A Little Extra Time
I am a mom of 4, so I technically do not have a middle child, but I do have one that I call “the middlest”. My kids are BOY, BOY, BOY, GIRL. The second boy is the middlest. He’s not the oldest, not the youngest, not the girl, not the easy one…he’s somewhere in the middle trying to figure it all out. He has a really tough exterior which makes you think his self-esteem is impenetrable but inside he is a real softy that actually cares what people think, feels really hurt when he is left out, misses his dad and me when he is away too long and truly just wants life to be fair.
Yesterday, the 6 of us were playing one of our favorite family games that we made up. Each person gets a piece of paper with the same squiggle on it. You have to draw a picture incorporating that squiggle. If someone else makes the same picture as you, you don’t get a point. One of the squiggles was a right angle. It could’ve looked like an L or a 7 depending on how you turned it. One of us turned it into a mountain range, another a circus tent, stairs, etc. When I was done, I looked over at my son’s and saw he had drawn the same thing I had drawn….a hangman game. I said, “Aw man, G…we aren’t gonna get the point!” He looked at me and then lost it! Started yelling and screaming and telling us he hated this game (which he loves), wadded up his drawing and ran upstairs. I went upstairs and gave the usual “it’s just a game” speech but he was not having it so I told him he could come join us when he had calmed down. A while later, I was cleaning up the papers that we had doodled on and opened up the paper that he had wadded up. Under the hangman game that he had drawn, he had spaces for letters _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ and had written I LOVE MOM. It was Mother’s Day and he’d really wanted to present his drawing to me but his plan had been ruined when I told him neither of us were getting the point. It crushed him. He didn’t recover for the rest of the evening.
At bedtime, I brought out this Mother and Son Journal that I know he enjoys doing with me, and just like that…he was happy. We sat in his bed and filled out some of the Q/As together and it was like nothing had happened earlier. I hate that I don’t pull this book out as much as I should because he really just needs some extra 1-on-1 time. So this post is as much as a reminder to me as it is a suggestion/recommendation to you that sometimes all they need is a little extra time with you. It’s as simple as that. <3
See more journals here…. Mom and Son // Mom and Daughter // Dad and Son // Dad and Daughter
