When Your Toddler Holds You Hostage In Superdrug

Sometimes I forget that I'm still a first time parent. I feel like I've been a Mum for a while, its not all shiny and new and I should just know the answers by now. I mean you get all that when you have a new born, that feeling of not knowing what you're doing, not knowing how to hold them without their head falling off. Unsure of the normal temperature, the normal colour of poo, the normal amount of crying. You're supposed to not know when they are new and you are new at being a parent, its expected, its accepted. Its ok to hold your hands up and say 'Sorry I'm new at this, I don't really know what I'm doing!'. 
Trouble is, I'm not really sure I can do that now my first baby is a new toddler. I mean I'm more confident with my parenting skills than I was in those first few months, his needs are easier to read, mostly because they are being screamed at me from across the supermarket. I can assess the right temperature because I've realised that its either just too fucking hot or too fucking cold, it doesn't matter if you're nine months old or ninety. I don't worry about the colour of poo, I no longer phone my Mum about it. Two and half years in, I've seen it all or at least please God, I hope I have. Its been on my hands, in my hair, on the carpet, there's nothing in the poo department that can worry me now. We've kept him alive and reasonably well behaved, we used to congratulate ourselves on what a 'good baby' he was.

Then three weeks ago, he held me hostage in Superdrug.

When Your Toddler Goes Feral

My son, ninety five percent of the time is a really loving and empathetic child. He loves a cuddle, a big snotty kiss goodbye, a snuggle up on the sofa. He's kind to his animals, he'll kiss you better when you stumble over his train track, he'll share his biscuits when asked. He is by nature, a kind soul.
However, every now and then - every 5% of the time my son goes fucking feral. Maybe he's just too good, reaches his limit and needs to go bat shit crazy to release his inner demons, I don't know.
Case in point, last week when upon Nursery pick up my husband was summoned to sign an Incident Form, because our darling boy had held his best friend in a headlock and wouldn't let go.
Not only did he hold this kid down like Hulk Hogan high on Meth, he then refused to apologise and kept shuffling out of the 'quiet corner' where he been put to consider what he'd done.

Grandparent Guilt

Three days a week Finley spends his day with his two sets of Grandparents. We drop him off in the morning and pick him after tea but he spends his whole day with them, all day long for about ten hours. This is because we both have to work full time and we are seriously lucky to have two sets of parents who can step in and help us in this way. I know there are a lot of people out there who don't have the help that we do and we are aware of how fortunate we are in this regard. 

However, I do think that society wants me to feel bad about this set up. In that I should feel guilty for abandoning my child, burdening our parents and skipping off to work without a care in the world. I get this vibe from the media, from other parents and from people who comment about how much time my son spends at my Mum and Dads house. The implication of course, is that our parents shouldn't have to raise their children's children. 

Well no, they shouldn't.

Night, Night One Year Old

On Wednesday night I put my one year old baby in his cot for last time, because in the morning he would be two and officially not a baby anymore.

I don't remember feeling sad at all when he turned one but I am really struggling with mixed emotions at the prospect of him turning two.
On one hand I'm excited for the next year to come. I'm so looking forward to having proper conversations with him where I fully get what he's talking about.
At the moment he has a lot of keywords like 'yes, no, choo-choo, dinner, poo-poo,' and he also has a couple of key phrases 'not ver hair' (not over there) and 'eee es' (here it is).