Sunday morning. It can be a little hectic. Kevin has to do chores, so I am getting the kids ready to go by myself and out the door by 8:30. I do this on non-church days with usually little to no stress, but I’m realizing that Sundays are harder.
For one, I have this old ingrained expectation that Sunday is “a day of rest”, so I tend to want to lounge more, to take my time, instead of getting up and at ’em like I do on the rest of the days when we have to leave the house by 8:30. I also think (and I currently am adjusting this expectation) that Kevin should be helping me more because we’re going to church together as a family.
For another, I have an expectation that we need to look “put together”. I don’t care what the kids wear when we go to our homeschool co-op and I have to leave at 8:30. I don’t care fret about whether I’ve combed their hair or what kind of shoes they have on when we leave the house to go to an early dentist or chiro appointment. Why do I feel I have to impress “church people” more? I honestly don’t think my church people are any less loving or any more judgmental than my homeschool friends, so why do I stress?
For a third, Sundays growing up were a HUGE point of stress. I can’t remember a lot of specifics, but I do know it is very ingrained in my being that going to church was a huge yelling fest; Dad was always angry, and you could never never be late and we were always running late.
This particular Sunday, Kevin wasn’t even going to go with us.
Cadrian had picked out his outfit and I buttoned him up where he couldn’t. Next kid.
Suddenly I look up and Cadrian is trying to UNbutton himself to change clothes. I internally freak out. I don’t know if I was scared we would be late. I don’t know if I just didn’t want to have to deal with whatever he wanted to change into. Maybe I was scared he would change into five different outfits and we’d have clothes up to our knees in the family closet. Whatever it was that this innocent action triggered, I felt I had to lay down the law.
Calmly and gently, I explained that he had chosen the outfit he had on. The outfit was fine. The outfit was fancy. He was wearing it. Period.
Fit commenced. I wouldn’t budge. He wouldn’t stop screaming and threatening. He screamed for the remaining half hour it took to get Elivette and Denton ready. He screamed almost all the way to church.
In hindsight, what would it have harmed to let him change clothes? We really did have plenty of time. Even if we were late, it wouldn’t have been the end of the world. If clothes were all over the floor, it would certainly not have been the first time. As it was, I had to go back in the house for some deep breathing and prayer, to calm myself down. He could have changed clothes twice over in that amount of time. And I wouldn’t have been stressed. And HE wouldn’t have been stressed.
When we talked about it calmly afterwords, I told him I was wrong. I apologized. We hugged and loved and all was well. (for the moment).
