Aug 26, 2014 TUESDAYS CHILD MAY BE FULL OF GRACE….TUESDAYS – NOT SO MUCH

There's an old poem that goes, "Monday's child is fair or face, Tuesday's child is full of grace..."  On the other hand, in the American Girl movie McKenna (and if you don't know the movie to which I refer, you clearly do not have a young female gymnast in your house), McKenna's dad sings a song called "I Hate Tuesday."  I'm with him.  Tuesdays are a crudfest in our house.  At least the last 3 Tuesdays since school started have been.

Why are Tuesdays such a trainwreck?  Maybe it's because Mondays are so long...we go right from school to the gym, then home, dinner, homework, chill, and bed. Maybe it's because Tuesday is the day I work on my own emotional health and I'm often a bit raw and battered from that. Maybe it's because Tuesday is very disjointed.....school, then home for 2 hrs, then gym, then home past bedtime.  Maybe just because. But Tuesdays are the day I am most likely to blow it.  I did today.

Homework was begrudgingly underway and TK was struggling with a math problem. When I tried to explain it she yelled,"Mom, we never learned this! Just stop it!"  I went into the "If you'd just listen to me for two minutes" spiel.  But the problem wasn't that she wasn't listening to me. The problem was that I wasn't listening to her.  Not the screaming or the attitude - the emotion. The emotion was saying, "Mom, I"m overwhelmed. I've used up all my regulation at school and there's nothing left right now. I need you to help me feel safe, not help with my homework. I need you to show me I'm more important than math homework."   But I didn't hear that tonight.  

Last week I heard it, and I gave myself a little extra grace for the next time when I blew it. Good thing, because I needed it tonight.  No, I'm not beating myself up (well, maybe just a little). I'll have plenty of opportunities to do it better, and ample opportunities to offer myself extra grace when I blow it.
It's a journey. It's not a straight path, and sometimes you can't even see the path, but we keep walking, because our kids need us to.  

I'm extending myself a little extra grace for blowing it tonight.  Give yourself some too.