Decision Making Stinks

Tonight my mind has been filled with lots of decisions, and let me tell you making decisions can really stink.  So I’m doing what I do best…writing my thoughts out.  I know there are a lot of mommies out there whose thoughts are on the same page as mine, if not the same exact topic, a topic of some type. Of course most tend to keep quiet about it, but I say share because we need each other.

This week we have had to make a very difficult decision to consider placing my C. on a medication for hyperactivity and attention disorder.  My thoughts are going around wondering if  this is me buckling to the pressure I feel every time we are in a room with other kids and parents…or my fear at looking at the new curriculum….or is it the best thing .…. will this do more harm than good…what about side effects….etc. etc. etc.  etc.  I wish I wasn’t trying to stop stress eating tonight, because a Milky Way would go a long way in helping me feel better.

All those years of playing house and mommy as a little girl-  I pretended to change diapers, pretended to feed my baby, pretended to clean my pretend house, but I never really pretended how I would 'discipline a child whom is easily distracted by irrelevant stimuli and frequently interrupting ongoing tasks to attend to distractions'.  If my baby doll had those issues I would have started playing with GI Joes and they could have just went around shooting everything.

Most people see that a child can talk well and walk well; therefore that child should do everything everyone else does at that age.  Judgment is such a terrible thing, especially when your sensitive to the subject.  I have divided family and friends up into two groups... those who understand and those who don’t.  The ‘don’ts’ tend to leave us off the birthday invite list and give us their opinion a lot.  Those ‘who do’ understand (typically moms, aunts, grandmas of boys)  tend to get my tears of appreciation.

    

As a teacher I embrace differences, I actually prefer it.  In my heart, I know God designed children in His own perfect image and likeness.  I can see the good in bad behavior, the gifts of an EC child, and I adore a unique child…I adore MY unique child.   

Buttttt, after watching  my own son greet elders in a church with a screaming wrestling interview instead of a hello, observing him do triple flips on the couch, sitting in timeout in church and again at school and again at home, taking forty five minutes to complete a five minute homework assignment, the looks of disdain at all the NOISE level, and my personal favorite getting all kinds of “advice” -  ‘honey you need to discipline him more’, ‘ you need to challenge him more’, ‘you need to have higher standards’, ‘you need to have lower standards’, ‘you need to take away all his toys’, ‘you need to test him’, ‘you need to take away all TV’, ‘you need to be the parent’, ‘you need to pray’, and on and on we go….I’m ready for un-unique and coloring perfectly inside the lines.    I want to growl and shout and spit…we TRY, I’m telling you we try, we have tried it ALL!!!   But I just smile politely (see us wild children can become reformed).  Decision making stinks.

Why don’t people talk about the good things in every child?  Because the good things don’t always fit on the evaluation, the test, the report card…no one has ever given a kid an A+ for impersonating Michael Jackson's dance moves, making up stories about Python Attacks, planting perfect flowers, building an entire town out of milk jug lids, and making people laugh…but if they did a lot of children would be shining stars! 

Basically the real issues are with me.  Isn’t that always the case?  We moms suffer so everyone else in the family can be at peace.  I know we haven’t entered the decision to medicate lightly.  We have been debating this decision for two years.  Did I mention decision making stinks?  As my child grows and enters more challenging work we want him to be responsible for what he can control and help him with what he cannot control.   As I write down all my thoughts tonight, God is laying it on my heart that I’m really very lucky, I have good support, a loved and confident child, and that I can do all things through Him who strengthens me.  


How do parents parent without faith?  I’m just going to say, if I didn’t have faith this whole Parenting thing would leave me with a bottle of whiskey, my underwear over my head, and me singing Yankee Doodle to the neighbors!  I’m going to just leave you with that image and say goodnight.