Only human...

I was going to publish a different blog post today. Something a bit more lighthearted. But I told myself when I started this thing that I was going to be as honest as I could be and not sugar coat the truth. So I'm writing about something different. It's not necessarily humorous (although I'm sure I will laugh about it in the future as I usually do about these things), but it is real, and what I imagine a lot of parents feel far more regularly than we care to admit.

The photo above is of Puds this morning and fully represents my feelings towards him right now. On the outside in view of the world is a big smiling face saying life is wonderful, I have totally got this. What you can't see underneath is a screaming banshee who is having a lot of "big feelings" and doesn't quite know how to deal with them. For the past week or so Puds has not been a happy boy. If his brain were like that of the little girl from Disney's film Inside Out, all his little memory balls would be coloured red for angry and blue for sad, with a little green disgust thrown in for good measure. I know why he's feeling like this, he's teething and in the annoying inbetween stage of developing big emotions and independance, but not quite handling either of them in the right way and not knowing how to communicate about it. He's frustrated, I get it, I really do, but knowing the why, in no way at all helps make dealing with it any easier. My memory balls are a kaleidoscope of colours in regards to him at the moment. Before becoming a parent I had no idea that you could love a person so utterly and completely, yet feel such heated dislike towards them at the same time. This week he has made me feel joyous, and angry, and sad, and guilty, and besotted, and hateful, all at the same time, and it's exhausting. Mummy is definitely the one struggling with her "big feelings" right now.

It all came to a head yesterday I suppose. I dropped Pickles off at school and Puds was his usual amount of difficult, so nothing I couldn't handle. It started to go down hill when I tried to say goodbye to Pickles and take Puds away from the classroom. As I picked him up, he screamed and in his rage he kicked off the seat he was on and his head collided with my mouth. I saw stars for a minute, my eyes started streaming, and I cut the inside of my lip on my tooth which started bleeding, and later swelled up to the size of a cherry. He screamed the whole way back to the car, pulling my hair, biting me, scratching, and kicking to let out his frustration of being forcibly removed and carried away from where he wanted to be. This continued for the rest of the day (until Nana saved me from the temptation of abandoning him in Asda by babysitting for me), and included an extremely painful bite on my thumb knuckle during his swimming lesson because I wouldn't let him whack the other parents and children over the head with a pool noodle!

After a goodnight sleep we both woke up in a much better mood, so I was determined today would go differently. Alas it was not meant to be. After we left for school early I thought we could do the walk from the car to the school along a path where I know there will be puddles to splash in. Let's have some fun, I thought! I dressed us in wellies and raincoats, and took both the kids an umbrella, and one for me, because Puds gets very jealous if his sister has one and he doesn't. This was where I had gone wrong. I bet you all saw it coming as soon as you read the word "umbrella". The first 30 seconds were great, loads of fun, and I congratulated myself on what a great idea this was. But Pud's hands were getting wet in the rain and he finding it increasingly difficult to hold his brolly upright. He flew into a rage. It was like someone had flicked a switch. He screamed and screamed and screamed. He threw the umbrella, and then was cross because he didn't have an umbrella. He threw his dummy because he didn't want it, but was then cross because he didn't have it anymore. He didn't want to walk, but screamed, bit, scratched and kicked when I picked him up. He purposely head-butted the paving slabs a few times to vent his frustration, then got cross because it hurt, then got cross because he wanted comfort, then got cross because I dared to comfort him when he asked. This lasted the whole way to the school gate and to her credit, Pickles was an absolute angel the whole time. On the way back to the car much of the same followed, plus a bit of sitting crying in puddles (him, not me, although I was sorely tempted) and purpously kicking off his wellies whenever I picked him up. There was a lot of swearing on my part. Some directed at the situation, quite a lot directed towards Puds, of which I am not proud.

He's now napping after his busy morning of screaming at me and running around soft play to wear him out. I feel mentally exhausted as I look at his beautiful sleeping face. I am so unbelievably lucky to have him, and my heart is bursting with love for this little boy, but right now I am finding it so difficult to like him. I know I shouldn't be too hard on myself though. As my friend I vented to at soft play reminded me today; I am only human.