Terrible Twos?

Good gracious. If anyone knows how to make a 2 yr old stop hitting, "twitching" his hands so that everything within a 3 foot radius goes flying off whatever surface it is on, kicking, and screaming for entire hours at a time.... I'm totally listening.

I swear, ever since he started getting out of bed at 7 or 8, the days get worse and worse. It's nonstop yelling, from both of us. Say all I want to do is change his diaper. I usually ask him if he wants one, because sometimes he'll say yes. If he says no, I'll ask if he wants to hold a diaper. This works about 70% of the time. If neither work, I'll wait 20 minutes or so and ask again. Or just set him on the ottoman and proceed. By this time, he is screaming his head off. "I don't WANT a diaper change! I WANT a diaper change!" There will be lots of foot stamping (I don't mind foot stomping, it's not hurting anyone or destroying items) and smacking of the table or said ottoman. Pajama pants off. Cue the nonstop foot kick. It's bad for whichever of us is changing the diaper. Caayn does it standing over the ottoman, so the kicks are perfectly aimed for his boys. I sit down on the couch to do it, because I can't stand hunched over like that. Which then puts his kicks aimed directly for my belly. He can't hear us tell him to stop kicking because he's screaming and yelling so loud, so then we're yelling back. And he's too darn strong to hold his legs still. What could be a less than one minute operation then turns into a 10 minute ordeal that leaves anyone involved worn out.

It generally just goes down hill from there. I hate it. I don't want to be the mom who yells at her kid. I'm at a total loss at what to do here. Something has to change or I'm going to go out of my mind. Most days, by 10am all I want to do is sit and stare blankly at the wall. It's so easy to just tune out the tantrums. But that doesn't help make them stop. And that's what needs to be done. I feel so bad for Mr. L... he is never going to get a chance to sleep. I feel bad for Caayn too; by the time he comes home from work, I am done. I don't want anything to do with Sully, I just want to go hide under the bed or something. I feel terrible even saying that, but its so true.

He does have his good moments. After a good 45 minutes solid of shrieking, writhing on the floor, smacking the crap out of things, etc, he'll calm down and be all smiles for a bit. That's always nice (even if half the time I am so pissed at that point that I don't FEEL like smiling back when I smile). We read books together. I remember when he was a baby, thinking about how would I ever read a book out loud? I always hated doing that because I have trouble keeping up and stumble over words. But he's brought out my inner narrator. It's fun to find the rhythm of each book. The more you get into it, the more he gets into it.

What am I doing that I can't stay calm in such a situation? I swear, any time Caayn gets overwhelmed by Sully's attitude, I'm always calm. I think we balance each other, because we are never upset at the same time. One of us is always rational. I want us to have a happy family, not grouchy.

I woke up this morning thinking that I ought to get some sage and smudge the house. All of this negativity is surely clouding the air.