For us, Sundays are the day when our son has no therapy or extracurricular activities. That means that my wife and I have the entire day to spend with Kai.
Am I a bad parent if I say that it is stressful to spend a whole day with our son?
It sounds awful, doesn’t it? I am shrinking in shame as I type this.
And yet, as Kai has become more belligerent toward us, it is becoming less enjoyable to be with him. When we’re together for a whole day, it is becoming inevitable that he will talk back to us and become disrespectful.
This weekend, he told us that he didn’t want to be our son anymore and that he would find another mom and dad. I told him that it didn’t work that way. We are his parents and he cannot just find someone else. Then he said that he would live by himself. He said that he didn’t need us. I won’t go into all of the details, but it went on to become a very unpleasant afternoon. He said even harsher things and went into a long timeout in his room.
He had to stay there until he cleaned up the books he threw on the floor and adjusted his attitude. Eventually, he did clean up. And, when I went in to talk to him, he finally showed some remorse. I talked to him about respect, mean words, and things he could say instead. He seemed to listen, and, this time, accepted his punishment that he would not have his periodic table or elements flash cards for the rest of the day.
While that sounds encouraging, I know that it is only a matter of time before we will have to go through this again.
I know that being a parent is hard work. We can’t expect kids to always do what we think is right. We have to teach them. It takes time and a lot of effort. Eventually it will pay off. So, we persevere.
I understand all that.
But, that doesn’t mean that I don’t feel relieved that the weekend is over.
Happy Monday.
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