Well, I Asked For It

The children and I played an interesting game at lunch today.

At Maggie’s request, I had to come up with a humorous-but-accurate description of each child that highlighted his bad points. I was reluctant to do so at first, simply because I don’t like to encourage faultfinding. The children assured me, however, that it would not hurt their feelings – and so I began.

My brood showed a great deal of maturity and self-awareness as they laughed at the sentences I had come up with. They couldn’t deny the truth in my descriptions of smelly rooms, snotty attitudes, and habitual whining. I was proud of the way they good-naturedly laughed at themselves.

But fair is fair – and here is where it really gets interesting. Courageously, and without missing a beat, I said, “Okay, now it’s your turn. You describe me.”

Maggie went first: “A freaky lady with a disastrous closet and her eyes glued to the computer screen.”

Okay. I admit that I’m quite frenetic at times and have been known to scream at the sight of a bug. But “freaky?” How many little girls do you know who would describe their mothers as “freaky?”

I also can’t help but wonder what’s so “disastrous” about my closet. True, I’ve got some boxes in there and my shoes aren’t in a straight line, but I’d hardly call it “disastrous.” A rather ironic word choice, too, coming from a child who has helped to redefine the word “slob.”

Well, one thing’s for sure. If I thought that I had pulled the wool over Maggie’s eyes all these years, I was sorely mistaken. She knows that her mom isn’t even close to having her act together.

“Freaky” still bothers me, though. I may have to summon my courage to ask her exactly what she meant by that.

Then again, do I really want to know?

At any rate, Rachel must have picked up on the seriousness of having a “freaky” mother, because, when it was her turn to describe me, she angelically proclaimed, “You’re a sweet lady who teaches us well.”

“Oh, thank you,” I smiled, “That’s very nice. But you’re supposed to say something that’s bad about me.”

“Oh,” said Ever-so-kind Rachel, as if she hadn’t know that. Then, after a moment’s thought, she stated, “You spit out meat fat at the table in front of us.”

There you have it, folks – another deep, dark secret. I spit out meat feat at the table. Now, before you formulate a vision of flying gristle hitting my plate at record speeds, I would like to point out that I certainly try to be discreet when discarding fat. It’s funny, isn’t it, how nothing escapes the eyes of a six-year-old? I suppose it would be better for me to simply swallow the fat and be done with it.

Sorry, that’s just not my style. Just ask my daughter.

Are you enjoying this? It gets better.

Jonathan, well-prepared by this time for his turn to speak, said, “You’re a red-headed, yelling stress-box who doesn’t like Paxil.”

Whoa!!!

“Red-headed? What do you mean red-headed?” Having spent quite a bit of money to become a blonde, I was more bothered by the “red-headed” bit than the rest. Silly me – Jonathan wasn’t talking about my hair; he was talking about my head. “You know,” he said, “Your head turns all red when you yell.”

Lovely. After spending the last nine months learning how to manage stress and priding myself on almost-never yelling, my son slams me with the worst possible description a mother could dream of.

And “stress-box?” I don’t know where he came up with that one. I do feel the need to point out, though, that he has a tendency to label me “stressed out” after he’s pushed all my buttons and exasperated me to the point of no return, as if somehow his original misbehavior was all my fault. “It’s just because you’re stressed out,” he’ll say.

I do give him credit for his lovely sense of irony, though. He knows I don’t dislike taking Paxil – in fact, he’s probably as thankful to the manufacturers of Paxil as I am. But that’s another story.

Yes, I wittingly opened the can of worms, and my children gleefully dug their hands in and drew out the ugliest ones. The question is, what do I do with them?

I could respond in Queen of Denial fashion and exclaim, “None of these things are true! How could my children come up with all this? They were just trying to hurt my feelings.”

Or I could reply in true Queen of All Queens style and say, “You have no right to speak to me this way! You have lost your privilege to eat or speak for the rest of the day, and I will expect a written apology from each of you first thing in the morning.”

But I think I’ll be true to my own style – the Let’s Get Real style. My children were feeling very safe during our little game. They knew that nobody was trying to hurt them, and they were not being hurtful themselves. The opportunity to talk freely about some of Mommy’s negative behaviors may have spurred them on to use slightly bolder language than was warranted, but if I’m wise I’ll sift through their words and discern what they were really saying:

Maggie’s use of the word “freaky” might be her way of saying that she wishes I would react more calmly when things go awry. The “disastrous closet” might be a subtle hint to practice what I preach. And “eyes glued to the computer screen?” I hear a cry for more attention from Mommy. No one wants to play second fiddle to a computer.

Jonathan’s colorful description of an angry Mommy may very well be his way of saying, “Mommy, I really wish you would control your temper. I know it doesn’t happen a lot, but I wish it wouldn’t happen at all.” And if I’m lucky, he sees himself in this description, too. In so many ways we are two peas in a pod. (Oh, the poor boy!)

As for the meat fat – well, I’m not going to read into that one much. Guess I’ll have to come up with a better way to spit it out without anyone noticing.

It gives new meaning to “from the mouths of babes,” doesn’t it?

Truthfully, though, I think it’s vastly important for us to listen carefully to what our children have to say about us. It might not come out in just the right way – and it might be masked in silliness or brashness or even anger – but if we humble ourselves enough to really listen, we will have made avail of a great opportunity to grow. A parent who is willing to say, “You’re right, I’ve had bad behavior,” is a parent who is truly deserving of a child’s respect – and who will ultimately spur his child on to be the best that he can possibly be, with an ever-ready willingness to admit when he’s been wrong. For children learn to live what they see us living.

Scary, but true.

So listen to your little ones. And if spitting out meat fat is the worst thing they can come up with – consider yourself lucky!