The One About Lighters, Lies & Little Lessons
T is for Theo… and also Thief. Theo is turning five next week, and to mark the occasion, I hope we get to celebrate the end of some four-year-old behaviors—especially those considered criminal in most states.
Last week, Theo joined me in my room, as he normally does while I'm getting ready for the day. I was blow-drying my hair when he came in and asked how to open my jewelry box. This jewelry box is glass, and I’ve used it as more of a catchall for special items like ticket stubs and souvenirs—nothing worth a lot of money, but things that hold sentimental value. I could see why he’d be intrigued: through the glass, you could see various colors and shapes, and I didn’t see the harm in letting him explore it. Once I safely opened the lid, he began pulling out odd costume jewelry and rope bracelets from summers past. I resumed blow-drying, only to abruptly halt when I saw he was holding a tiny pink lighter.
In my defense, it has been a hot minute since I’ve been in this box. To be fair to him, I should have quickly checked the contents before letting him dive in. Neither here nor there, he had found the bright relic from my yesteryears, and now I had to get it back. As every fiber in my being wanted to scream, "THAT’S DANGEROUS, DROP IT!" I didn’t want to risk him finding my reaction curious, thus ensuring he’d hold onto that torch with a vise-like grip.
Instead, I gently put the blow-dryer down and casually asked him to put the items back, including the fire starter. As I saw him follow my directions—without much protest, I might add—I thought it was safe to resume grooming while simultaneously giving myself a parental pat on the back for not overreacting.
Fast-forward to 3:20 p.m. I had just retrieved Theo and Cole from school—the dismissal hoop-jumping alone is worth its own blog entry, by the way—and we were cutting through the goose-poop-ridden field headed to the playground, a part of the school grounds that has become unavoidable due to the locations of their respective classrooms. Yes, this is the fastest approach both for picking up the children and getting to my car; don’t get me started. Once we arrived at the playground, all seemed to be going well until I saw Theo reach into his pocket and pull out a very bright, very familiar, very prohibited-on-school-property object: the bubblegum-colored weapon I thought he had returned earlier that morning.
I was shocked. I was embarrassed. I was afraid he’d get caught. I marched over and whisper-screamed to him, “Theo! I thought you had put that back this morning! That is not yours. You took it without my permission and you hid it—that’s wrong! Give that to me immediately!”
It’s probably no surprise that the very response I had hoped to avoid that morning by not overreacting, I had just elicited in a public space that afternoon. He clenched his little bear paw around that lighter like he’d rather give me his right hand than let go of his new favorite toy. Then he took off. I think I blacked out around this time because I don’t remember much between him beginning to run and me tackling him onto the blue turf. Turns out I had used the last calm parenting stunt in my arsenal that morning, so I was left with the only tried-and-true approach I had on hand: excessive force.
I won’t go into the aftermath. As you can imagine, there was screaming, there were tears, and there was a very long, quiet 3-minute drive home. I’m not proud of how I handled the situation and, upon honest reflection, can admit I probably embarrassed myself more by tackling my four-year-old than if someone had caught him holding a lighter. But that’s the thing about parenting: we’re not perfect either. We’re learning too! When we got home, we had a nice reconciliation: I apologized, he apologized, and we spoke about the value of honesty and trust. He assured me he’d never take what didn’t belong to him again, and we moved on. Or so I thought.
Over the weekend, we hosted a joint birthday party to celebrate Cole’s belated September birthday and Theo’s impending October birthday. Because my parents live farther away and their schedules are more jam-packed in retirement than when they were working, we decided one party for two kids worked best for everyone. Cole seemed relieved to know that we didn’t forget to throw him a party, and Theo seemed even more confused as to when he was born, but generally, everyone had a great time. We hosted a brunch with way too many breakfast items, a tuna cake (more on that later), and my mom even made her famous dirt bombs and chocolate chip cookies to top it off. Given the amount of food and the size of the tuna cake we consumed, we reserved the cookies for later—aka, we hid them on top of the hutch in the dining room, out of sight of partygoers, because we’re selfish like that.
After my parents left, I remembered the chocolate chip cookies, took them down, and left them on the kitchen counter. On Tuesday morning, Theo came down for breakfast and spotted the cookies. He asked if he could have one, to which I responded, "No, not before school." He asked if he could hold one. Now, you’re probably saying to yourself, There’s no way you are a big enough idiot to trust a four-year-old to hold a cookie and not eat it!
I am! But hear me out:
Since the lighter incident heard 'round the district, Theo and I have been practicing little things to build trust. For instance, he’ll ask me for a snack before dinner and I’ll say, "No, we’re going to be having dinner." He’ll ask if he can hold onto the wrapped treat until dinner is over and then have it. Initially, I wanted to say, "No, I don’t trust you not to eat it." But how was I to build any trust if I didn't give him a little freedom to make choices and prove me wrong? So I have begun to say yes, and he has kept his word. Mostly.
So when he asked if he could hold the cookie, I looked at him and said, "You may not eat it until after school." He nodded his head and said, “Oh, absolutely.” I went upstairs to make my bed, and—whether I had forgotten something downstairs or my mommy-sense was going wild—I returned downstairs and shocked us both when I found Theodore eating the cookie.
In that moment, I had a very vivid flashback to the playground, the lighter, the tackle, the turf, and the tears. I didn’t want to make the same mistake, but I did need him to know that what he did was wrong. I calmly walked over to him and asked for the cookie. He handed it to me and promptly asked if he could have a dirt bomb instead. He looked at me with those big, sea-glass-colored eyes, and truth be told, I wanted to give him the cookie and say, "What the heck, you didn’t get to have one at your party, go ahead." I wanted to give him the dirt bomb and the cookie because he had handed it over without a fuss.
However, while I feel it’s important to be calm, gentle, and forgiving, I also know consistency is key, and rewarding bad behavior is confusing. Even though I was the one enforcing the discipline, it didn’t make it any easier to refuse him the dirt bomb and deliver the lesson—to watch his face crumble and disappointment sink in; to hear him grunting as he threw every stuffed animal out of the wicker basket and every pillow off the couches. To be honest, I hate being the bad guy. I hate having to harp on the same things over and over until it sinks in. It breaks my heart to disappoint my kids or, worse, point out the error of their ways, all in the name of molding them into honest, kind, respectful, and responsible people. But that’s also the thing about parenting: it’s hard… but I'm told it’s worth it.
After yet another conversation about taking things without permission (albeit a gray area because I did say he could hold it, just not eat it), what constitutes a lie, and why truth and trust are important, we went off to school. He was in a decent mood, all things considered, and I was once again ready to pat myself on the back for remaining calm and doing the tough stuff I hated doing.
Not fifteen minutes later, I received a text from Theo’s teacher asking me to call her. Evidently, when Theo greeted his teacher that morning, he didn’t say hello or good morning; he said, “My mom screamed at me. She was in a mood.” Thank God his teacher has a sense of humor, because she was more tickled by his choice of words than anything else. When I spoke with her, I explained what had happened, and while I admitted to screaming every now and then, I did defend my delivery that particular morning. She asked me to send her a picture of the cookie and told me she was going to confront him about it later that day.
Every morning, I pray for patience, but I also pray for grace. Grace to roll with the punches, to accept that I’m not in control, to let go, and to forgive myself for the mistakes I make on a daily basis. I am not perfect, nor do I pretend to be. However, I can admit when I’m wrong, apologize for losing my temper, screaming, or—gulp—tackling. I can tiptoe around the brink of propriety with my candor because I believe in walking the talk.
The Tuesday morning of "Cookie-gate," I chose to take a different path. But as I admitted to Theo’s teacher, I have been known to scream on occasion because sometimes I revert to old habits. I don’t feel heard, so I turn up the volume. I lose it and accidentally tackle my children. But I also own it. I write about it. I try to learn from it and make different choices moving forward. It’s not easy and it’s not a perfect science, but it’s progress, and I have to remember to always try to do the next right thing because I have little ones to lead.
At pickup that afternoon, his teacher greeted me with a big smile and said, "Someone changed their tune!" I don’t know if she showed him the picture of the cookie—I didn’t ask—but I do know that he told his teacher I wasn’t mean that morning, that I was nice, and that he wasn’t going to take things that didn’t belong to him “ever again.” I know that I got a big hug at dismissal and had my hand held as we walked the long perimeter to the exact opposite corner of the building to get his brother. I know that while they are learning to be good people, they were already born with good hearts.
