Thursday, July 8, 2010

Our Man returns home

July 2010

The Children
After months - 5 months to be precise - the Man of our house is home from his Monday - Friday life away from us. Previous to this stint, he was abroad for 6 months so we have not had a normal life for 15 months. We are a bit war-torn from the struggle without him. I am anyway. The children somehow have got into the habit of always complaining, whinging and bickering with me or with each other. I blame myself. I am a bit whingy and bickery myself. And as I said in the previous post, kids just emulate what they see.

We have been juggling a lot. I would love to have been brave enough to ditch the job for this period. But I wasn't.

Since I finished work in June for the summer, I have made a monumental effort to try and over-ride this unfortunate pattern. I have been calm. I have given good example. Most of the time. But the ease with which we slipped into this habit of living, is a much greater struggle from which to climb.

No3 is responding fairly well. She is young and she wants to be a good girl. In fact, she never loses and opportunity to point out how well she is doing when one of the boys is struggling. No1 can be so nasty to his smaller brother. Yet, when I reason with him he understands why he should not behave in this way. In theory he responds, in practice I find myself reiterating the same thing again and again. I know that some of this is just sharpening their social teeth but it is wearing and sends us on that negative spiral. No2 is the tell-tale, the autocratic dispenser of 'The Rules' (which apply to everyone else except himself) and the howler.

Each one of these children have so many beautiful characteristics. No1: loving, diplomatic and personable. No2: spirited, cuddlesome and thoughtful. No3: sunny, enthusiastic and sociable. There is so much potential between them. We are now finished with the simple days of the *baby bubble* now and on to the challenge and responsibility of the hard stuff.

These past 15 months have been difficult but now we are out of them. It is time to look forward; pour oil on the troubles; put a glint in our eyes and start embracing a fuller life.


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