Threenagers And Quarantine
Okay, let me be clear. I love my threenager. But I do not currently like her. It is 12pm and she has made me cry twice today already. I am not here for it.
Quarantine has only exacerbated these challenges. I mean, my threenager is never happy unless she is wiping boogers on my clothes or pouring her third half-eaten gogurt on my bed. I have exhausted every option here and to no avail. When this quarantine first started, I went in so hard. I bought play-doh, paint, construction paper, greeting cards to mail out (Happy Eid, even though you never received your car. They are still on my dresser.). I even went as far as to get this little minion the puppy that she has been begging me for.
Well, the play-doh is now shoved into every crevice of the dining room table I am still paying for. The paint has left marks on every piece of clothing said kid owns. I pick up little pieces of cut-up construction paper about a million times a day and have yet to find the scissors my lovely threenager is using. And the Eid greeting cards. Oh, I laugh at the amount of hope I had for being THAT family. You know the one. Yea, did not happen.
I was a different person at the beginning of quarantine, and I am not afraid to admit that. Oh, and the puppy? Yea, she is scared of it. But will still run up to random dogs thrice her size and pet them on our walks. What the h-e-double hockey sticks!
Three is hard. THREENAGERS are so hard. At this age, they are just old enough to tell you what they really think and just young enough to not understand why that wasn’t cool of them. They are just old enough to go use the bathroom in the potty but not old enough to actually wipe all the poop off their butts so, of course, you have to do that. And they only need to poop when you’re in the middle of eating dinner. They are old enough to want to take baths but not actually want to be washed. The list goes on. And I am tired. And frustrated. And beat.
Not only is three the most difficult stage of motherhood thus far, but these last few months have also been full of stress for me. But all we can do is our best. And if our best means not sending the cards, not stressing over the play-doh and baths, then it is what it is and that is okay, momma! We are all going through it in some way, shape, or form. All of us are stressed and, let’s be fair, so are our kids.
So to all the threenagers out there: may your sticky hands stay off my furniture and your brutally honest truths at least encourage me to work on the flaws you see in me. Because I do not really know what else I can do except pray about. And to all the mommas going through the quarantine blues, we got this. I mean, we kind of have no choice, right? Ha.
