Collin...The Trained Assassin

Okay, I admit that when I've seen other kids throw major tantrums, and I mean MAJOR tantrums, I have smugly thought to myself, "wow, I'm lucky my kid doesn't do that." Yes, I've then corrected my smugness and just thought, "phew, dodged that one."

Collin has been a mellow kid since day one. Hungry? Feed me when you get around to it. Poopie? I'll sit in it all day. Tired, I'll sleep wherever you put me. That's his style. Just mellow. He has his moments, sure. If you stretch that hunger thing just too far, he'll let you know that he wants a "Cacka" in no uncertain terms darn it! But that poop thing, he's still pretty okay with wallowing in his own filth.

But, he's developed a penchant for the tantrum recently...very recently...like the last two days recently. I've decided that it's through no fault of the evoltionary phase that is the approacheth of the age of two, or the fact that his Daddy's been gone all week so he's out of sorts. No, I blame Damien because it's fun to blame him, and because we saw him at the park approximately three days ago (coinciding with the start of all this mess). Coincidentally, Damien threw about a dozen tantrums that day over everything from whether the sky was blue to how many sand grains there were at the playground to who got to play with the trucks. It was horrible.

These tantrums are awful. They are designed to make Mommy want to pull her hair out and jump off the roof...or maybe just lay down and die on the carpet becuase after the sheer number of them in the past two days, they are driving her insane.

They begin with the pint size human (Collin in this case), standing in front of Mommy and saying "NO!" to something/anything then promptly throwing himself on the ground, facedown and shrieking. Since Mommy doesn't pay any attention, thankfully this ends rather quickly becuase Collin, being the mellow kid that he is, finds this activity a bit strenous for his character. He quickly peters out to a low whine, which is much more irritating to Mommy's sensibilities. That goes on for another minute or so, then he looses interest. Eventually, he goes on about his life and plays.

The problem is, if you catch his attention mid-tantrum with anything at all that you aren't going to allow him to have, even accidentally, like say you walk by him with a pot of boiling water for dinner, he will immediately want it and that will start the whole process over again. It's quite the pickle. You can't really stand still and hope not to catch his eye; but you can't exactly stop living while he is in the throes of irrationality either. But, please Mommy, let me scald myself! Please! It's somewhat tempting when he's behaving like a lunatic.

I've decided that despite this new development in my sweet boy's personality, which I'm treating with complete ignorance to it's existence, I still love him. Yep, I'm pretending it's not happening. It seems to be working. So far, the longest one of these floor-body-slam things has lasted was about a minute. And, the number of them dwindled from the first day to the second and we're surviving.

And, for the second day in a row, I got major, major hugs before naptime. I mean super hugs. He wanted to snuggle my shoulder for five minutes, be rocked and then switch sides and be rocked again. He hasn't wanted that since he was a baby. So, if he needs to unleash a little floor demon to be a sweetie-pie now and then, I think I can live with it, so long as it's a phase...a short one.

Besides, he was still the best behaved kid in a waiting room full of kids at the doctor's office today, which by the way was filled with some of the biggest animal kids I'd ever seen. One kid actually kept trying to push my son off of my lap so I'd read him a story instead of my own son. What's with that? Uh, hello kid's mom who's sitting RIGHT THERE...do you think you could maybe get your son?