As much as I tried to stay patient with her, I felt like I spent all day frustrated with her, trying to work through one breakdown after another. After a couple of days of nothing but tantrums and time outs, I was worn out! We were at the grocery store one afternoon and during our umpteenth tantrum of the day, I remember thinking "I'm done!" I had been disciplining Mary all week and I was done fighting her. I decided to let Mary make the decisions from then on out and I would just go with it. We ended up having what I called a Mary Day, just for her. She picked out dinner that night (Chef Boyardee baby) and I let her pick a movie to watch in her jammies. We made a bed on the floor in the living room and ate snacks in front of our movie until we were SICK of junior mints and popcorn. I remember how excited she was that night when she realized that we were doing something just for her and that she got to make all the decisions. I had no other responsibilities and all of my attention was HERS. She loved it, and the tantrums stopped. We had a blast(!) and I had my sweet little Mary back to normal!
Yesterday was another well deserved MARY DAY. I had been sick for almost two weeks and poor Mary toughed it out like a trooper. Wait ... what am I saying? She got to watch all the TV she wanted for two weeks! Not so bad for her. I definitely felt like a bad Mom though trying to distract her every time she wanted to play with me. It's pretty pathetic when your baby girl says "C'mon Mommy, come dance with me!" and you tell them to go watch a movie instead. So, I woke up to a sunny morning yesterday feeling fabulous, so I knew it needed to be a Mary Day. We ended up at the zoo and I left the stroller in the car so she could run the trip that day. I just followed her wherever she wanted to go and it ended up being so much fun. We rode the carousel and jumped in the bouncy house. I even let her look at the Black Mamba for 20 minutes instead of pulling her away to look at something more fun (why is that her favorite animal in the zoo?!). We stopped by Toys R Us on the way home just to browse the aisles and talk about all of our favorite toys. We came home with a new set of Disney figurines and read about 30 books before bedtime. I feel like a good Mom again! I sure do love Mary Days!
Too bad I don't have the stamina to do that every day.
and just to answer the question in everybody's mind these days - NO I am not pregnant. I was wiped out with the flu and the worst bladder infection of the century. That may be too much information for a blog, but seriously ... all these pregnancy assumptions are making me feel fat.
