I am incredibly blessed to have the opportunity to get a decent amount of sleep every night and if I don’t, 9 times out of 10, that was my choice.  The night before Tyler’s birthday was crazy.  I was already tired, but stayed up late finishing preparations and was up early the next morning.  I haven’t heeded my body’s pleas for rest and today it was readily apparent.  I was running on fumes and had no capacity to handle the varying emotions of toddlers with the exception of “happy” and “calm/quiet”.  I did not have the capacity to meet the kids’ needs today. 

It would be just my luck that both kids slept poorly as well last night and were both cranky. Additionally, my Dad would be spending the whole day with us while my Mom attended a seminar.  How bad was the day?  My meltdown came at a hike.  The place I go for peace, respite and recharge.  Quinn had been fussy and then Tyler was upset because he missed seeing the deer that ran across the road. 

Here is a parenting note for anyone interested:  when you want a child to stop crying, do not tell them to stop crying, because they will cry more.  I know this of course.  Tyler needed me to validate his emotions, to sympathize with him, to hold him for a spell.  Also, Mama needed to tune into the fact that he was really tired.  But I could’t do that.  I wanted silence and I wanted to get on with the hike.  It wasn’t pretty.  I said things that I knew were unkind and would only exacerbate the situation.  I saw the words flying out of my mouth, but had no ability to stop them.  What was worse was to have my father witness my parenting at such a terrible moment.

Finally, we sat down to have a snack and both Tyler and I calmed down.  We talked through it and I owned up to the mistakes I had made that morning.  We tried to continue the hike, but I realized that Tyler really wasn’t wanting to do it, so we went home. 

On the way home, I kept asking myself, “what is the fun way to handle this?  What do I do when everything has gone to hell?”  So we all headed down to P. Terry’s for a hamburger, fries, lemonade/milkshake lunch.  Thankfully, my father and Quinn both took 2+ hour naps and my Mom returned to the house at 4:30pm.

It was a terrible day and really boiled down to the fact that I didn’t get the rest I needed.  It was eye opening to see just how much my game would drop off after a few days of reduced sleep.  I was operating in my primitive, reptilian brain and it wasn’t pretty.  As I write this, we are heading towards 9pm, so I will take my own advice and wrap this up.