It's 320AM in California. I'm wide awake.
For the past hour, I was battling with nn. Around 2AM this morning, she started crying and screaming. It woke up the entire house and furthermore, she was spiraling into an uncontrollable cyclone of emotions. The more I tried to calm her down... the louder and wilder she got. Kicking... crying.... screaming. Albeit.... she's 2. But then again.... she's 2.
"This has gone on long enough." I thought to myself. So of all the nights... this was the night I wanted to break her. Lay down my final expectations. If you don't want to sleep.... you want to cry and scream and holler at the wee hours of the morning... if you can't control your emotions... then so be it.
For the next 50 minutes, I made her stand. Stand. No timeout. No sit in a corner. Plain old STAND.
She tried crawling back into bed... I told her "No, not until you stop crying." She got louder.... I didn't back down. She had to stand. She went to her usual kick and scream on the floor. I pulled her back up and said if you don't sleep, you stand! She screamed for mom. I said mom needs to sleep... just like everyone else including the sun. Nn pulled out every trick in her tiny 2 year old book. And I stood pat.... she had to stand.
50 minutes. That's almost an hour. We wasted an hour just letting her emotions drain away. Boy!! She's full of energy. After 50 minutes.... she was still going beserk without any signs of tiring.
Where did we go wrong as parents? Why did it have to come to this? She's 2. Did we set our expectations too high? Am I too strict? Or should I believe that this is a phase...she'll grow out of it.
Whether she crawls into bed or not.... whether she fully comprehended the magnitude of her disobedience... whether or not I did the right thing by forcing her to NOT sleep... in the end, I still lose.
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