You’ve been 3 for an entire month now and I have to say, despite all of the warnings, it’s not worse than 2 at all. No in fact, it seems so much better. I was warned by other Mommy friends that 3 is worse because it’s the age where you will start talking back. And talking back, you are…
Your favorite thing to say to us is, “I’M GOING TO PUT YOU IN THE FIRE!” You have no idea what it means, but the first time you said it you got such a reaction that you knew it had to be good. So you kept saying it, over and over. I’m not sure if your pre-school teacher has heard it or not, but I hope to God she doesn’t think that’s something that we’ve said to you. You got the idea from a movie called, Robots where in the end the evil robot she-villain gets thrown into a fire. It never occurred to me that this act of on screen violence would make such an impact on you. In fact, the first few times you said it, it sort of creeped me out. I couldn’t figure out where it had come from.
It’s not hard for me to listen to the talking back at all. What’s hard for me is not retorting. When you get mad and say you want to put me into the fire, I say, “You DON’T talk to Mommy that way!” in a stern voice. This is what comes out of my mouth because the filter that goes from my brain to my mouth is blocking the thing that I almost said first which is, “You’re going to feel the fire of my hand on your ass if you say that again”. You mellow me.
I’d like to save you from the sarcasm your father and I are so well equipped with if for no other reason to make your teen years more bearable for us. I catch myself, being sarcastic with you and try to reign myself in, although even though your 3 years old, sometimes the humor isn’t lost on you.
I think you are starting to reason a little bit more and I see you gaining a small amount of impulse control. The lack of impulse can be a danger to a child and it’s one of the things that’s kept me on my toes. The other day I took you to the grocery store and for the first time, did not put you into the cart. You only made a few efforts to stray, but came back to me when I called you. It made me notice something that I knew somewhere in the recess of my brain, but never thought it would affect me and that is, that anything at the grocery store that is below three feet high has either Dora the Explorer or Spiderman proudly displayed on it's package. I’m not sure how we managed to make it through without 5 boxes of Spiderman fruit snacks, but we did. And having a successful (although twice as long) trip to the store without having you fight to get out of the cart, made me feel like I had just swam the English Channel... but with less sharks.
We’ve been pumping you up with the whole “big boy” thing. Which is bittersweet for me. Being a big boy means, going bathroom on the potty and keeping your clothes on in public, which are all critical life lessons, but I think it’s hard for you, because sometimes you want to be a big boy and a baby all at the same time. I don’t think you’ve forgotten what it’s like to be the baby. You are still held and cuddled and sometimes when I’m holding and cooing your brother I see you watching with interest out of the corner of my eye. Soon after, you’ll come and curl up in my lap, asking if you’re a big boy or a baby, to which I respond that you’ll always be my baby, even when you’re all grown up. I’m sure that’s something that will make you shudder with revulsion when you’re in high school, but I can feel it deep down in my soul... you’ll always be baby to me.
Love,
Mama
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