Bottom of the barrel mothering

Recently I read a criticism of the book Go the F*ck to Sleep which was concerned with its violent imagery against children by their parents.  

Now I pretty regularly read Peaceful Parenting and other similar parenting websites because I strive to be a loving, consistent, decent parent.

But sometimes I have a week like the one I have just had and I feel tremendously proud that, unlike the dad in Texas who abandoned his son on the highway, I didn't abandon my children and strike out on my own.  I only felt like doing so multiple times an hour.  

N had her tonsils out this past Monday, June 27th.  She did really well and by 8:00 that evening was eating scrambled eggs.  She has done far, far better than I expected.  All day today she refused her tylenol/codeine medicine but still continued to eat mac & cheese almost nonstop.  She feels tired and is still camping out on the pull-out sofa all day long, and she doesn't talk much since that causes her discomfort.  But I expected to deal with 10 days of nonstop crying and nearly unmanageable pain.    

Still, she is post-op, and I have been worried about her liquid intake and her pain.  The first 4 nights I set the alarm to wake up twice each night to give her the pain medication (12:45 a.m. and 4:45 a.m.).  Even if your child is doing well, until they are acting 99% normally your hackles don't fully settle down.  

I guess my worry bucket has been a little more full than normal.  Couple that with greatly interrupted sleep for almost a week (since it's not like the boys took a hiatus from waking me up while I was playing midnight nursemaid to N), and you have a grouchy momma.  

My worry has not blinded me to the fact that N is a royal pain in the arse when it comes to taking medicine.  She hems and haws until I nearly have to hold her down to force her to take her antibiotic (which was one of the reasons I wanted her to have her tonsils removed....since she was constantly battling strep and therefore I was constantly battling her to take her omnicef).  I very, very quickly lose my patience because it's not like I have all.day.long to sit in front of her and wait for her to decide she is ready to drink her medication.  

Then there is my son G, who at the best of times I feel like stringing up by his toes.  This week he has been hyped up on popsicles (it is downright impossible to keep a 3-year-old off the stuff when his sister is sucking them down one right after the other) and stuck for most of the day inside the house (since I don't feel comfortable leaving N inside without another adult while she is still recovering).  

Add to that the "baby" who, at just shy of 21 months, is immersing himself fully in the tantrums and head-banging behaviors of toddlers.  

Now combine all that with the fact that I do not do well with lots of time inside the house with my children AND I may be PMSing.

I think in technical terms this is called "the perfect storm."