You know, there are times when I look at my kids and all of the wonderful things they do and have accomplished and I'm so "well pleased." I have heard SO many times, "Your kids are SO well behaved!" and "Wow, if I didn't see them, I would have NEVER known there were so many kids here!" and "I don't know how you do it...I can barely control my two and you have SIX and they're just angels!" I love those comments. It makes me feel like I'm doing something right. *breathes on and shines her perfect mommy badge*

Then, there are times like tonight where I wondered where I went wrong. Caitlin is very...ummm...how do I put this...strong willed. She can be SUCH a good kid. There are times when she makes me SO happy. However, OH MY GOSH...that child makes me want to tear my hair out more than anyone else! I don't know how I raised such a rude, disrespectful, angry child. Is it because she was my first and I've learned as I've gone along? Is it just her personality? WHAT IS IT?!??!?! I want to know so none of my other kids act the way she does at times! I'm SO grateful she seems to save it all for home though. All I ever hear from her teachers is how wonderful she is and how helpful she is and how well she gets along with other kids.

Anyways, so what brings this up? I asked Caitlin two days ago to take a shower. She didn't do it. I asked her yesterday to take a shower. She didn't do it. I asked her to wake up early this morning and take a shower before school. She didn't do it. So, tonight I TOLD her to take a shower. She told me she didn't want to...that she wanted to spend time with Drake since he was home and she feels like she barely gets to see him. I told her she HAD to take a shower. How did she respond? She screamed at me that I was being unfair. She stomped up the stairs and yelled that her life sucks. She screamed that everyone hates her and that she wishes she wasn't a part of our family. I told her that I didn't want to hear it and that instead of shower, she had to go to bed.

I came upstairs to put the rest of the kids to bed and found a letter on Caitlin's door. This is what it said:

Date: August 3, 2007
Today: Saturday
Subject: Parents
Slogen: Hard Work
Feeling: Mad

I hate you Katie and Drake!! I wish if you said please and thank you. Let's make new rule of anytime you ask someone to do something say please and thank you! Yes or No (Circle)
I think it's not fair that when it's a stressful day that I or any other kids have to take a shower at night! After school when webarely ever get to see you! Plus we think we're getting to be big kids and be able to go to bed until 9:45 or 9:33. Last but not least the things we get we would like to use them. For an example Emma and me got the Techno Robot sometimes we clear off the table so we can do it and you say no not today then you never even open it.
Thank you.

So, she's obviously mad because I didn't say "please" when I told her to go take a shower. I would have said please if I was asking her to take a shower. I wasn't. I was telling her to. This Techno Robot thing she's talking about is something my MIL bought them when they were in Hawaii. It has a ton of little pieces and it's something that needs a lot of parental supervision and needs Sera to be in bed before they can do it because she'll get into it and scatter it everywhere. She's right in that it's been a while (almost two weeks) since they got it and I haven't sat down with them to help them. There just hasn't been a good time. I've explained this to her.

'm trying to understand that she is just trying to voice her frustrations and talk to me about the things that are bothering her, which I want to encourage. I want her to feel like she can talk to me about things that are bothering her so we can come up with a solution that works for everyone involved. Drake and I have always told her that if she feels that we are being unfair about something or if she feels like something isn't working in our family, that she needs to tell us and we'll talk about things and figure out what needs to be changed, or we'll try to explain to her why things are the way they are and why they won't be changing.

However, when she writes me this hostile letter, it's difficult to be understanding. Personally, I'd like to just ground her for the rest of the school year and show her how I can really make her life "suck." (She KNOWS how much I hate that word!!!!) The letter wouldn't have bothered me all that much if it hadn't started with "I hate you Katie and Drake!!"

I want to come up with a way to talk to her about things, explain why things are the way they are and talk about what things we can both work on without her thinking that her letter was an acceptable way of communicating her frustration with me. I don't want her to think that what she did is a good way of getting the results she's looking for. However, I do want to encourage her to let me know what's bothering her and I want her to realize that I think her feelings are valid and worth talking about. I just don't know where the happy medium is.

I'm thinking I'll just leave a note for her telling her that I understand that she is upset, but some of the things she wrote were completely unacceptable and when she's ready to apologize and talk with me calmly and nicely about things, I'll be here to talk to her.

Caitlin has always been my "difficult" child. She just doesn't seem to have that "This probably isn't a good idea" filter. I've talked to her SO many times, asking her, "WHY did you do that?" She honestly doesn't seem to know. She says that her brain tells her to do something and she just does it. I ask her if she knows it's wrong. She says she does, but she doesn't think about it being wrong before she does it. She also doesn't seem to have that "I shouldn't be saying this" filter, either. Every thought that enters her head comes out of her mouth. Argh...it's all just so frustrating.

There are times that I really question my decision to be a mom when it comes to her. Did I bring about this behavior? Was it the way I raised her? Did I create this in her? Shouldn't I be able to mold and shape her behavior and personality? Shouldn't I be able to teach her what is acceptable and not acceptable and actually have her listen and do it? If I can't raise her in the way that she should go and to be the kind of person she should be, should I even be a mom? Am I potentially ruining her life? I'm responsible for the way she turns out. This is a HUGE responsibility. Am I screwing it up? Is she going to grow up and think that I was a terrible mom and that her life is harder than it had to be because I was her mom? I want to be a good mom. No, I take that back...I want to be a GREAT mom. I want my kids to think as highly of me as my siblings and me think of our mom. I don't know what I'm doing. I feel so incredibly inadequate. There are times that I think I'm doing so poorly at this whole mom thing that I just want to sit and cry and apologize to my children that they are stuck with me. Time to hand back that shiny perfect Mommy badge.

I do feel the need to balance out this post with some wonderful things about Caitlin. She truly is an amazing person. Her teacher gave the parents a homework assignment. It was to write a letter about our child. She wanted to know their areas of strength, areas of weakness, special things about them, etc. This is what I wrote:

Mrs. Szentesi,

Caitlin Silva is my daughter. She is my eldest and such a joy in my life. Caitlin is one of six children, and as the eldest has had to accept many responsibilities that I think few children of her age have had to take on. She consistently amazes me with the things she is capable of doing. She is always quick to help and usually does so without complaint. She is someone that you know you can count on to help you out, even if she would rather not, because it makes her happy to help others and because she feels it’s the right thing to do.

One of the qualities that I admire the most in Caitlin is her ability to speak her mind. While at times, as a mother, I find this incredibly frustrating, it pleases me to no end that she is confident enough in herself and her thoughts to say the things she is thinking and feeling. There are times that she says things that would be better off kept to herself and times when she can come off as disrespectful when she disagrees with you and lets you know it, but, for the most part, she has discovered how to voice her opinion without being overbearing and can do so with tact.

Socially, Caitlin is very adaptable. She can take on a leadership role if that is the position she feels she needs to fill, but is also able to step back and let others lead if she feels that will be more beneficial. She isn’t one, however, to stand back and let others lead in a way that she feels they shouldn’t be. Last year, she was involved in a “dance club” with some of her friends at recess time. The leaders of the club would teach the club members new dance moves each time they met together. One day, they taught the club moves that Caitlin felt were inappropriate for children to be doing. She spoke up and told them that she felt the moves were inappropriate and that she didn’t want to do them. They told her that if she didn’t, she wasn’t welcome in their club anymore. While she realized she could possibly lose friends, she still chose to leave the club rather than do something she felt she shouldn’t be doing. She came home in tears over the loss of her friends, but confident in her decision.

Caitlin is a very easy going person and is flexible and open to change. She embraces new experiences and is excited to learn new things. However, if she finds something difficult, she would rather ignore it than work her way through it. For example, last year she was supposed to memorize her multiplication facts. This didn’t come easy to her, so she just gave up and chose to not work on it. I think that most things come rather easily to her, so she hasn’t learned how to respond to things that are difficult for her. We have been working on this at home and plan to continue doing so.

My hope for Caitlin this year is that she will learn how to learn. I think this is something she really needs to want to do for herself for it to come about. I would like her to want to learn the things that are difficult for her and for her to strive to feel the sense of accomplishment that comes with learning them, rather than getting discouraged and choosing to not work on them at all because it’s the easy thing to do.

My goal for myself this year is to be more actively involved in Caitlin’s schooling. I think that I often take for granted the fact that she is so independent and capable of doing almost everything that is asked of her and that makes it easy for me to let her do everything on her own…from homework, to remembering important dates and events. I often put more on her than she should be expected to take on and I need to actively remember that, while she’s an amazing child, she’s still a child that needs her mom to help keep her organized and to make sure she stays on track. I can’t let my being busy with the other kids be an excuse not to take the time to sit down with Caitlin each day and make sure we both know everything that is going on.

I hope that you enjoy having Caitlin in your class as much as I enjoy having her at home. She truly is a special child with some amazing and admirable qualities.

Sincerely,

Katie Silva