I'm Not a Bad Mom; My Kids Just Make Me Look That Way

Today is Tuesday. I hate Tuesday. Because Tuesday is the day I take my daughter to gymnastics class. And at gymnastics class, she makes me look like a bad mom, just like her brother did when he took gymnastics at this age.

My kids are generally very well-behaved and pleasant to be around, but something about gymnastics class sends both of them into screaming, whirling dervish, misbehaving, mom-embarrassing mode. Their gymnastics teacher is incredibly patient and understanding, but even she has admitted that my children are the worst-behaved kids she’s ever had in class.

They make me look like a bad mom.

Or, at least, they make me FEEL like a bad mom. After all, what kind of mom can’t control her two-year-old for 45 minutes? What kind of mom raises a hellion who won’t sit down for even 30 seconds to listen to directions? What kind of mom has a kid who screams so loudly that no-one can hear the teacher (a teacher who is used to making herself heard in a GYM)?

I’ll tell you what kind of mom: A mom who disciplines her children, who teaches them to use polite words, who makes them say, “excuse me” when they interrupt a conversation, who puts them in the naughty chair when necessary, who reminds them to listen with their ears and not their mouths, and who does not put up with tantrums. In a word: Me. And yet, when my daughter gets to gymnastics, all that discipline and all those good manners go right out the window. And there I am, tossed once again into “Bad Mom” territory.

I hate it. It’s embarrassing.

But you know what the worst part is? The worst part is that it makes me spend more time worrying about what the other parents think and not about what my daughter could be getting out of the class. I want to quiet her down not so that she can have fun and learn something, or even so that the other kids in the class can have fun and learn something, but so that I won’t look bad in front of the other parents. And that kind of does make me a bad mom.

So today, I vow to take off my bad attitude when I put on those yoga pants, and to bring my daughter to class with my head high and my expectations low. Today, my goal will be for my daughter to have at least 5 minutes of enjoying the class between tantrums. My goal will be to think only about what she’s thinking and not about what the other parents are thinking.

Because BEING a good mom is a lot more important than LOOKING like a good mom. 

Destructo-Boy Rides Again

Maybe it’s because he’s rapidly approaching the “Terrible Threes,” but my son has been on a major destructive tear for the past few weeks. In the last couple of days alone, he has poured half a bottle of gold nail polish on my desk, scratched the heck out of that same desk with a ballpoint pen, glued my computer mouse to my mouse pad, written all over the back and arm of the couch with a dry erase marker, scribbled on the wall and table with crayons, drawn on top of the soda fridge with a Sharpie, cut up some documents on my desk, removed all the tires from three toy trucks, and shredded too many books to mention. Is it any wonder that we refer to him as Destructo-Boy?

Don’t get me wrong, he’s not a bad kid. He doesn’t destroy things just for the sake of destroying them. In fact, he doesn’t even intend to destroy them, and is sometimes mystified when I inform him that something he broke can’t be fixed. He’s just curious about everything, and his need to explore currently outweighs his need to obey my orders not to touch something. So even though he knows he’s not supposed to get his scissors out of the drawer, he can’t help but wonder what it would feel like to cut through that tempting piece of paper on the desk. The siren call of the unknown is just too strong to resist.

The result, unfortunately, is frustration on both our parts. I’m frustrated that I can’t trust him out of my sight for 30 seconds, and he’s frustrated that he gets in trouble when all he wants to do is figure out how something works or what it does. So how can we both survive the next year? What can I do to assure that twelve months from now most of my possessions will still be whole and functioning? The answer, I suspect, is: Energy channeling.

No, I don’t mean some kind of New Age technique involving chakras or feng shui or reiki.  I mean finding a way to nudge his curiosity and energy in a more positive, constructive direction. It might involve projects like making homemade playdough or finger-painting with pudding or helping build some Ikea furniture. It could involve physical activities like taking hikes or riding his tricycle or building sand castles. It might involve getting him out of the house to visit the library or a playground or spending the day at daycare. It might even involve starting pretend school by practicing counting, tracing letters, and sitting quietly for story time.

But whatever the solution is, I’d better come up with it quickly, otherwise I might not have any more possessions to protect. Besides, I have to be sure this destructive streak is quashed before his legs are long enough to reach the gas pedal of my car!