I lost it | Imamother

amother

OP ↓

Thu, Dec 12 2024, 6:26 pm

I lost it. I totally lost it with my 13 yo ds.
I have so had it with him.

I'm sitting in my room with the door closed, feeling dazed. What is wrong with me?

What happened was that I'm exhausted. I got less sleep than usual and I'm probably hormonal from my period. I couldn't keep my eyes open and decided to try taking a nap. I was trying to rest all afternoon but my 3-4 younger ones kept coming to me, jumping on me, kvetching, bickering, acting wild, etc.

Then 13 yo got home and he was driving everyone crazy. Every 2-3 minutes one of the younger kids would come to me crying, or start screaming to me from across the house that he was bothering them. I kept telling him to stop, he pretended to listen but started again with the next one a minute later, thinking it's hilarious. At some point, the boy closest to him in age was sent to his bed for throwing a ball around the house repeatedly, which is against the rules, and not listening when I told him to stop.

From the minute I sent him to his bed, he started calling that the 13 yo was bothering him. I kept telling the 13 yo to stop. I was so tired! I just wanted some quiet for 2 minutes to close my eyes a little! The cries got louder and louder, and all of a sudden he's screaming that 13 yo is dragging him off his bed (top bunk). This kid knows how to shriek, and he was shrieking bloody murder.

I didn't have a choice. I had to get up. I was so tired. I got up and ran to the boys and I totally lost it. I was screaming and crying at my 13 yo. Telling him he should get out, screaming that I'm so tired and I just wanted to lie down for a little and what's WRONG with him, why on earth does he have to bully everyone? I was crying and yelling and telling him to get out of the house. It wasn't pretty. I tried to push him away from the bunk bed and out of the bedroom. Of course he refused to move, kindly observing in a smug voice that I had lost it. I told him it's a miracle I didn't lose it ages ago from him, and that I have just about had it with him. I was roaring, and I was crying.

I finally told an older dd to watch the 2 year old and I went into my room and closed the door and now I can't even rest anymore because gallons of adrenaline are pumping through my system and I'm still exhausted. Crying

This is not a new thing, he bullies his siblings every time he's in a bad mood. I took him for a psych evaluation last year but he refused to cooperate. He's in therapy and his behavior has improved, but he still does this from time to time.

Ugh. I could just hate myself. I've been trying so hard to work on myself emotionally and I thought I came so far, but it seems I didn't.

amother

Kiwi ↓

Thu, Dec 12 2024, 6:53 pm

All parents lose it sometimes. You do a beautiful job of creating a calm, healthy environment most of the time. He can survive the few exceptions. At the right time which probably isn't today, you can apologize and explain. You can come up with better strategies to handle this better next time. But right now, give yourself some compassion. You're a good mother. You're having a hard time today. It's okay to be human. And it's okay to model to your kids that you're human and you can make big mistakes sometimes too and still accept yourself.

amother

Sand

Thu, Dec 12 2024, 8:35 pm

Not proud but I've lost it like this and probably would have reacted the same way. I have some non neurotypical children and let me tell you- parenting continues to be a journey. Some things to do now is 1, to apologize and 2, do something now to be proactive. Find a parenting method to use specifically for this child that you haven't used before -change it up. Also, give him one on one time interrupted, hug him, ask a specific question about his life from time to time to show interest, go to his room to say goodnight at bedtime. 3, he sounds bored. See if you can come up with activities together with him for evenings. Collaboration is a very underrated parenting tool. Not that you have to do the activities with him, just brainstorm together.

amother

Puce

Thu, Dec 12 2024, 8:49 pm

OP, I’m sure writing this post took a lot of courage. Kudos.
Do you have someone irl who you could say all of this and wouldn’t judge you? I think it’s important to talk about our mistakes, otherwise we wallow in the shame.
We’re all humans, we all make mistakes. Forgive yourself.
That being said, you did hurt your child. Yes, his behaviors needed to be addressed, but not from anger.
Can you shift your focus from “I lost it, what is wrong with me, I’m a failure” (shame-based) to “I hurt my son, now what can I do to make sure this doesn’t happen again”?
The former is I AM bad, the latter, I DID something bad. None of us is bad, all of us do bad things sometimes.

luckiestmom

Thu, Dec 12 2024, 9:51 pm

amother OP wrote:

[b]

The trick is to do this before it gets to you. Since you end up in your room anyway, might as well do it before you lose it, get a short rest, and then youll have more koach to deal with everything.

amother

↑ OP

Thu, Dec 12 2024, 9:55 pm

Thanks all for the ideas and reassurances, I read and am digesting them all.

luckiestmom wrote:

That's what I was trying to do initially, but she didn't get home until shortly before I exploded so I had no one to watch the kids and besides, she's tired after school and helps a lot so I try not to do it unless absolutely necessary. Either way, she doesn't get home early enough to have been able to help prevent what happened.

amother

Tan

Thu, Dec 12 2024, 10:49 pm

amother Daisy wrote:

Reading your post I was I.kind of waiting for the explosion. Your only human.

I have a kid similarly.

I would try to talk to him about his behavior and what can be done about it. You did say it's gotten a lot better and that is good.

Another thing is that if you see you will not be able to rest go into the living room on the couch. Be near the kids. You will feel less resentful. Eat a bar of chocolate to keep you awake or that a coffee.

Agree on this. At a certain point a nap just isn’t going to happen, if kids are losing it they might just need some attention.