Three days without a blowup

Remember how in Monsters, Inc., there's a chart on the scare floor of how many days without a contamination accident? With my recent improvement on reacting to Tobey's antics, Tom joked that I should have a chart of my own: number of days without a (Ang) blowup. And when I blowup, we have to reset the chart to 0.

Actually when he said "chart", I thought he said I should have a gold star chart. Each day I DON'T blowup I get a star and every three stars I get a pearl milk tea (I thought up of my own reward). Very preschool. Very incentive-style potty training. Very not-going-to-happen.

But point is, this is day 3 (so far) without a blowup on Tobey. Do I get mad and frustrated still? Sure, like when he kept throwing things in the air and screaming when Kyle was over today (earned two timeouts in his crib) or when he just ran up to Eli later and said, "Kick Eli!" and kicked him in the bottom. But I haven't done the unreasonable silent-treatment drag Tobey by the arm type of blowup that leaves me seething afterward and that is market improvement over the last month.

The difference? I can point to a couple things.

First off, I was the most vulnerable to blowups/outbursts during the pre-nap diaper change. I realized that when I change him on his bedroom floor, while I thought it was convenient for me to just have him walk over, it was extremely distracting to Tobey. If I change him on our bed, he is more prone to staying still (not such an open expanse to go squirming and rolling) and I am more mobile (I can dodge falling and kicking legs). It is worth the extra effort to get him to climb onto our bed, plus, he hasn't been as dawdly getting up onto the bed (maybe he likes the calmer diaper changes too).

A couple of small victories on the part of me and Tom in the area of Tobey discipline has given me a little more motivation to keep trying to find what works. And Tom's encouragement that my increased volume and escalating the intensity of my voice doesn't just NOT work, it makes things worse (Tobey just shuts down when I start blowing up). In a way I realized it but I didn't know what else to do besides raise my voice. Now we're trying various things that might work better than naughty corners and yelling (like crib "jail", taking away the cherished basketball hoop, and believe it or not, explaining as opposed to demanding).

Having a little bit of a break is always nice. I had all of Saturday off to relax and get outside of myself for a change. And I was looking forward to my night off last night. It is both the time off and knowing that Tom is also gaining more insight into the kids as he cares for them help me out a lot. Maybe it helps that we have a busy March coming up so I have a fair amount to do around the house to prepare. That busy March also includes Tom's parents visiting for a week -- that's always a nice break for me.

Another is that following the last Moms Times Out when Kerri sharing about anger management (oh, I need to publish that post), I started thinking a lot more about my anger, how I manage it (or don't), how I need to or don't need to express it, etc. It gave me a little more understanding into what was going on, versus just "letting myself go" when the frustrating moments started coming.

And finally, Tom and I had a significant conversation on Tuesday night about my "Understanding each other" post. We ironed out some misunderstandings and I got to say and hear what I needed to in order to feel significant closure on this issue. The result is that I don't spend idle mind time stewing over anything or wondering if Tom thinks I should be doing more. That's a lot of mind freed up to think of more productive things and a big burden and dark cloud lifted. I'm not sure how that relates to my blowups -- maybe I'm just a bit less negative now than I have been.

So, hopefully the trend continues. I shouldn't set myself up for failure by thinking I'll never blowup again. But it's nice to have my mental "chart" and to see how long I can go sans blowup.