Cold or Flu? Neither.

My throat is sore and my voice is raspy. Could it be that I caught a bug? No. I've just been yelling at my children all morning. And when I say all morning I mean since 3:00 AM.

One of the twins kept waking up throughout the night. He was crying enough to be annoying but not enough to tire himself out. I tried to remain calm and concerned, but by the third time of having to get out of bed I had had it. Now a peaceful night of sleep was not only ruined by a child's crying, but by a mother's yelling. I gave him some Tylenol, changed his diaper,- even though it was clean- and put on his shoes- the kid has a thing for shoes. After which he finally slept peacefully through the night.

Well I told myself I wanted to have a good day because the early morning hours had not gone so well. But I just ended up having blow out after blow out.

• The first event took place when, after breakfast, my children refused, yet again, to say finished in any form. I have been working really hard on this one. "Say finished when you want down. Don't just throw your food on the floor!" That's my motivation. It took an hour and half to two hours one night to finally get them both to say finished to get down. And believe me my patience did not hold out that night. I had to put them in their room while I calmed down, and then strap them back in their boosters to finish the process. Since then one or the other has to be stubborn about saying finished, and it drives me batty.
• Next I came downstairs to do some blogging while the baby took his first nap. I was calm and happy. I finished blogging and retreated upstairs and kindly asked the twins to follow me so we could have lunch- they usually are capable of following such directions. The twins had been playing peacefully with their toys- which was amazing because they are usually playing with things they are not supposed to- and so I did a few things upstairs then went back downstairs to tell them, once again, to come get some lunch. Well, they weren't playing with their toys anymore. They were in the laundry room and they had, once again, gotten into the laundry soap. And they had, once again, thrown it all over the laundry room and the baskets of clean laundry. What makes this situation worse is that my husband makes our laundry soap so it is sort of a jelly like substance. My voice was not capable of yelling loud enough. I could not properly portray to my children just how upset I was. But boy did I ever try.
• Lastly was feeding the baby. A task which already lacks in the fun department, but which lacks even more when your child cries the whole time. He cries because he chokes. He chokes because he cries. It's a vicious cycle. The first attempt I got upset, yelled and put him in his room. Then I discovered that he was poopy- its hard to remember to check because I'm not used to him crying about things I can actually fix. I changed him and then proceeded to try and feed him again. He threw a fit. I discovered the cereal was cold. I warmed it up, but by then all hope was lost. He cried hysterically the whole time he was eating. I yelled hysterically the whole time he was eating. When we were finally done I put him back in his room so we could both cool down.

What a horrible day. It's strange how my temper can just switch on so fast. Some days I can feel it boiling. I can tell I'm just looking, almost hoping, for something to tick me off so I can just get good and angry. But other days I'm as calm as can be. I'm under control and handling things well. Then all of the sudden I loose it! I don't even see it coming. Today was a mix of both. And I don't enjoy either one, nor do my children.

At least my children are forgiving, and at least they don't remember how horrible I am- though in some cases that might do us both some good because then they would remember not to do the things that make me mad. But I still feel guilty when I think about how I was entrusted with such sweet spirits and all I can do is yell at them. I guess that's just motherhood. Frustrations will always arise. Making mistakes is just human nature. No one can do it perfectly. Tomorrow's a brand new day and I can try again to be the best mom that I can be.