A new found bond

Hindsight shows us a lot of things.  Some of those things are great and we are happy to have had that epiphany.  While others are extremely painful and leave you wondering how you could possibly have ever lived that way.  My hindsight epiphany came a few years ago.  My oldest son (let’s call him B) and I haven’t really gotten along in the past a few years, which says something quite sad because he’s only 6 ½ right now.  Things were dandy until he turned 3.  Fuck terrible 2’s!  Whoever started that one should be slapped and so should their mom!  Countless times, I’ve talked to numerous parents and every last one of them has said, oh 2 wasn’t bad at all, but 3 was awful!  Terrible 2’s is an absolute myth and I have the emotional scars to prove it!!!!  So B’s terrifying 3 stage was literally the worst year of my life!!!!  He was too young to be reasoned with.  Spankings (in the privacy of our home) worked and were one of the only ways to get his attention.  And I DO NOT want to hear anyone judge me about spanking my child.  I owe you no explanation.  To each their own.  If you don’t like it, shut your mouth and keep it moving.  Now, moving on.  There were so many a times I walked out of stores crying my eyes out with him in the front of the cart because of all the many things he did and tantrums he threw in the stores.  It wasn’t easy, by any means.  And it wasn’t about the stares, whispers and mean looks from people in the stores.  I gave them evil looks right back and on an occasion told an old bag to mind her business.  

The problem stemmed from what I realized in hindsight.  Which is the fact that I never bonded with my oldest son and I will NEVER in any of my days understand how things went the way they did.  From age 3 on, he had an incredible way of pushing my buttons and making me about lose my shit on a regular basis.  That terrifying 3 year, I decided that I didn’t want any more children.  How was I going to handle the one I had?  I couldn’t even fathom the idea of another.  As time went on, things increasingly got better with his behavior (at home), but he still made me angry SO often by just doing what he was good at with me.

Fast forward to today!  I actually just got done crying my eyes out like a little baby.  Happy tears, people!  Happy tears!  I honestly thought, and said to my husband before, that I felt like I’d never have a bond with our big B.  I had an inferiority complex because I felt like he liked and loved his dad more than he did me, from the time he was a crawler on.  But it’s not that.  He just has a different dynamic with his dad.  His dad works on things around the house and B would rather do that any day over going outside to play sports.  Funny kid!  But awesome!  We’ll talk about his talents in another post so I can brag about how damn smart my kid is and annoy you all!  Haha!!  I’m always going off of my topic!  Back to it.

So tonight, B and I had a really nice time together.  Dadda (as he and our youngest dude, D call him) worked late tonight so after I put D to bed, it was just B and I.  He has been defiant and talking back a lot, so I had a heart to heart and very calm talk with him about that.  After that we just laughed and he told me about his games with his favorite cousin and his imaginary friend (which I LOVE that he has an imaginary friend!!) and the tooth fairy because he lost a tooth yesterday and she brought him money and a toy and wrote him a really nice note!  He said it was the best day ever.  Anyway…  My point is that tonight I realized that my oldest son and I have a chance.  I had given up hope of ever being really close with him, as ridiculous as that sounds.  Tonight proved to me that he loves me to the moon and back, as I do him and always have.  I want him to know that he can talk to me about anything and right now is a key time to get that into his head.  I think he gets it already because a good chunk of my day is pretending to really care about his My Singing Monsters game, Minecraft and whatever funny things happen on his favorite episodes of Dinotrux or Talking Tom!  LOLOLOL!  He’s an incredible little person and I am proud to have had a huge hand in raising him thus far.  Of course my husband has too (although he tends to work a lot).  But because of my husband and his incredible work ethic and desire to care for his family, I’m here 24/7 molding B and D and shaping them.  B is turning out to be an amazing boy and I could not be more proud.