clean up by letting Mandy sit in Sam’s coveted deep end of the bathtub. But still, GEEZ.
(And lest you think I’m some kind of monster, I did try several times in the course of this to hold her and calm her down, but she was having none of it and wouldn’t even let me sit next to her. This one had to be ridden out.)
The interesting thing about conflicts with Sam and Mandy is that they kind of roughly map on to how conflicts played out between my parents and me and my sister (hi Shawn!). Like Samantha, Shawn would be much more likely to directly lock horns with you, arguing and fighting head to head to get her way. I, on the other hand, was more like Mandy in that I would most often ignore you completely or mutter something noncommittal if I had to, then just go and do whatever the hell I wanted as soon as you turned your back. People who know us might say that these traits persisted into my and Shawn’s adulthood, so I guess I know what I have to look forward to in my own kids.
Of course, this means I have advance notice for the purpose of planning and scheming.
If you are drawing this analogy, then get ready for when Sam is a teenager! I was a really good little kid but a hellion as a teenager. It is true though, you always did your own thing and I would fight it out. I wish I had more of your trait. Maybe Sam will go to law school. At least she did not call Jesus and everyone else in the family to help her.
BTW, Mandy is totally left handed like her Aunt Shawn!