The most amazing medicine ever: Read, Understand, and Laugh

I have actually had a pretty emotionally draining week and it's only Thursday. And surprisingly, I haven't had any "yelling" at my kids episodes. But I know that it could happen if I say.... found homework sitting on the dining room table after I told Tobin 3 times to make sure it was in his backpack or I found Noah eating a bananayogurtbagelpeanutbuttercrackersbrownieapple snack 10 minutes before dinner or I found that Brenna has put stickers on the brand new furniture in her room. I saw this article and felt a sense of awakening (if only for a moment) from my draining week. I know I have had conversations with many of you about yelling or not yelling at the children, so I thought you would like this. The child who made the comment to his dad at the end of the article, I swear, could have been replaced with Brenna, Julianna, Ethan, Torin, Skyler, or anyone of a number of children I know!! Enjoy.

Can Yelling at Your Kids Be Good?
By Lisa Belkin

I never lose my temper. I am Zen in the wake of any storm. Sometimes I speak a bit more, um, loudly, than other times, but that’s only because there is background noise and I want to make sure my boys hear my rational and calm explanation that begins with an even-keeled “how many times do I have to tell you…”

If you ever meet them and they start to spin tales about how, once or twice (or whatever) I actually lost my voice from shrieking about the dang clothes left all over the darn floor, well, boys do have active imaginations, now don’t they? And the one about the time Mom threw a full glass of water (the contents, not the actual glass) at one of their heads (she missed, they will tell you) — you don’t have to believe them. (I would never miss.)

We rarely talk about the anger of being a parent. We know the lurking danger — of anger turning physical, or crossing a line. That means we also don’t talk about the fact that we all lose it. Or the corollary fact that sometimes anger works.

When all else fails, a few claps of oral thunder certainly show that Mom or Dad has had it, that humans can be pushed just so far, and this is what it looks like when you’ve pushed them too much.

I have friends whose parents really never yelled. Those same friends were terrified at their first fight with their own spouse, or their first anger at their own children; they were certain the marriage was over and the kids would be taken away. There is a lesson learned by some yelling (not abusing or berating, or belittling, but emoting; not constantly, but sometimes): we get mad, we make up, we still love each other.

My guest blogger, Susie Orman Schnall, knows this, well. She and her husband are raising three young boys in the suburbs of New York. Most days go well. Here’s the story of one day last fall that didn’t. For some of you what she describes will sound like a minor skirmish, others will find it outrageous. For her it was frightening, and memorable — and it seems like it all turned out okay.

THE DAY MOM THREW THE CRAYONS

By SUSIE ORMAN SCHNALL

It’s a terrifying moment when you realize that you’ve done something in your childrens’ formative years that just may become formative. One of those episodes that was so memorable, so — dare I say — traumatic, that it becomes an actual childhood memory.

I don’t have many distinct childhood memories. It’s more of a happy blur: weekends at my dad’s, watching “The Brady Bunch” in bed at night with my mom and my sister, making up plays with the neighborhood kids. The real sharp memories often are of something bad happening. And that’s what I gave my kids tonight. Served up one of those scary, Mom-goes-crazy memories on a shiny silver platter.

It happened after dinner. The kids were making hand-print turkey Thanksgiving decorations. I was clearing the plates when I noticed crayon smears on the new kitchen table. I freaked. Well, actually, some woman who looks like me freaked. I was watching it all from the ceiling while the woman who looks like me picked up the bin of crayons and threw the entire thing on the floor. Then she yelled, “Pick them up,” and stormed upstairs.

By now ceiling me had jumped back into the body of the woman who looks like me, and I contemplated whether to giggle or be disgusted with myself. I had really done it that time. I had lost it. Officially.

Cue the children screaming. And crying.

One of the boys shouted, “Why should we clean up the mess? You made it.” And I had my hook.

After I returned a few e-mails and relaxed with a couple Ujjayi breaths, I went downstairs to clean up my mess and hug my three scared (scarred?) boys. Shocked to see the power I wield, I found dried tears and all the crayons back in the bin. I thanked the boys for cleaning up the mess and lined them all up in front of me.

“How did you feel when you had to clean up a mess you didn’t make?” I asked my little army. “Not good,” sniffled the littlest cadet.

I explained to them — here comes the moral — that, no, it doesn’t feel good to clean up a mess you didn’t make. And that Mommy doesn’t like cleaning up their messes all the time. And that they need to take responsibility. And then I apologized to them for shouting and throwing the crayons. Luckily, I’m not too stubborn to refuse offering an apology when one is painfully needed.

Although the lesson taught was unrelated to what set me off in the first place (basically just fatigue and frustration with a little crayon on furniture to break the proverbial camel’s back), it certainly was a good lesson to teach. And my antics, however shameful, sure did make an impact.

As mothers it’s impossible to not lose it sometimes. A wise parenting expert I know said you should strive to be a great parent 80 percent of the time. The rest of the time you just need to realize you could have done better and move on. It’s that 20 percent that inducts us into the sorority of on-the-edge mothers and also lets us off the hook when we so desperately need it.

So, hopefully, I didn’t cause too much trauma. Hopefully, the incident will not affect them as much as I’m thinking it might. Then again, I may be out of luck. I woke up this morning to hear my 7-year-old telling my husband, “Did Mommy tell you about how she threw the crayons?”