Mama Said Knock You Out

We have officially entered the dreaded stage of terrible two's. Now I must say that Amelia for the most part is really well-behaved and sweet. Most of the time.

BUT.

Occasionally....her little terrible two year old self rears her ugly head. And unfortunately, this means that dear old Daddy and me have to figure out how to handle this whole "discipline" thing. We're basically flying by the seat of our pants in this arena.

Chris, bless his heart, thinks he has it all figured out. When Amelia disobeys him, he is very good at sticking to his guns and patiently asking her to do what he asks over and over again until finally she relents and obeys. Sometimes this takes just a couple of tries....and sometimes they have a 20 minute stare down. But in the end, I have to admit, he's been pretty successful with his approach.

Old mommy dearest over here, well, I just have to come out and admit that I don't feel like I have a firm grasp on this discipline thing.

I mean I have quickly discovered that I am not too proud to bribe my child with waffle fries to avoid a public meltdown when she doesn't want to leave music class, instead of choosing a more disciplined approach to address her behavior.

I never realized how hard it would be to stick to your guns as a parent. What can I say, I just don't like confrontation.

Take for instance last night. Amelia was in the bath, and I was sitting in the floor next to the tub. We were having fun playing with her bath toys and splashing a little. All was good and happy. But then, I leaned my face up closer to her, filled with the utmost love for my precious girl and said to her, "I love you, sugar bear"

... to which I was quickly met with a swift 2 year old hand palm planted smack dab in my kisser.

I'm not sure why she did it. It really wasn't with cruel intent,  but more out of spontaneous excitement. And it didn't even hurt at all. But I think we can all agree that it just isn't very nice to whop someone in the mouth, especially your dear old mama who is leaning down to tell you that they love you.

So it was time to lay down the mama law.

In my sternest voice I told her "No, ma'am. We do not hit. You do not hit Mommy. You do not hit Daddy. You do not hit anyone. DO YOU UNDERSTAND?"

I thought we were getting somewhere when she responded with, "Do not hit Nana. Do not hit Papaw."

So just to sum up the lesson, I asked her, "Ok, very good. So tell me, Amelia...Should you hit Mommy?"

Amelia took a pause to mull over the question. She looked down in the bath water and then slowly lifted her gaze to me and with the sweetest, softest angel voice she said, "Yes."

Sigh.

Jesus, be near.

Ok, so that is not the correct response, Think, think, think. Time to employ a new strategy.

"Amelia, you don't hit Mommy. I think you might need a time out to think about this. You are going to have to sit in the corner and you can't play or talk - you just have to sit there and think about what you've done."

Thinking that she would utterly hate having to endure a "time out", I hoped to give her one more chance at answering me correctly.

"So how does that sound? Do you want to take a time out?"

But she completely threw me a curveball, when she replied with, "Yes."

I mean. What kids WANTS a time out? How do you even respond to that?

We ended up having the exact same conversation about 3 more times until FINALLY she answered me with "No" instead of "Yes" when I asked her if she was supposed to hit Mommy.

Ok so MAYBE she didn't sincerely have a change of heart in her answer. It's POSSIBLE that she just knew that if she didn't answer the way I wanted then she was going to be stuck in that bathtub all night and she was ready to get out.

I guess I'll find out my answer soon enough if she decides to whop me upside the head again.

At which point, it might be time to call in the Big Daddy reinforcement squad, ya know, since he has this whole thing all figured out.