I thought it was going to be a smooth, calm morning where I could just spend time sipping coffee and watching my two kids play… even get down on my knees and play with them. What a picture-perfect fatherly moment, and why not? I am a therapist, trained in the ways of thoughts, behavior, and emotion. So naturally, I would have this whole parenting thing in the bag.
Pause. See where it’s beginning to go wrong? Where I have set myself up for it to go awry?
The day started with my son crying because he wanted a snack, but it was too early for him to have a snack, and just plain too early for him to be up. So he was yelling at my wife and continually slamming doors. This is all while I’m in bed convincing myself that I am actually still asleep. But ultimately, I accept that I’m awake and I get out of bed and attempt to stretch out all the aches and pains I have because I am 42 and that’s a part of it.
My daughter comes into my room to give me a hug, which is nice, but it’s one of those hugs where she expects me to pick her up, putting all of her weight on me, all back. She tells me she wants to cook eggs. I am conflicted because it’s exciting that my 7 year old wants to contribute, but I am also thinking about egg all over the counter and that burning smell coming from the pan.
Then my son, who seemed to wake up this morning and decide he wanted to watch the world burn, wanted to watch something on his tablet during breakfast, and when I reminded him that this is not something we do on schooldays, he cried and screamed. I tried to hold him and show compassion, “I know it’s hard not getting what you want.” He was also throwing things and again, slamming doors. “I get it, my boy, We are having some big feelings.” So I am trying to get my daughter going with the eggs, and he decides that this is not okay with him, so he starts punching me in the back…
Pause again. Any of this resonate with you? Have you also experienced your own special version of this type of chaos?
Unpause. Here it is. I lose it… I pick him up and walk him up to his room, all the while I’m telling myself, “this is warranted because he hit”. I place him on his bed, and it just came out… at the top of my lungs while pointing right in his face, “WE DON’T HIT!!!!”. Then came the water works. Him, not me. I left him there, crying.
I came downstairs and went back to my daughter. We were quietly finishing up the eggs when she said, “so… are you going to say you’re sorry.” I told her I would, but that I needed a minute. She’s clearly been here before as the older child.
Now here’s what I am quickly going to say. My wife talks about this a lot. She feels overwhelming guilt about being a Mom. Guess what? Many men may not talk about it, or it’s assumed that we don’t understand the guilt, or don’t feel the guilt, but we, in fact, spiral too. We feel the guilt too. It didn’t take long for the guilt to set it. I messed up, and I knew it. And the thing about modern parenting (and perhaps the emotions of a modern man) is that I have the reaction, the blow-up, and then I get down on myself for it. I am angry, and now I feel the shame that says I am not a good enough parent (a “bad dad”, if you will).
I’m having these thoughts while helping my daughter scramble some eggs, so I have some time to process. Was there a moment before we got to this point where things could have ended differently? Hindsight is where we parent best, right (and also win every argument we get in)? I could have paused before getting out of bed to notice my own stuff. I had a busy day ahead of me, and I felt a bit of a weight on my shoulders. Noticing this may have allowed me to have more respect for my space in the morning. Instead, I powered through, chalking it up to just another morning with my feral children.
Maybe I could have asked my wife to stick around for a few minutes while I got myself together, to prepare to be present for my kids. I tend to struggle with being interrupted when I am deep in the middle of something, so I could have asked my daughter to hold off on the eggs while I calmly tended to her brother. I could have done some deep breathing myself (instead of just telling him to breathe). I could have acknowledged that this boy, at this moment, may not be able to be controlled, and shifted my attention towards what it’s like for me to not be in control. I could have…should have…..
So here we are, finishing up the eggs, while my son is upstairs crying. I’ve stepped back from the “I’m a bad dad ledge” and acknowledged that I wasn’t my best. I tell myself I am human and that I have the power to change this whole thing. I tell my daughter that I will be back. She nods… she knows what I am going upstairs for. Again, she has been here, too. I walk up the stairs with a little more ease. It’s amazing what introspection and self-compassion can do to a person…while scrambling some eggs.
So now comes arguably the most important part of the whole incident, and a turning point for the morning… the repair. I walk into my son’s room, where he is crying. I sit on his bed and immediately start with “daddy’s sorry”. I told him that I don’t like to yell like that and that I am going to try harder. I fight the urge to say, “but you shouldn’t…” or “but if you hadn’t” because this is about me taking responsibility for my actions, not the 4-year-old doing what 4-year-olds do.
He ultimately apologized too, for hitting. It felt good that he could take responsibility as well. We hugged it out, and he came back downstairs. He enjoyed some of his sister’s eggs and was clearly in a better mood. It stinks that my yelling at him effectively changed his behavior. But I know there are times I am able to stay calm and be with him through his emotions without letting them affect me.
This brings me here, to the children that I love so much, that can make me laugh, smile, and feel all the warmth in the world, but can also cause me physical pain, anger, self-doubt, fear (so much fear) and shame. This morning was a microcosm of what I, and likely most parents go through on a day-to-day, or a moment-to moment basis. Talking about it makes it feel less lonely, and more relatable. Less like we’re doing something wrong, and more like we are all learning. My son is learning how to manage his feelings….and so am I.
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