Hard Kid, Scared Mom

Working on parenting without fear even when I have no idea wtf to do

Photo by Luis Villasmil on Unsplash

Tonight was a bad night.

My daughter couldn’t find her digital camera. I think her neighbor friend was waiting outside and they were going to take turns filming trick basketball shots or something with it. She flipped out. Screamed at me. Dumped her backpack all over the floor.

Her camera of course was in her backpack (where I told her it would be), but she was so panicked she didn’t check the side pockets where, naturally, her camera was there.

I picked up her discarded backpack and found the camera. But I looked at the mess she made and said, “you can have this when you clean up all of this stuff and calm down.” She immediately screamed at me and hit me. I walked outside to get away from her and her violence, and, dear reader, made a bad mistake.

She followed me out and kept hitting me. I threatened to throw the camera in the pool if she didn’t stop hitting me, go back inside and clean up her mess. UGH, this was really stupid of me.

OK obviously this was poor de-escalation. Her panic surged and she went crazy hitting, kicking, and screaming at me, pushing me into the bushes and just trying to hit me in the face.

This went on for about 10 minutes. I’m pretty sure the friend who had been waiting for her walked into the house, saw what was going on in the backyard, and turned around and was just like, “nope!” and left.

She did eventually go back inside, and calmed down. And there have been and will be consequences. She’s lost all access to screens for the foreseeable future (meltdowns related to screens is a pattern with her and we’re sooooo done. We’re done with screens entirely, unfortunately including the digital camera, at least for the time being).

I’m reflecting on my own poor de-escalation, and how her panic triggered my own panic. I find it really hard to stay calm when she’s upset.

There’s also about a million other things that run through my mind when she is flipping out, and they all center on what a terrible parent I am:

I caused this by not giving consequences for previous meltdowns, so now she thinks she can just do whatever she wants when she’s upset.

So I repeat the same mistake over and over: I try to give the consequence then and there while she’s flipping out (or, stupidly, threaten a consequence I have no intention of actually following through with, like throwing something of hers in the pool and destroying it), and try to assert the boundary when she has no higher-level brain functioning and is basically having a panic attack.

I’m done making that mistake. I’ve done a lot better staying calm during her meltdowns - I don’t yell at her or anything - but I need to make better choices to de-escalate and not get sucked into her vortex.

Some kids are harder than others

As much as I want to wallow in my pity party of bad parenting and just keep beating myself up about it, part of figuring out how I can fix this stuff is allowing myself to acknowledge the fact that some kids are harder than others.

She is harder than others.

She’s been intense and stubborn since she was born. She has a sensory processing disorder so would get really upset if she was too hot, clothes were itchy, etc. A delayed snack - and therefore, the sensation of hunger - resulted in a toddler tantrum (not necessarily meltdown - meltdowns came later) 100% of the time. I know now she needs very few carbs but instead healthy, consistent protein and fat, otherwise her blood sugar drops and if that happens, it’s BAD.

I never ‘gave in’ to tantrums, but I also didn’t punish them either until she was about 4 or 5. Her ‘punishments’ usually have involved loss of screentime and some mostly failed attempts at time-out.

Time-outs would result in my trying to physically restrain her while she hit and scratched and bit me. I couldn’t just be like, “go to your room and stay there until I say you can come out.” I could physically carry her there, I could close the door and even stand at the door, but she would be out in a flash (she has been unbelievably strong since she was a toddler - trying to get her in her carseat was bananas, and sometimes I just literally physically couldn’t do it with her fighting me). Put her back in her room while she fights me. Try and keep her there. Hold the door shut. She would scream and kick the door and it really never calmed her down much, she just hyperfocused on trying to hurt me and got more and more upset.

I’ve watched other parents say “go to time out” and their kid just….goes to time out. Maybe cries a bit. But just….goes and waits to be let out. So I know that does work, I just totally failed to do it right with her. I probably wasn’t persistent enough, but I just do not like physical altercations, even with my own kid. It was hard for me to stay calm and I didn’t like the feeling of being upset while my kid was trying to hurt me. I was afraid my attempts to defend myself (like, trying to stop her biting me) might result in me accidentally hurting her.

My 3 year old is the chillest kid ever. He basically never has tantrums. He might go “NOOOO” or something if he doesn’t want to go to bed. But ultimately, he does whatever I tell him to do immediately. Something my older child has basically never done.

So I’m either a much better parent with him (which, I mean, I have learned a thing or two even if I don’t get it right all the time) or kids are different.

And some kids are harder (way harder) than others.

If I’m honest, her meltdowns scare me

I admit it. I’m scared of how wild and unpredictable she is.

I’m a super mild-mannered person. My ADHD medication makes me even more mild. My emotions often feel distant from me, like I’m aware I could be having an emotion but can just choose not to. So, it takes a lot to get me truly outwardly upset.

I could never in a million years imagine behaving the way she behaves, not even as a kid with ADHD myself (I have inattentive type, which I do think makes a difference). I do remember crying in my room as a kid - I’m sure I was sent there for some kind of punishment, but I would never, EVER in a million years, attempt to hit my mom. Not because my mom was a harsh disciplinarian or anything; I don’t really remember her yelling much or really disciplining much outside of the silent treatment (her preferred method of punishment, which really did work but I think is probably not healthy). I honestly don’t remember my mom being around much so we were often left to our own devices (I think this is a good thing).

I’ve learned that instead of pure fight or flight, my response to crisis is ‘faun’ with a little bit of flight (probably a result of the aforementioned silent treatment). It would never occur to me to fight. I just want whatever trouble I’m in to go away, and to appease anyone who is angry with me.

So I struggle to understand her mindset. I struggle to see how and why her brain chooses such vocal and wild outbursts.

When I’m upset, I want to shrink down into nothingness.

When she’s upset, she wants to take over the entire world with her rage. It’s the exact opposite of my response to being upset.

And truly, I’m scared. I’m scared when she is upset and lashing out.

I’m scared she’ll always be like this. I’m scared she’ll grow up to be an adult who gets arrested. I’m scared my poor 3-year old will be witnessing her violence and thinking it’s OK.

I’m scared I’m a terrible parent who caused this. I’m scared my fear is making her worse.

I need a way out of this pattern.

So here’s my plan:

• When she starts to meltdown, I tell myself, “It’s ok she is upset.”

• I do NOT attempt to punish or take things away in that moment.

• “I choose to de-escalate this situation” (I can repeat that to myself, aloud if necessary).

• If she hits or tries to hurt me, I will tell her “I’m not going to let you hurt me” and remove my 3 year old to another room as quickly as possible to wait out her meltdown.

Sometimes she blocks my path so I’m not super sure what I’ll do in that situation - if I try to remove myself from the room she will often follow me and hang on me or pull on my clothes. I don’t want my 3-year-old getting hurt or even witnessing this chaos, so that’s always the tricky situation.

In the past I’ve been afraid she would run away, but I told her if she does that I’m calling the police. So she has stopped threatening that she’ll do that, and if she does run away, I have a plan for what to do. She can’t use that threat as leverage.

I’m tired, y’all. Here’s hoping tomorrow will be a better day.