You mention one word to ‘The Very Particular Girl’ and she constructs such vivid mental images that if put in words would fill a book.

The mother says ‘ice cream’ and ‘The Very Particular Girl’ imagines one scoop chocolate ice cream with sprinkles and M&Ms with a cherry on top, in a kids sized waffle cone. This to be had in the Cold Stone Creamery close to her house, sitting at the square table against the wall with three chairs around the table. She visualizes that her mother would be sitting next to her with a white plastic spoon on her hand. She visualizes that she is allowing her mother to swipe her ice cream from time to time and swatting her hands away at other times. She visualizes her younger sister sitting across from her eating vanilla ice cream with sprinkles and M&Ms in a kid sized sugar cone. She had already visualized what clothes the trio would be wearing.

If the mother had said ‘ice cream’ during an outing in which the little sister had not accompanied them…. no problem, she automatically assumes that they would go home, pick up the little one, change clothes and then go to the ice cream shop.

See the way the four-year-old mind works? She constructs an image, actually a movie clip, by gathering snippets from her past experiences. If the reality changes, the movie projection in her mind does not change. Her four-year-old brain is not that agile cognitively, so she changes reality in order to achieve her mental representation.

Of course reality being pretty real, there usually is a mismatch in the end result and the mental projection. Thus resulting in hands-flailing-legs-kicking-rolling-on-the-floor-tantrums. At times the mother has been afraid of ‘The Very Particular Girl’. There is no telling what ‘The Very Particular Girl’ is thinking and after the hoops the mother had jumped to do something that she thought would make ‘The Very Particular Girl’ happy, she had to face-ear-splitting-brain-melting-tantrums. Most disheartening of all, ‘The Very Particular Girl’ would come back home and pronounce the verdict that would descend on the mother like thunder “You made me very unhappy amma.”

After going through painfully small improvisations, one at a time, finally the mother and the ‘The Very Particular Girl’ have settled in to a routine. For anything activity they do, no matter how small it is, they draw up ‘A Plan’. A plan is nothing but a set of expectations, both the mother’s and ‘The Very Particular Girl’s’. Then they analyze what they can do if something unexpected happens and the plan goes haywire. The mother tells/warns at least 1000 times that one can only plan and life can throw surprises. The ‘The Very Particular Girl’ nods her head understandingly. Thanks to the plan, if something upsets ‘The Very Particular Girl’, she says, “But amma, that is not my plan.” The concept of ‘A Plan’ helps put things in perspective not only for the ‘The Very Particular Girl’, but at times also for her mother, because when you are a mother, you tend to just do things. In your heart, you are doing whatever you are doing in the best interest of your family. At times like that the little voice, filled with reproach helps the mother find her balance.

THE END

CAST AND CREDITS(Like you guys didn’t know all along!)
‘The Very Particular Girl’ – Chula
Mother – Yours Truly

Technorati Tags: Toddler tantrum, preschooler tantrums, how a child thinks, why do children throw tantrums

Technorati Tags: how a child thinks, preschooler tantrums, Toddler tantrum, why do children throw tantrums

Theorem I
The number of ‘NO’s a mother says to her child is directly proportional to (the personality of the child + life experiences of the mother).

Theorem II
In a particular house, the number of ‘NO’s a child hears is always a constant. This is irrespective of the birth order.

In order to spare the readers with the details, if I can describe myself in one word, while Chula was a wee little baby – HITLER.

But the second baby was such an eye opener. I learnt from my previous experience that there is absolutely no need to freak out. Mieja has lot more degree of freedom(from me) when compared to Chula. I really started thinking before I uttered the word ‘NO’. But when I said no it was a NO in 72 point, bold, underline, no matter the tears, tanrums, screaming. End of discussion. Case closed.

I learnt from experience that every single runny nose does not warrant a trip to the doctor. A trip to a restaurant can happen with out feeding the baby in the house/ packing food for the baby for hygiene purposes. If I don’t use Purell/anti bacterial wipes the world does not come to a grinding halt. The equation, ‘baby skipping afternoon nap one day = falling asleep in the evening = baby staying up well past midnight = baby with poor sleeping habits for the rest of her life’ exists only in the minds of a paranoid mother. Which lead me to write theorem I.

So you would assume that Mieja hears lesser number of ‘NO’s right? Wrong. There is this micro managing elder sister on her tail, observing her like a hawk.

NO baby, you can’t do that.
NO baby, you can’t touch that.
NO baby, it is not okay.
NO that is mine. Put that back.
NO baby that is not acceptable.
NO, come out of the room.
NO, NO, NO, NO……….

Which lead me to form theorem II

Its been 4 weeks since the mother became a faculty in her daughter’s school. The mother and the daughter have settled in to a nice routine. They leave the house together and come back together. If the mother happens to walk in to the daughter’s classroom for some errand, the daughter comes running and gives a hug, kiss…yeah, the whole shebang. If the daughter happens to catch a glimpse of the mother through the window, she bangs the window to get the mother’s attention and waves all bright and cheery. She even calls her classmates and proudly points, ‘That is MY mommy’.

But it took quite a bit of learning from the mother’s part. Remember the mother’s bellyache about the lunch box issue? The first week, the mother did go overboard on the same issue. She checked the daughter’s lunch box during her break *gasp* pulled the daughter aside to feed her the food *gasp to power of gasp*. The poor daughter was seen walking around as if she crushed by an invisible boulder. At times she even hid under the table when the mother walked by.

But within two days, thanks to the over thinking and over analyzing mother’s brain that worked at the speed of light, a control system was established. Thus materialized an unspoken unwritten pact.

For the mother: When in school the child is cared for by HER teacher. Do not, do not, do not interfere.
For the child: When in school, you listen to what your teacher says. You were asked to sit out of circle time because you behaved inappropriately. Amma can’t do anything about it baby and NO you cannot come and start working in my class because you are unhappy with the situation you got yourself in to.

Guess even ‘mothering’ can become annoying, both to the child and to the mother, if the mother does not accept her boundaries.