Dirty Little Secret

I swear to the Goddess that this post was going to be happy. I was going to list things I like. Or something. I really wanted to write a post that didn’t involve bitching. Possibly that’s too much to ask when I’m on the rag, the kids have spring break and my allergies are trying to kill me, I don’t know.

I do know that I was a shitty mother this morning and I feel the need to confess. I had this plan in my head. I would take my kids to the indoor play area and grab some fast food lunch (sorry Jamie Oliver, I really am trying to do better {more on that later} but I’ve got 48 hours of solo time, killer cramps AND a headache). It would be fun. They would be happy. And cramps like french fries.

There were a few other people there, one family with two boys and a pair of women with their 2 girls. Lovebug and Ironflower rushed to make friends. The older boy didn’t want to befriend Lovebug at first, which Lovebug took on the chin and moved on. Eventually, the boy changed his mind. Ironflower seemed fine with the younger girls. I spent my time chasing ChunkyMonkey and preventing him from getting trapped in the play area.

Until I saw the 2 girls, but no Ironflower. The place isn’t very big, so I found this surprising. Eventually I found her crying in the corner. The girls didn’t want to play with her anymore. Now, I try to be reasonable. I know my daughter can be bossy. The girls were younger and already knew each other. I said as much (well, I substituted “decisive” for “bossy”). She kept crying. I asked if they said anything mean. She shook her head. She rejected playing with her brother. And me.

And then. . .well, I got mad.

I told my daughter that she needed to get over it and not let those girls ruin our good time. Or we would have to leave. She got up and climbed slowly around. She bit my head off when I checked on her and then she cried some more.

Even after the girls left, she didn’t want to play. She was too sad about them not wanting to be friends with her. I hugged her and held her on my lap. And then I sort of went off about the whole situation.

It’s not that I wasn’t sad for her. But if this kind of thing is going to devastate her so much. . .how will she ever handle elementary school? How will I?

I pointed out that she was ruining our family fun time over 2 little girls that we would never see again and obviously weren’t very nice. I pointed out that she loves to play with Lovebug. I pointed out that I had gotten dressed  and paid money and dealt with 85 ChunkyMonkey tantrums so they could have fun, dammit, and why couldn’t she just have fun for the love of God??????????????? (I left out the dammit, but I’m not sure about the “for the love of God)

I am not a nice person.

The mood lifted as we left. We got McDonald’s. We read stories. We had quiet time. Now they are watching a DVD. Under calm questioning, Ironflower still cannot articulate (and if you know Ironflower, you know that’s very very strange. . . . Ironflower is nothing if not articulate) why she was so upset.

But I’m so afraid of the next time someone doesn’t want to play with her. We’ve always encouraged our kids to be friendly and to include all kids in their games. But maybe that’s not the best thing for Ironflower emotionally. I just don’t know.

Advice, internets? Also, feel free to tell me how to handle this without turning into an evil cow.

That’s what my son said today, after I prompted him to say good-bye to a boy from Ironflower’s class. The kids like to run around a bit after being picked up from preschool, because apparently freezing temperatures, a biting wind and snow on the ground are not half as important as playing with their classmates for an extra few minutes. Today I’d seen Lovebug argue with the boy, a nice kid from Ironflower’s class. As it didn’t get physical and no one came to me about it, I figured all was well.

Until, as we walked to our car with the boy and his mom, my son said, “Good-bye, you bitch.” The look of shock on her face combined with the shock I felt made me giggle. I covered my mouth. I made him apologize. I repeated, “We don’t call people that” like a mantra.

But of course, we do call people that. Not me, actually – my favorite word, as I’ve mentioned, is “shit.” But my husband and possibly my brother-in-law prefer the term “bitch”.  We just spent 10 days at my in-laws, a number of them snowed in. Add in the 3 days driving there and the 3 days driving home and well, we’ve had a lot of togetherness lately. (Yes, you read that correctly. Three days in the car back to the farm outside of Kansas City, 9 days in a house with no internet, and three days home.  And we’re all more or less intact.)

None of which excuses the fact that we’ve been swearing in front of the children again. Well, in front of Lovebug. Ironflower doesn’t seem to notice most of what we say (even when it’s directed at her), but Lovebug is like a little sponge. A sponge that called a bigger boy a bitch in front of his mother.

I personally don’t care much about swearing, which is good since that would make me a total hypocrite. But name-calling really disturbs me. Maybe it’s because I can still remember being called names – that still echo in my head – as a child, but don’t even notice most swear words anymore. The only reason I haven’t hijacked all of Lovebug’s Thomas trains is that I don’t think he knew that he was name-calling.

But he’d better remember next time.