Act of Kindness

Yesterday John and I took the boys to McDonald's in Hillsboro. They were going crazy at home, wrestling and running around and I was sure someone was going to end up with a nasty head wound if they kept it up. Despite the fact that there are about a dozen or more McD's between here and Hillsboro, the one out there has a cool outdoor playland (The boys call it "treehouse McDonalds") and I felt like they were too wild to be indoors, even at a McD's playplace. Also, the outdoors one doesn't smell like wet diapers.

Max hadn't had a nap. We're kind of in napping purgatory right now with Max. In between needing a daily nap and giving up a daily nap for good. He can go go go until about 5pm, at which point he passes out for several hours, waking just in time to have missed dinner and fuckup bedtime, but it's nearly impossible for him to go to sleep for a nap any sooner. Yesterday he'd fallen asleep in the car a few times, but only for 10 min or so, and it was 7PM. He was tired. And for Max, tired=grumpy and a grumpy Max, well, let's just say that there is a reason I call Max The Hulk.

He perked up when he got his Happy Meal. Chicken nuggets, apple slices and chocolate milk seemed to renew his energy and when we were done with dinner we took the boys outside to play. They were playing so well that John left us to browse at FYE and I got out my Kindle to read, but soon Max said he needed to poop, so I called Alex down from the treehouse, but by the time Alex came to me Max had disappeared up into the treehouse again. Then Alex said he had to poop, so I called Max down again, gathered up all our crap and the three of us schlepped back into the resturaunt to potty. Taking two young boys to a public restroom for a tandem poop is never fun, and this time was no exception. I don't know why my kids insist of narrating their bowel movements. I don't mind so much at home, but when in a public restroom, I wish they didn't say things like "WOW! That one made a big splash!" and "arrrgh! This poop is taking a long long time to come out of my butt!" or "My butt made a poop bubble!".

Back outside the kids resumed their play, but soon got into trouble. My kids, never content to just play the way the equipment was intedned, had shimmied their way inside of a piece of the playground equipment meant for balls. it's hard to describe, but imagine Max and Alex inside a Plinko game. Seriously kids, WHY? I left them there for a while, figuring, they got in, they can get out, but then the other kids at the playground started banging on the plastic screen that the boys were trapped behind. The other kids were just being kids, but the hard plastic screen, when banged on, was smacking my boys in the face, and, being trapped in a Plinko game, they couldn't really move to get away from the smacking. Alex shimmied his way out, but Max was pissed. He wasn't scared, or physically hurt really, just MAD. So he started screaming and crying. So I went over and told the other kids to go away while Max got out. He didn't want to. He wanted to scream about the atrocities that had happened to him and how his feelings were hurt! I finally coaxed him out, gave him a snuggle and suggested that maybe, had he not gone into the Plinko game to begin with, his nose wouldn't have gotten bopped by the screen. He agreed that he wouldn't go in there again, so I left him to play and went back to my table. No sooner had I sat down than Max launched his happy meal toy (a hard plastic Papa Smurf) at one of the kids who had been banging on the screen. Thankfully he didn't hit her, but he'd earned himself a timeout for the attempt.

Tired and with a bruised ego, Max did not go to timeout willingly. He fought. And bit. And struggled. And went boneless. And went rigid. And flailed. And hit. And basically acted like a rabid wolverine.

Max is a kid who is perfectly capbable of tantruming for HOURS, escalating until I'm sure the Earth will crack apart from the intensity of his anger. Under different conditions, I'd have thrown him in the car and we'd have left. But we were trapped. We'd driven a long way just to come here. Alex was being a perfect angel playing happily with the other kids and didn't deserve to leave just because his brother was pitching an epic shit-fit. Not only that, but John had left, taking the keys to the Dilliermobile with him. I couldn't call him to come back because I needed all of my arms and legs to hold on to Max, preventing him from running amok Tazmanian Devil style and bring down the entire playland.

It was at this moment, I was completely frazzled, trapped, sweaty, and desperately trying to keep my hold on a wild, biting, thrashing feral animal of a child that a woman gently touched my arm, and said "I just wanted to tell you I think you're a great mom"

I looked at her for a moment, then looked down at my screaming child, and figured she was surely being facetious. The last thing I appeared to be was a "great mom" at that moment. I said to her, while putting Max in a headlock and grabbing his hand that was smacking my face "Are you serious? Because I'm a little too busy for a mom-fight right now"

She smiled at me, very kindly. "I'm absolutely serious. Most parents would give up, just let their kid go and run around crazy and wild and get away with acting like a brat, but you're not letting him get away with it. I admire that and I think you are a really good mom."

I almost cried.

When I was feeling the most defeated, helpless and like a completely crappy mom (in fact, Max was screaming as much to me), another woman, a mom who clearly has been in my very position before, made a point to tell me that I was doing just fine.

Max calmed down after a while and I did let him go back to play, and as we were getting ready to leave, that same woman came back over to us and said again "Really, I want you to know I think you did great."

"Thank you." I told her.

So often moms watch each other and judge. "She's not doing it right". "I wouldn't do it that way". "No wonder her kids are so bratty if that's what she calls discipline"...It was wonderful and refreshing for someone to see another mom struggling, and instead of judging, offer words of encouragement. Thank you McDonald's-Playplace-in-Hillsboro-Lady. Thank you so much.