Moms do the hard stuff

It poured rain again yesterday.  Lots of great puddles available for splashing, so after school, Callie headed out for some puddle-stomping.  She wisely went barefoot so she wouldn't get her shoes wet. Oh wait.  It was NOT a wise choice.  She joyfully went stomping in a great puddle that had lots of sticky prickly thorns at the bottom, and ended up with 2 feet full of tiny thorns.  Yikes!

I expect any normal mom would have sat on her and plucked the darn things out.  It would have been a 5 minute job, tops.   I did not do this.  Callie is my temperamental child.  Had I gone the brute force route, she's have screamed forever and hated me for days.  True story.  Plus, I kind of have the same pain-makes-me-neurotic thing going on, so I do understand it.  As a grown up though, I can (ususally!) see how silly it is to prolong the pain when it could be over so much faster.  Let me tell you how it went!

I carried Callie inside and put her on the bathroom counter.  She wailed and screamed.  I told her I could pull the thorns out quickly and she went hysterical.  I asked what she would like to do.  After more crying and dithering, she decided she wanted to lie down on the living room floor and cover her face with her blanket.  She went into drill sergeant mode and started bossing her sisters and me around- go get my blanket, I need a pillow, no one look at me, put the dog in his kennel so he doesn't accidentally touch me, bring me the cd player and put on the children's hymns so I can be distracted..... oh yeah, loads of fun already!

I finally got her situated on the living room floor, yes, with pillow and blankets, dog in the kennel, and her sisters playing upstairs.   I told her I wanted her to be comfortable and I would do what she wanted. She cried and cried.  She wasn't ready.  It has now been 30 minutes. 30 minutes of crying that was so completely unnecessary!  She cried about the dog yipping.  She cried that it hurt.  She cried that she was afraid.  She cried that her sister came downstairs and looked at her.  She cried because my hands weren't the proper distance from her feet.  She cried because she could see the tweezers.  She cried because her feet hurt.

My patience was wearing thin.  I did have dinner to make and 500 other things to be doing, other than sitting on the floor watching my child howl over something that could have been over and done with by now.

Then she looked at me and thanked me for being so patient with her and told me I was the best mommy ever.   With such heart-melting encouragement, what could I do but persevere?  I held her foot and we counted to 3.  She screamed, "No! Wait!  I'm not ready!!"  So I waited.  We did it again, with the same result.  And again.  I suggested she count to 3, cover her face, take a deep breath and then count, 4 and 5, and I'd pull one thorn out.  She agreed, but when we got to 3, there was more shrieks of no no no, not yet.  Sigh.  I got her to try again, and I finally pulled one out while she was on 3.  Whew!

Oh wait, there were 8 more thorns to pull.

Sufficeth to say, it was a 90 minute ordeal before they were all removed.  The cd had long run out of music, her sisters had run out of things to do upstairs, and I had run out of time to get dinner done before we'd be eating late.  Thank goodness she knows and appreciates that I love her and was willing to help her be as comfortable as possible throughout the process.  It was nice to have her delighted with me for once  And so rarely do I hear from her that I am the best mom, so it was totally worth it!