Cleaning House
This last week was a hard one. I had two utterly irrational blow ups at S. involving yelling and, once, dramatically dropping the broom I was using to sweep around S's feet while she sat at the kitchen table refusing to do her homework or chores. If I'd had only one screaming match with her, I could feel as if my behavior was somewhat justified--I apologized right away, went through the same consequences she would get for raising her voice and stomping around the house--but two? The blow ups have been happening more frequently on S's end, too. I was called in to talk to her teacher after she had a blow up in class. The reason--and this is hilarious--is that she had a rotting banana in the bottom of her bag, which she was not particularly willing to remove, mainly because doing so would have involved also removing every other item in her backpack. Now, if you have seen my office, or our home, it is not entirely surprising that her backpack is a mess. (I once got a note from ...