desperation..

Ugh.. I am depressed today… didn’t sleep well.. I guess I just have way too much on my mind lately…

A few of the big things:

~ My Traveling Notebook…

~ Christmas – how everything is going to come together- it’s my boyfriends and my first Christmas together… so I am nervous about the whole thing…

~ My son.

And that’s what I am post on today. My son. My heart. My eight year old lil man.

I know I have said this before… but right now, I feel like a failure at being a mom. I am heart broken. I cry in my room after the kids are in bed almost every night.  

My son is very head strong and stubborn. He is also very spoiled. I can sit here and blame his grandparents, his dad, or whomever… but honestly when it comes down to it. I am his mom. I am in charge of him. I am the main person that should receive the blame.

I know when I was going thru the divorce with his father, I gave in a lot. Why? I felt guilty and it was easier to just say- OK you can have this or that, than it was to fight him.  

It got rough for a bit when my daughter’s father and I moved in together, but again I was still going along with the guilt thing and the easier way out. Her father and I didn’t have the greatest relationship and at that time my mom and I were having our own issues and I felt bad because my son was stuck right in the middle of it all.  

It was about when my daughter’s father and I split up that I really started noticing everything. The saying no. The hissy fits. The pouting. The crying.  I was the only at home. I was the one who had to be the bad guy.  And I was…  but nothing helped.  

And it has progressively gotten worse since then. We have a good moments- please don’t think he is horrible all the time.  

I am at the point where I don’t know what to do. I need help, but I don’t even know where to go for help.   But I can not handle the talking back, the attitude, the arguing, and the yelling at adults from my child anymore.  He is only 8! What the hell is he going to be like at 13? 15? 17?  I have tried grounding. Taking toys away. Spanking. Time outs. Soap in mouth. Jumping jacks (for excessive energy/hyperness). I’ve tried talking nicely to him. I’ve yelled. I’ve tried focusing on the good things he does. Having a mommy and son day. Nothing seems to make a difference. Nothing changes his behavior.  It only continues to get worse.  The thoughts of maybe he’s ADD have gone thru my mind, I guess mainly because I don’t know what else to do.  I just don’t know. 

I’ve been told that I am just too hard on him. I expect too much from an 8 year old.  But really?? Is it too much to ask for him to sit thru dinner without banging his hands on the table??  Or for him to use a fork thru the whole meal?  Is it too much to ask that if I ask him to put on his coat or shoes, that I shouldn’t have to repeat myself 5x??  Or if I tell him to lose an attitude that I have to argue with him for 10 minutes?  Or I ask him anything… and it’s a NO, an argument, some reason why he doesn’t have to do it etc.  

I am told that the punishments that I give him are too extreme for the behavior… but this is happening day after day after day. Hello!!! If it were the first time…that one thing. Or even the 2^nd time… but how many times to I have to tell him to do something. the same something… for him to just do it without me having to tell him and then punish him because he can’t do it!?  

And then there’s people that tell me that I am not hard enough on him. I have heard this for years…  That my son needs to be spanked more, slapped in the mouth, beat with a belt or a spoon or who knows what else.  That’s a hard one for me. I don’t believe in physical punishment all that much. To a point yes, when it is deemed necessary. But not as the normal punishment.  I do spank when needed. When I get to that point when nothing else works…  

I just feel so alone somedays. I just don’t know what to do and feel like I am failing my son and I don’t know how to change that.  He is a wonderful kid. I have been praying for him. God has answered one of my prayers, to help him with school. Up till this year, he has hated school. I had to fight with him every single day to get him to go to school. Now he loves it. He loves his teacher. He loves his classmate. He even loves riding the bus.  He’s getting good grades. It’s been a complete turn around there… I just keep praying that he will straighten up at home too.

Otm and Lil Man (Easter 2009)

God Bless

Overthinking Mama