Little Miss Stubborn-Pants

Her name is Rose Meri White, but I try not to use her middle name when I’m annoyed at her because I like her middle name and I don’t want her to dislike it.

Yesterday, while Rose was eating a new flavor of creamy Greek yogurt, she said "this tastes elegant."

Also yesterday, when Rose was dressing up, she stuck a small light saber up the middle finger of a glove and waved it around, saying "look at me!"

I write these cute, funny moments down to balance out the HARD.

Seriously, one second I want to hug Rose till her eyes bulge and the next second I want to run away from her screaming. She is so stubborn! Her stubbornness is relatively constant; it's my fluctuating sleep levels that make some days harder than others. She keeps doing little things that bug me/aren't allowed and ignoring me when I ask her not to, like climbing over the back of the couch, touching food that I'm cooking, peeing in her undies because she stubbornly waited too long to make it to the potty, and putting public things in her mouth like the lid to the milk. None of these infractions is necessarily important or particularly dangerous, but when they all occur in rapid succession they max out my patience. I feel like such a hypocrite when I'm smiling at Amber while banishing Rose to time out! It’s all too easy to believe that Amber will never go to time out—she’s so sweet now! But alas, I remember thinking the same thing about baby Jay and baby Rose. Ha! Ha!

I don't like to turn the little things into battles of will, but I feel like once I've asked Rose to do (or not to do) something, if I don't follow up on my request I'm teaching her it’s ok to disobey/ignore me, or that I’m teaching her that what I say doesn't matter. Did that make sense? Rose has such a strong will of her own that 9 times out of 10 she refuses to do anything asked of her until:

1. she's done with what she's already doing (even if it's forbidden), or…
2. she delays long enough until she can do the thing on her own schedule and claim that it was her idea.

These two situations only happen when Rose decides to do the thing at all. Too often she decides not to do it at all, forcing me to turn what began as a small normal request into a power struggle. Argh! It's so hard to handle, especially on low sleep. Lots of times I find myself at a complete loss as to how on earth to handle her stubbornness. I feel like a bad mom when I allow myself to get frustrated with her behavior. But it happens a-plenty! The times that I don't cave in to frustration I still feel like I'm blundering around blindly looking for a solution.

What I want: Rose to listen right away whenever I ask her to do/not do something. I try not to make a direct request unless I really mean it--I don't want her to be overwhelmed with demands and feel controlled. There are levels of necessity when it comes to a child heeding a parent: danger/safety is the top tier of importance, and the others are secondary to it: following rules, helping out, avoiding unnecessary messes, manners, and being considerate. The list goes on, but those are my main concerns right now. 

If I could depend on Rose to listen every time there was a safety issue, I wouldn't be as concerned/lost as I am, but she is not a reliable listener at all, regardless if the situation. She's just as likely to scamper off alone across a busy parking lot as she is to cling dutifully to my hand while we walk across said parking lot. I use different tones of voice for each type of situation too, so she should know what's going on, more or less.

It's confusing because Rose is a well-behaved girl in general. She's not a terror! She's sweet and kind and not obnoxious to others. She doesn't even go off on her own and get into forbidden things at home (no ominous silences around here). But she has this headstrong streak that flares up all too often, leaving me bewildered and worried that I'm doing something wrong. I suppose I should be grateful that this is my main parenting challenge right now, but it's stressful because I feel like I'm failing and letting Rose think it's ok to ignore authority. How much of her stubbornness is an age thing that she'll grow out of and how much of it is a personality trait that she'll keep forever? It terrifies me to have a willful, disobedient teenager! How much SHOULD I expect from a just-turned-four-year-old? I feel that high expectations are better than low ones, but I don't want to get frustrated or worried that my expectations aren't being met if they are too high for her age! At least Jay is sweet and strong and a good example for Rose. She adores him. At least she has that.

It's fascinating to see how each child comes to earth with his/her own personality. Some personalities are stronger than others. As parents, I guess all we can do is pray and teach our kids good principles as best we can. At the end of the day it all comes back to agency. I have agency, and so do my kids. They can choose to follow what their parents teach them or not. For now when my kids are younger, I have a little more control over their choices than I will in the future. I guess that's comforting? I must confess to already missing the days when Jay and Rose were smaller and I made most of their decisions for them. It was so much easier! I am totally a baby-mama more than a big kids mama. Amber is a breeze to take care of! It's hard to figure out where to draw the line with agency and rules in a family with kids at different ages. I don't have a good formula--I doubt one exists. I just hope I end up doing what's best for my kids in the long run.

I wish I could be writing about overcoming and triumphing over this stubborn struggle, but I'm not. I'm barely surviving over here, riding the waves of willfulness one by one. Every now and then I get seasick on them! Right when I think we’ve made progress, there’s a relapse. I suppose things are better now than they were six months ago, but boy the improvement seems miniscule. I don't think there is one answer or one fix for little miss stubborn-pants. My current plan of attack is to make sure Rose feels loved so that any willful behavior does not come from a need for attention. We are very serious when safety is an issue. That’s our method. As long as she knows that her parents love her no matter what and that we care about her safety, we'll keep rolling with those stubborn punches and do our best to raise Rose right. 

After all, she's only four years old. Patience and perseverance must be my mantra.