Someone asked in a recent comment if my girls break into fights pretty much any time I leave the room for more than five seconds. And the answer, sadly, is yes. YES! It's ridiculous how much of our parenting these days involves playing referee. And damn, it's tough. We're not even to the stage of She said / She said yet. There's no "she started it," or "she's lying." There's just...fighting.
And it seems to go in waves where it's either Elsa's fault all the time or Clio's fault all the time, and I start questioning my ability to be a fair and impartial judge, because I fear I am biased against one child or the other, based on her recent behavior. Or I worry that I'm subconsciously trying to even things out by under- or over-reacting to one or the other of them. (If you're having trouble following this paragraph, then you can begin to get a sense of how confused I often feel in the moment.)
The fights tend to fall into five distinct categories. There's the "You took what I was playing with and I want it back" fight; the "you are crowding my personal space" fight; the "I am mad at you for some entirely inane and irrational reason, like you put your milk cup to the left of your plate and I want it to the right of your plate" fight; and the "you are doing some silly/annoying thing on purpose just to drive me nuts" fight (Clio is frequently guilty of this -- mischeivous child). Then there are the expressions-of-affection-and-playfulness-turned-rough incidents, which, while not as contentious, still require parental intervention
In fact, it seems like almost all of their -- ahem -- "disagreements" require parental intervention. I've tried a few times, experimentally, to let them try to work things out on their own, but it usually only leads to escalation. I try to assume the role of "conflict coach" when I can, encouraging them to use words instead of screaming / crying / hitting. I'll say (for example) "Elsa, if you don't like it that Clio is swinging your Curious George around by the leg, you need to tell her 'please stop doing that to my George,' instead of crying." Not that it necessarily works. But it's a start, right? Much of the time, though, we have to get right in there and arbitrate.
It's the physical fights that I hate the most. Both girls are deep into the hitting / pushing / kicking thing, and I find it awfully disturbing. We are very firm about these not being acceptable behaviors. Our strategy, when it happens, is to physically remove the perpetrator -- sometimes for an actual "time-out," sometimes not, depending on the situation -- and have a little "talk" about how hitting and kicking are not OK responses, you need to use words. We require an apology. After that, if possible -- that is, if we witnessed what happened -- we try to address what the other child did to provoke the physical response: grabbing a toy or insulting her sister's haircut or whatever. But making it clear that violence is not an OK response is our first priority.
What I find particularly infuriating is when the girls strike out at us, which happens occasionally. They may only be two and a half, but they are strong little buggers, and a smack or a kick from them can really hurt. It's hard to remain calm and reasonable when your daughter has just whacked you on the head and screamed at you to "go away!" while you're trying to cut her waffle (for example) because she asked you to cut her waffle. (No is yes! Yes is no! War is peace! Freedom is slavery!) You are not only angry at the behavior, but you're hurt that they've lashed out at you, and, possibly, in pain.
Sometimes their "violence" is not even in anger; it's just out of punchy (literally! Again!), overtired playfulness. Yesterday afternoon, I was changing Clio's diaper and she was being kicky, but in a totally silly and playful way -- giggling the whole time. I told her she needed to stop so I could change her diaper; she didn't. I held her feet and told her to stop; she didn't. I told her, quite firmly, that if she didn't stop kicking she was going to go upstairs in her crib for a time-out. She proceeded to kick me in the boob, hard, smiling the whole time. And up she went.
Are my children psychopaths? It doesn't seem possible. So much of the time, they really are lovely, and play nicely with each other. But sometimes....good God. I feel like they've been possesed by that kid from The Omen. And I am the hapless, heartbroken mother played by some actress whose career never really went anywhere and ended up playing the main character's best friend on an 80s sitcom that was cancelled after one season. You know?
It's all fun and games until somebody loses a nose. Photo by Ned Harvey.
