It was normal Friday afternoon and as usual I like to take the kids to do something special after a long week. I picked up my son and we headed to Target for pizza and shopping. That day I had written a post entitled Yes I have a lot of small kids. I was getting several notifications from Facebook that people were liking the post and commenting on how they understood my position. I was feeling good about about myself.
So the kids and I went into Target, the kids chose a table and we sat down to eat our pizza. There was an older gentleman sitting behind us who had his earbuds in and his eyes glued to his cell phone. He began to laugh hysterically, and my daughter L obviously found his laugh to be funny so she started to laugh hysterically. Of course everything she does is cute to me so I started laughing at her. It was the best. We all eventually finished our pizza, I packed up the leftovers and we were on our way.
I grabbed a red cart and put all three kids in. My son and daughter L began tussling over a decorative pumpkin my daughter had swiped from the dollar spot as I was getting the cart. I took the pumpkin and proceeded. A few steps away I placed the pumpkin back in the dollar spot. As I was leaving my daughter begins to cry that she wanted the pumpkin back. I redirected her attention and we were on our way. We vogued as we passed by a mirror, we talked about how good the pizza was and we sang some of our favorite songs.
Eventually my daughter began to sing louder and louder. I attempted to tell her to sing quietly but the more I tried to redirect her the louder she got. Then her twin sister joins her in song. At this point I’m starting to get anxious. So I decide to act like it wasn’t bothering me and continue looking at cute clothes for her. I take her out of the cart still singing to try a skirt on her and she begins dancing. Honestly it was pretty funny. But I put her back in the cart as if I disapproved.
About 20 seconds later her brother begins to say “Mommy I want a Ninja Turtle watch.” I tell him we can’t get it right now. He starts to cry repeating: “I want a watch, I want a watch”. His sister obviously felt upstaged so she begins to cry saying she wants to get back out of the cart. Ugh! With my son crying and acting up I had to take L out of the cart and let her walk. She begins rolling all over the floor and singing loudly. At this point I’m sure I have an audience. Honestly I’m sure I didn’t but I felt like the entire store was giving me the side eye and mumbling under their breath.
Their Tantrums Got the Best of Me
So I caved. I picked my daughter up off the floor, threw her in the cart with her screaming brother and sister and rolled those 3 hollering babies right out of the store. As I was exiting at this point we really did have an audience. After all I had just paraded through the entire store with a screaming trio. But at some point in between throwing my daughter in the cart from embarrassment and reaching that exit, I decided didn’t care what people thought. I walk through the parking lot confidently until I reached my vehicle and put the kids in their carseat. I was finally safe.
So just 3 hours after having published a post stating “Trust me, I got this!”, I didn’t have this. But I quickly had to be okay with that. Each step I took toward the exit garnered me a swift burst of confidence I’d never known. I loved that feeling. I owned what was happening, I made a decision how to handle it, and executed it successfully. That’s what it’s about. Learning through the circumstances to be better prepared for the next occurrence. Because there will be one. But this time I will forsee the situation and be better prepared to deal with it.
All in all, today just helped me better embrace the beautiful mess of motherhood. I’m delighted to get to experience it.
