How Much of A Role Model is Our Media?

How Much of A Role Model is our Media?  <<Click to see an article from commonsensemedia.org about the role of media in our kid’s lives and what their suggestions on preventing this from being detrimental to their development. In my opinion some of their ideas are a little extreme but what are your thoughts on the article?

Agree or disagree?

Butterfly In The Wind

Nobody wants to argue in front of their kids.

Those couples that don’t have a problem with intense disagreements, violence in the home or financial and personal issues, don’t think it should ever happen and go further to say, if you allow it to happen you are endangering your child’s mental health.

Those couples are right. However, like I said, nobody wants to argue in front of their kids. Nobody wants to make any mistakes at all. But they happen and they happen often. Will you argue in front of your kids at some point no matter what the situation? 99% of the population, yes you in fact will. It then becomes a question of when does it start to affect your child.

I can tell you from everything I’ve researched and read, that this “danger zone” will happen before you notice a difference in your child. It will be slow and gradual. And once it hits that point, it will be extremely difficult to repair.

For all those eternal newlyweds that don’t have any consistent bickering, you will say to those who do, “just stop it” “break up” or even, “why do you need to argue?” Not so easy my friends. The only thing you can really do is watch your child’s face and when they look at you with fear or anger, you turn around, put on your parent hat and say, “I don’t matter right now.” Let your spouse win the fight, lie, give in, walk away. Allow yourself to take the brunt of everything to save your child any pain. From small fights over the meaningless to violent knock down wars, your child is innocent until the day they aren’t and our job as parents is to preserve that innocence for as long as humanly possible. To teach them kindness and cooperation.

Far too many people in the world today struggle because their parents didn’t put them first when they were children. And they saw and heard things they shouldn’t have.

“Children are gifts. They are not ours for the breaking. They are ours for the making.”
―     Dan Pearce,  Single Dad Laughing

Fairy wings and race car dreams for the children. Not a nightmare real or imaginary should they know.

http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2013/04/29/179237081/shhh-the-kids-can-hear-you-arguing-even-when-theyre-asleep

The More I Know, The Less I Understand

If the truth of the matter is the only one you can trust are your children, does that create an unfair expectation? Is that too much pressure on them?

It does if you use your children to heal yourself. If you use them to fill your voids. If you use them to provide love you are missing.

Children are not made to take care of you. Remember it is the other way around. You child can never feel your desperation or your need because children are naturally prone to provide comfort and caring, it’s in their innocence.

Part of the sacrifice you make for your children is you must always pretend to be strong, whole and sane. Even when you’re not.

Every Mother Needs To Watch This

I defy you to watch this if you’re a mom and not cry. Can’t do it, nope no way.

A Problem You’ll Probably Never Have

A man sues his wife for giving birth to “ugly” children… and wins! So who’s the bad guy here? Her for having plastic surgery and hiding the fact that she was quite gnarly pre-surgery? Or him… for calling his kids ugly and suing his WIFE about it? I’m on team former uggo myself. Jesus what kind of psychological damage will you go through to find out your dad used your unfortunate physical features as a reason to take your mom to court and the whole world knows about it?… more messed up serial killers in the making, good job.

http://couplesandco.blogspot.ca/2013/11/man-successfully-sues-wife-for-ugly.html

Not Tosh 2.0, Not Donna Reed

So when I sit here and think, “ok, what do I know about being a parent that anyone could possibly care about?” I have a dilemma. Do I know a lot of tricks? Yeah. Some child psychology, well yeah. Will I post some of that? Sure, sometimes. But this is the age of instant information and Google is king. Who are you going to ask about teething or potty training? Me or a acclaimed baby website who’s sponsored by every diaper company in existence? You wanna know something about child rearing? Ask me and if I know, I’ll tell you. But there is something I have that Google can’t really help you find. The duality of being extremely blunt and also being a mom. I will tell you all the crap I get angry at that no one tells you before you go through it. There really shouldn’t be anything anymore that is taboo. But there is a difference between being honest and being deliberately offensive.

So my husband made me watch Tosh 2.0 tonight and really not my fave show but I had just made him watch The Project : Guatemala (which is actually a great positive reality show) so I owed him. And some parts were funny but then at the closing of the show he had a little monologue making fun of the videos of soldiers coming home and reuniting with their families. Then continues to show a clip of these videos put to a soundtrack of horror music and screaming. So….. sorry I’m open to all types of humor but watching a little boy seeing his dad return from war and crying to the music from Dracula or something is just plain gross. Way to take a tender moment and shit all over it. Now that, is offensive. At least to me… you never know who you might offend I guess.

So my point is, when I tell you about my thoughts during post partum depression, or embarrassing short cuts of motherhood I’ve used, or tell you mistakes I’ve made along the way, forgive me. I’m not Sally freaking Sunshine all the time and mothers need to not feel like they have to be. Having kids and raising them is hard and brutal work and just like after a day of digging ditches, sometimes you want to crawl into the same ditch with a bottle of booze and sleep for ten years. If one person had told me how it felt relating to your first child after they were born, I mean told me HONESTLY, I would have saved myself a lot of heartache. But all I heard was the whole, “babies are miracles, you will love them all the time” garbage. Not true stop your propaganda. Oh yes they are miracles. And god knows you will love them. But sometimes you will be angry at them, resent them, blame them or ignore them. And that is not wrong and you are not the only one.

Here’s one for the road. My two year old was a monstrosity today, I mean not at all his normal cheery self and just full of whiny misery. So by his bedtime my nerves were shot and I was beyond exhausted. A perfect mother would have done our normal bedtime routine, teeth, potty, face and hands, story, song, tuck in…. etc. Instead, I let him take pizza into the big bed, watch Care Bears and said screw the rest of it, tomorrow is a nice time for that stuff. And then I got to sit down.

Am I recommending this? No…. but I sure as hell am not condemning it. I told him I loved him and made sure he had his doggy. That’s all he really needs to be happy. And I got a few moments of Adult time. You need to just skip things sometimes….. recharge and relax. Because children my friends, can run you ragged and then what kind of parenting can you give them the next day?

Take a moment, be imperfect.

P.S. Google Donna Reed if you don’t get the reference. I realize I am one of the few that watches that stuff anymore.

Preventing Tantrum Escalation

Some really helpful tips when you have a toddler that just gets out of control. Click Preventing Tantrum Escalation to read.

My Manners Superior

My two year old son Roarke has better manners than I do.

I ask him if he would like some crackers, he says. “no thank you.” He drops something, “Oh sorry mama.” He wants to watch a video, “Pweeease.” I give him a juice box, “Thank you mama!” I mean don’t get me wrong, he’s two so he is still the king of tantrums and NO when he wants to be but holy crap he’s so friggin polite! I think how it ended up getting that way is because I’ve spent the last two years correcting him on saying please and thank you and most of all I say it back to him. Just because he’s two and I’m 27 doesn’t mean that I don’t thank him for things or apologize when I’ve done something wrong.

I was doing dishes (dear lord please a dishwasher soon) the other day and out of nowhere, winning a personal quiet award, my son chucked 8 new markers in the sink. Scared the shit out of me. So my natural reaction was to scream his name in a threatening manner and clutch at my heart. I actually figured out his motivation…. when he’s done with a dish he tries to put it in the sink and says, “all done!” Well. He was done with the markers too. But I yelled at him and he looked really ashamed and said sorry to me and ran away. I felt terrible because of course I didn’t mean to chastise him so harshly when he didn’t know any better, I was just startled. So I got down on my knees and made him tear his eyes away from Bubble Guppies (damn that show with it’s catchy toddler songs) and I told him I was wrong and I was very sorry. He didn’t understand and apologized to me again and I had to insist, “no mommy is sorry.”

Every time I change the baby’s diaper I ask him to please put it in the garbage for me and thank him afterwards. And now he’s just, caught on to the idea. The idea for my kids is I want them to be better than me in every way. If I forget to say thank you, my hope is they won’t. I’m trying to raise human beings that have respect for others which is apparently something my generation and the one after mine has trouble with.

I have a really hard time breaking my bad habits to instill the values I want in them. I swear Roarke says “fucking hell” in his garbled toddler talk…. and I swear half as much as his Dada does. You really have to watch how you talk to them and around them. I’ve switched stupid to silly, pissed off to cranky and omg leave me alone and go away to, mommy just needs a minute sweet pea.

But as much work as it is to constantly be polite to my two year old and edit everything I say to him, when I switch on a Thomas the Train video on Youtube he says, “Oh yes! Thank you Mama!” Worth it.

When Diapers Started Trending More Than Sex….

No matter how much you try to be a cool mom. No matter how much you try to keep up with all your friends still in party mode. And no matter how much you wish all you thought about was still sex, things change.

It’s no longer all about the sex for me. I literally don’t have time. Remember the story about the time you got wasted with your friends and it was so much fun? Neither do I. It’s like a UN peacekeeping mission to run logistics on getting out of the house now.

I have two beautiful boys and for better or worse, they’ve changed my life. I had to start another blog. About kids. Holy shit. Still NOT a mommy blogger, but I realized when 9 out of 10 statuses on facebook are about my kids that maybe I should accept my fate that somethings will never change back. And I love some of it. I love talking about my kids. I love playing with them and watching them learn and grow. They are the best things I ever did. I do not like being introduced as “Shauna with the two kids”, or being the only one out of all my friends with children or the changing demographics that made 27 too young to have kids.

I go to the park and literally every mom is 40+. I have no problem being friendly or talking to them about kid stuffs but they never want to talk back. I get the new motive to achieve all your career goals and financial stability pre-kiddies but I didn’t do that. So pariah of the playground is what I am most times. How dare I have kids in my 20s…. ugh. If it was thirty, forty years ago I’d be the regular mom. Honestly I’d probably be an older mom. Can I have a conversation with the stroller moms about our respective sex lives? Ermm no.

Some moms these days have a stick up their butt. They forgot themselves somewhere along the way. They forgot Neverland. I am fighting tooth and nail so that doesn’t happen to me. I will let my kid touch dirt and fall down so he learns to be careful. I will talk to them about anything and everything when they ask. I will run around and yell with them. I will post statuses about how my baby had an explosive diaper and then about how I’m going to attend the local sex exhibit or how I could really use a drink after a rough day.

I went bowling with my husband the other night and after two rounds of sucktastic bowling I realized that I am miserable at bowling and if I was going to have any fun at all I had to start not caring about gutter balls. So at last I threw up my hands, let out a laugh and said, “Fuck it!”

Same thing with trying to be the ideal mom. “Fuck it!” I’m me and I’m here to find all the other unique moms out there. Spread love and positivity, raise my kids and stay true to who I am. Screw stroller moms, you’re just no fun.

 

Image courtesy of earlymama.com