Monday, June 4, 2007

Biting, Slapping and Hair Pulling

And I am not talking about a girl fight...

We have spent the past five days with Matthew who is sick and by far this has been the worst illness. In fact, I believe I commented here that I was always scared of having children in part due to the illnesses that they come with and I thought the stomach flu would be the worst - little did I know (and perhaps ignorance is bliss so stop reading if you do not want to know about this lovely illness that I am sure your child will get if he/she spends any time around any child in the future...) Matthew has what is commonly known as Hand, Foot and Mouth Disease. It is misery - for EVERYONE.

Today, while I was home with him and trying to change his over priced pull up/diaper, he started pulling my hair. I am tired having been up with him for three nights in a row now and I lost my cool. I just could not deal with him pulling my hair. My hair is long and it was not up - my bad. I love my hair being long but today I was like this stuff is coming off. The worst is when toddlers think it is amusing thus encouraging your rage to new levels. It is like having someone laugh in your face after being told off. I know he does not mean it that way but when he does that, that is all I can think about. I finally gave up because he was in the process of tearing huge chunks of head and hair out. I calmly put him down and walked away. He came screaming after me like "how dare you ignore my attempts at attention woman!"

SO I sat down and tried to reason with him like all those freak show books tell you do - I said "Matthew, Mommy is upset because you keep pulling her hair out and it hurts Mommy - ouch." Matthew then slapped me in the face HARD and ran away crying. Hmmm, that didn't work so well and it hurt. Like he got me good with the full palm and it stung like hell. Basically I had to concede. He feels like crap and I would have to say that I some times feel like being this way when I am sick... On top of that, I thought 'OMG at least he is slapping me now and not when he is 18!' Because as Liz the Midwife said the other day - supposedly there are some that think that if your toddler has lots of tantrums when they are teens they will be easier but if you have a "easy" toddler, the teen years will be more difficult! EKKKK!

AH so rewind to a few days ago and Matthew bite me - his mouth has these nasty flaming red sores around his mouth, in his mouth and down his throat (I am taking the ped's word on this...) He bite me hard. On my arm. He sunk those almost full sized baby teeth right in and seriously I think he even shook his head a little like a dog holding on to a play toy and he would not let go. I cried out but not in anger at him as one would imagine. I believe he did this on Saturday after we saw Dr. F and she told us that basically there is nothing she could give him.

Hand foot and mouth disease is a bacteria. It makes your kiddo cranky/moody as all get out, they get a massive headache, with these blistering nasty pustules that hurt like hell, they cannot eat because these aforementioned pustules hurt so he is hungry but cannot eat and basically well as you can imagine must seem like hell to a two year old. We've tried ice, ice water, those freezer pop pedalyte things, no fruit (his fav) or salty stuff (no Goldfish oh my...) We tried letting him cry, we've tried holding and hugging, distraction, and quite frankly I drove Matthew around for two hours this morning looking for construction sites (this was the most happy he has been in a week!)

I realized as his teeth sank in and he shook his head - that my son felt rotten and I felt so freakin' powerless that I wanted to cry for him - well I still do but now I am even more tired and really at a lose as to how to deal with him. I hate feeling powerless when it comes to Matthew... but I am really powerless. I mean I can set this kid up with all the best in terms of emotional/physical/spiritual well being but I cannot stop him at any point in his life from being hurt or sick - I cannot protect him from everything nor is that my job. It has been in some ways a painful lesson to learn. I am not saying I am cutting my kiddo loose or anything like that - I am just saying he will hurt and be sick in life and some times he will slap me but as long as I am always there for him, we will be all right. And we will survive this blister filled bacteria with renewed happiness and a learning all wrapped up into one.

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