I love my kids. I really really do.
But they are driving me crazy. Like, completely crazy.
Today my wife locked the door of the room she was working in so she could finally get some work done without the kids jumping all over her, but that meant that the kids were all over me instead. This is usually basically fine, but today I was in the middle of a meeting and it just made everything impossible.
So I gave them some TV time, which always makes me feel guilty. Thankfully my mom was able to FaceTime with my daughter for a while, which is good for both of them I think.
But then bedtime happened, and it was a disaster. In normal times my wife and I alternate nights for bedtime, but while I've been recovering from surgery she's been doing every night. The kids love this, but I miss the ritual. Tonight I finally felt able to go up and do bedtime with my daughter. But she pitched a fit about it, which hurt my feelings and pushed my buttons, so by the time we finally got up there I was annoyed with her. Then she continued to pitch a fit, waking up her brother in the process, so I told her she had lost her reading-before-bed privileges for the night and I turned off her reading light.
And that's when things got bad. She completely lost it, started screaming, woke her brother up again, and ran out of the room, downstairs to mommy. At this point I've completely lost control of the situation and I'm realizing that although in my mind she is in so much trouble the reality is that I have no more levers to pull. If things were normal I might be able to take away her ipad or tv time, or confiscate a toy. But I can't do those things because they are key pieces of our so-called childcare plan.
Thankfully my wife calmed her down and sent her back upstairs, and we made up and everything was fine...
At least until my wife went upstairs to get ready for bed and found the bathroom mirror covered in hand lotion...