I think the number one thing I feel guilty for in raising my kid is all the times I yelled about the spilled milk. Yes there’s bound to be spills. Yes, my boy was a spastic child doing his spastic thing. And yes, as Big Bird sings on Sesame Street, everybody makes mistakes. But for the love of Pete, the apple juice and grape juice and milk that have poured down on my clean kitchen floor time and time again. And all those dried sticky puddles under the table legs. They always just aggravated me. Like being mugged just as you are entering a nice restaurant.
Depending on the day, I can be a little more or less irritated about the spillages. I have to stop everything that I’m doing to hurry and grab a thirsty towel to take care of that wet unnecessary mess that is still pouring off the table onto the floor as I am fetching the towel. I have yelled. Many times. I always regret it. That’s just bad parenting. It was an accident, right? Even when it’s the third time this week.
What do you do? Sippy cups forever is my first thought. But I didn’t want to give him a complex like “night-time underwear” would. I think for a while we banned all beverages at the table. Why not? He drinks it and then refuses to eat his dinner because he’s full anyway.
And then, after I’d written the most of this, trying to find a way to begin again, not wanting to keep doing this when my baby girl grows old enough to have an open cup, he spilled the pitcher. The entire pitcher of grape juice. I am often aghast at the complete lack of sense that a 9-year-old boy has. Why wouldn’t you just move the pitcher on the counter while you’re digging in the fridge for the (whatever it was)? And I yelled. Sigh.
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3 Comments
Sigh.
And somehow I remember the horror of spilling things. Frozen, all my muscles clamped in dread of the yelling. And I still overturn my cups. On cue. My sippy cup is now a coffee mug. And I try to train myself to slide the top to closed after I drink it. We didn’t have sippy cups when I was tiny. We had horrible thick dried mucus yellow stackable glasses someone who shall remain nameless got from…Hell. I remember the sound of those things going over.
You have to know what a lousy sucky Mommy I feel like when I get mad over this event. And I vaguely remember the cups but I find the horror you conjure of the color and the sound of them being knocked over wonderful. Thank you.