Family Update

From an email to a friend back in Wisconsin, asking how we're doing.

Things are hard here. John's working/studying/dissertating (we made it a verb) a lot, which means I'm a single mom most of the time. I'm usually fine with that, but some moments, hours, days, and weeks are much harder than others. I know the saying "If Momma ain't happy, then nobody's happy," but here it seems to work the other way.

I took Isaac out of kindergarten because he was thoroughly unhappy when he was home and I couldn't deal with it. It's full-day kindergarten, and it was just too long doing exactly what his teachers told him to do--seven hours every day...I would get so upset at him for being crabby, which wasn't what either of us needed to be feeling or doing. Now he's a happy boy again. We'll either homeschool for a couple years or start him in kindergarten next year, I'm not sure which yet.

Danielle's starting her "terrible two's" and has very stubborn (wrong) opinions about many things. Usually she's angelic, so the twos-ness always comes as a surprise...usually I can redirect her from her opinions, so it's not a big deal.

But, Jeremiah. Oh, my little angel boy. So sweet sometimes, so loving. And then he'll completely out of the blue start physically beating himself up. He gets upset, and I usually can't figure out why or fix it if I can, then beat himself up--slapping his face and throat, punching his body. And that's when I get completely overwhelmed and lost and confused and sad. I can't help it--it makes me so sad to see himself hurt himself, and I don't think he's in control of himself at that point, and I can't fix it. I don't like feeling helpless, even for a few minutes.

I can't figure out how to balance attempting to have a reasonably clean home, teaching children to be kind and happy, preparing food for them to hopefully consume (quietly, if it isn't asking too much), and time for myself. If I could get Jeremiah to stop shredding toilet paper all over our apartment it would drastically help this place look a lot cleaner. :) But not being able to come up with a plan has been really hard for me. If I hada well-thought-out plan and didn't follow by choice, it would be a lot easier. But I just feel stuck.

Our bishop took me aside after he set me apart a couple months ago, and he told me that I have much more to do than is possible right now. So at least I know it's true. I know I just need to choose wisely..but I don't know how. If we had thousands of dollars to spend on food every month, I'd just have everything prepared for me by somebody else--but we don't.

Though, I am learning a lot. I learned a few nights ago that even if a green crayon destroys a load of laundry (from someone else's laundry, left in the dryer), it's still more fun to fold if I watch a TV show while I fold it. Very good to finally learn. Laundry has been so boring and time consuming for the past eight years, and now I can almost look forward to it.

I'm learning how to distract my kids into doing what I want them to do, which has been very useful, and sparks creativity. I'm learning that I can get my kids to walk into stores, home from the playground, down to the car...creatively...mostly races and bribes of food. I'm learning to give Isaac more responsibility and trusting him to obey, which has been hard and good.

Just little tricks to make things easier. And I'm teaching Danielle things now that will make my life so much easier in a couple years, and I wish I knew how to teach Jer the same things. She's so easy to teach, I understand how to teach her...But I can't figure out how to get Jeremiah to sleep without an adult right next to him. I keep hoping that when Isaac's a little bigger, he can get Jeremiah to sleep, but I think that's more hope than actual possibility there.

That's the longer version of "I think we're doing pretty good, with exceptions, of course."

The weather here is perfect. Isaac, Danielle and I walk Jeremiah to school, and a sweatshirt is optional. Pants are preferred but not absolutely necessary. I can open up our windows in the afternoon and there's a nice, chilly 60 degree breeze to cool things down a bit. I love the winters here. It finally isn't summer anymore. :)