You Aren’t Allowed to Get Mad at Me

I’ve officially lost my mind. My mental capacity is out to lunch. Goodbye to the thinking part of my brain. Now it’s just a heavy pile of mush in my skull. How will I continue to function as a sane person anymore?

My daughter did this to me. Don’t get me wrong - she is so sweet, and so kind. She makes my heart bubble up with the kind of emotions that cause me to forget what I am doing and focus solely on her smile or laugh. Caring for her is my primary responsibility in this life, and she makes it so easy. Well most days. Not today.

The reason for this temporary madness is a note she left me. The note said, “you aren’t allowed to get mad at me.” The note went on to list the five reasons she hates writing, and how it is unfair she has to do it. She is over it. 

You see, while we are temporarily living in Houston for a couple months, we have to homeschool. Too short a timeframe to enter her into a new school. So homeschool it is, and homeschool is going horribly at the moment.

That might be too strong, but today feels like it. I have been patient. I have been kind. I offered my help, offered suggestions, offered everything under the sun except writing the dang sentences for her. She sits blankly, staring at the paper. After a while, still very calm, I offer the suggestion to go into her closet and work. That might sound nuts, but in this apartment her closet is the size of a bedroom, and she has set up quite a studio.

On the floor is a cushy blanket and five pillows of various sizes. She is currently entertaining ten different stuffed animals and two barbies. It’s a plush setup, comfortable for a 10 year old to lounge and play. Two days ago this trick of letting her go to her own space worked. It has to work again, right? No, of course it won’t. Thirty minutes later I go in to check on the progress. No school work has been done. Instead I am scolded for not reading a note written on a pink note card that she cheekily placed on the kitchen counter while I was on a phone call.

The note was the aforementioned statement about her disdain for writing, and the forceful explanation that I was not allowed to emote about her decision to forgo writing forever. So now I am a lunatic. How dare she tell me what to do. I am an adult. I am in charge. 

Can you imagine if you told this to your parents when you were a kid, to your dad specifically? “Oh by the way father, I’ve decided that homework isn’t for me, but ah ah ah, you aren’t allowed to express how you feel about that. Don’t bother me with your concern over my lack of an education.” The audacity.

With a few minutes spent sitting down to write this, I am drawn back to a vague sense of reality. I understand that I am overreacting. Of course I am. But she made me do it. I am helpless against feeling what I feel, expressing what I feel, and feeling justified in expressing myself. Right?

No, a mental mess is what I am. Give it thirty minutes and I will recollect myself, come up with a new game plan, and one day laugh about this whole thing. It’s a quick insanity. Like when you are underwater and go up for air, but the surface isn’t as close as you thought. You just go nuts for a second, thinking you are about to drown. It’s just a second, but that second is terrifying. An involuntary panic. 

Ten seconds later the only thing you are worried about is if anyone saw you flail out of the water like one of those wacky inflatable tube men. I also wish no one saw my pure frustration, but writing it down is the only thing that seems to help.

I am a parent. I sometimes flail myself around. I sometimes believe children are the most unreasonable creatures on the planet.

Then again, I do love that little girl. Maybe she even had a point. She did predict that I was going to get mad. She did suggest I do something else. To her that might have seemed like a pretty agreeable solution to our disagreement. “I have some news you aren’t going to like, but perhaps this whole situation will go better if you don’t, you know, lose your mind over it.” 

Too late. I guess I’ll try again tomorrow.