Going Parental: My three-year-old is kicking my ass

The reality show Survivor ^[1] has a great little tag line, “Outwit, Outplay, Outlast.” The person who is able to accomplish all three of these things at the end of the show wins a million dollars. Pretty awesome, right? My three-year-old daughter would kick ass in that game. They’d never see her coming. I imagine it would go a little something like this:

“Ohhh look at that gorgeous little girl with the blond hair and big eyes. What a sweet smile you have. Aren’t you just the cutest little thing?! Hey wait a minute, how the hell did I end up on the floor — hogtied, with you standing on my back pumping your fists in victory? What just happened?!”

I’ll tell ya how. She just outwitted, outplayed and outlasted your ass. Welcome to my world.

In the past month or so I’ve noticed a change in my daughter — and myself. Ultimately, she is a pretty well behaved kid. I can take her anywhere and she will be social, play nicely with other kids and basically not embarrass me. She’s not the kid in the supermarket rolling around on the floor, having a fit because she’s not getting the candy she wants. Even she thinks that kid’s a douche bag. That’s not her thing. She’s too posh for such public displays. She sits in the cart, munches on Pirates Booty ^[2] and smiles at people while we shop. What a little angel.

And then — we leave the store and get into the car.

Within minutes, “My seat-belt’s too tight! I don’t like my shirt! Change the music! I need juicy! I’m hungry!” I’m talking yelling. Not asking politely, or in a calm or soft tone like she used to do just weeks ago. It’s turned into a full blown scream fest. So what do I do in my infinite maturity? I yell back. And then she yells back. And then I yell back. And within minutes I find myself arguing with this little pisher as if she were a 15-year-old kid. I don’t know what happens to me. I completely lose not only my self control, but my awareness of her age. She’s fucking three! THREE! It’s like she pulls out this toddler Jedi mind trick ^[3] on me and totally gets me to turn into a raving lunatic, knowing its the exact opposite of who I want to be. It’s like a game. And kids love games.

So what the hell is wrong with me? I’ve never been this way with her. I’ve never yelled so much in my life (OK maybe I did when I was the General in Color War at camp, but that was different — those little bastards had it coming, I mean how hard is it to carry an egg on a spoon?). I hate yelling. I hate it when people even speak loudly.

In the past two weeks, two friends have sent me the same New York Times ^[4] article entitled, “For Some Parents, Shouting Is the New Spanking ^[5].” If you’re reading this blog, you have to read this article. It’s all about our generation and how completely screwed we are because we don’t hit our kids, we don’t even want to (most of the time), time-outs and counting to three become futile after a while and so what do we do? We yell.

Well apparently, yelling is potentially fucking them up more than smacking them in the ass. According to this article, I’m destroying my daughter’s self-esteem and sense of security every time I yell at her. I am the worst parent. And what’s worse — deep down I know that this is a part of her development. She’s testing things, seeing how far she can push. She’s still totally incapable of properly expressing her emotions and for the most part, she’s just being a silly kid.

Right?

Because sometimes — honestly, I feel like she’s fucking with me. She has this smirk and this twinkle in her eye and I feel as though in her head she’s saying:

“Mommy’s so stupid. I’m just going to keep smiling and not clean up my toys while she stands there trying to look all scary and just wait for her to snap. Then she’ll yell at me. Then I’ll yell back and say I want Mama, which will totally hurt her feelings. Then I’ll cry. Then she’ll feel bad. Then we’ll hug it out. And then I’ll get chocolate. And then — in about an hour or so, I’m going to do it all over again. This is fun.”

Like I said… outwitted, outplayed and outlasted.

Mayday.

Going Parental appears every Thursday… as long as I’m not busy stunting my daughter’s mental and/or developmental growth.