159 days without yelling, 206 days of loving more to go!

Dear Readers,

I have no idea if this post makes sense. I had a funeral today and my eyes are so sore and tired from crying all day and my heart is so heavy with sadness for my friend that I am not sure what I wrote. All I am sure of is that I needed to write tonight. Because in some really twisted way, the funeral I attended today only emphasized the important of this challenge for me.

xoxo,
The Orange Rhino

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I had to watch a very close friend bury his mom today.

He already lost his father about thirteen years ago.

He just had his first daughter three weeks ago.

Unfortunately his mother entered the hospital and a coma shortly thereafter and was never able to meet her only grandchild.The whole situation pains me so. I’ve been carrying around a huge weight of sadness since this Thursday when I first heard the news. Knowing that someone so close and dear to me is suffering just breaks my heart.

And yet, since Thursday, I’ve been short and b*tchy with my four kids, with four people so close and dear to me. Here I am feeling so sad about my friend’s loss of his mom and yet I am being a mean mom to my kids. Why? Why is it that we are short with the ones we love? I don’t know why but I do know this. Just admitting it – admitting that these last few days I have been short because I am overwhelmed with grief – has at least kept me from yelling at the things so undeserving (oh like shoes being left by door for me to trip on, wake up calls at 4 am, food being flung.)

But still, even though I haven’t yelled, I hate it that instead of reaching out to my kids for the love I so desperately needed these last few days, I shut down and was short and distant. Because that is the antithesis of what I wanted. I have cried so much the last few days because my friend and his mom were so incredibly close and that is what I want for my sons and me.  I don’t want to be short and distant to them. I want to be incredibly close to them.

My friend cared for his mom so deeply and was such an amazing son. Ever since his dad died he looked after his mom with a sense of love, commitment, responsibility and honor that never ceased to amaze me.  He cared for her in a way I can only hope my sons bestow upon me. I want for my boys and I the same strong, loving relationship my friend had with his mom…and yet here I spent the last few days doing anything but building that relationship. (Unless days on end of “acceptable” snapping by Orange Rhino standards counts?!)

My friend shared some words today about his mom that made me really think. Well, and that made me really cry too. He said something along the lines of:

“It all boils down to this. My mom loved me unconditionally. Every time I had a question or a problem, I went to her and she told me she loved me and that she was proud of me. Even in her last days I asked her if I ever disappointed her. She couldn’t speak but she shook her head no and gave me a look that said, “are you nuts?!”

Listening to my friend speak, I thought of three things. One, my friend’s mom raised a great son and she’d be proud of him today, two of the immense sadness he must be feeling and three, I would be honored, no blessed? if my sons ever speak of me the way my friend spoke of his mom. I would be honored and blessed if my sons love me an eighth as much as my friend loved his mom.

You know, I struggled this week to answer the simple question: Why do I want to stop yelling at my kids. Really, the answers are so clear to me now. It’s because I love my kids and like my friend and his mom, I want them to come to me with every question and problem, even if they have failed, because they know I will love them unconditionally.

And why else do I want to stop yelling at my kids? Because while I love my kids, I know I can love them more. I want to love them more. And every time I yelled at them, I mean really yelled, screamed, went ballistic type yell, I chipped away at that love, I didn’t add to it. Instead I slowly chipped away at the potential for the unconditional love to grow. I chipped away at the opportunity for my boys to come to me without fear whenever a problem arises.

I am sure my friend and his mom had moments where one or both of them yelled. And I know that realistically a yell will come out of my mouth at some point in my many years as a mom. But that isn’t going to keep me from trying my hardest to love my kids more – with more respect, more patience, more grace, more empathy. Because loving my kids more will only teach them to love me more. Loving my kids more will only help our relationship grow stronger. Someday my boys will be speaking about me from a podium. And when that day comes, I want them to be able to speak of the same unconditional love my friend shared today. And I can only imagine that not yelling (or even yelling less) is one step towards that.  And it’s a worth step worth taking because let me tell you – watching my friend speak today, sensing the love he felt for his mom? It was powerful. Beyond powerful.

154 days without yelling, 211 days of loving more to go!

Dear J.F.,

Thank you for all your constant support and motivation. You have words of wisdom that always lift me up and get me back on track when I want to quit this challenge. The best part? You were a total stranger to me. Until now…. Thank you also for taking the time to write a little something for my blog. As I expected, this week after my staycation has me overwhelmed and behind schedule. ON EVERYTHING. I want to get back into blogging full swing but it is nearly impossible. So I gratefully share below some of your thoughts on the challenge. I thoroughly enjoyed reading what you wrote below – because it made me realize I AM NOT ALONE. That my feelings aren’t ridiculous. They don’t make me ridiculous. If anything, they make me normal. They make all us reading this, perhaps all of us able to identify with at least 1, if not more of your points, feel normal….

many thank you’s,
The Orange Rhino

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Written by J.F. Please show your support for her with Facebook love and/or comments!

Dear Orange Rhino,

As I follower of your blog I would like to say:

Thank you for helping me be a better mom. Thank you for letting me try again when I fail. Thank you for giving me the motivation not to quit.

I never used to yell at anyone. Then I became a mom. By the time my boys were 4, 3 and 1, I began to yell at them, when no one else was around. I was overtired, stressed, surrounded by clutter and mess, feeling fat, and feeling isolated from adults (I was a stay-at-home mom). I felt helpless, and my life didn’t seem to belong to me anymore. All this seemed to trigger the yeller in me to come out. And when I yelled, I wasn’t just yelling. I was yelling with great inner turmoil. I was emotionally upset when I yelled. That’s what made it so awful.

I think that’s why it was so hard to just stop. All of those emotions were always bubbling up. But I kept trying to stop, because I love my kids. I don’t want my kids to fear me. I want them to grow up feeling safe, secure, and loved, and have happy memories of their childhood. I want them be able to deal with life when they get upset. When they fight and misbehave I always tell them, “You don’t have to yell or hit. Just use your words.” I want to do that too, and be a good example to them. I don’t need to yell. I can just use my words.

Thankfully, I stumbled on the Orange Rhino Challenge. Wow! Discovering that I wasn’t alone helped me immensely. I didn’t have to be embarrassed to talk about my yelling problem with others. Reading the blogs got me really thinking much more about why I yell. It’s given me insight. It helped me to discover some of the things that set me off, so I can stop them before they start. It helped me find other ways to react when I want to yell at my kids. Tooting my Rhino horn and posting my progress has made me accountable to someone other than my kids for my behavior.

Someday I would love to say I made it 365 days without yelling. In the mean time, I will take it day by day and try and set new records for myself. I will celebrate all my small victories along the way. Because it is a victory to make it through a day without yelling. I love my kids, and because of that, I will always keep trying.

*

And when I yelled, I wasn’t just yelling. I was yelling with great inner turmoil. I was emotionally upset when I yelled. That’s what made it so awful.
Um, you took the words right out of my head. Especially the inner turmoil bit.

I didn’t have to be embarrassed to talk about my yelling problem with others.
It is so hard to admit something that you are personally struggling with, right? Especially when you worry what other people will think? But when you do admit it, it is almost freeing and it is amazing all the support that exists. The support is always greater than the judgement I find….

Tooting my Rhino horn and posting my progress has made me accountable to someone other than my kids for my behavior.
I didn’t want to believe that posting progress would make a difference but it does. The days of staycating and not checking in were some of my worst on this challenge. Now that I am posting progress, I am more accountable. I have more motivation to not fail.

Because it is a victory to make it through a day without yelling.
Yes. Yes it is. Any moment for that matter is a victory. I know my goal is 365 days but honestly, any moment I don’t yell I already feel I have succeeded. Because I am making progress forwards…and so are you. Keep on being victorious please, you are an inspiration to me!

153 days without yelling, 212 days to go!

Dear Nikon Dsomething or other, a.ka., my camera,

Somewhere along this process I realized something really important:  sometimes when my boys act naughty, when they are bound and determined to piss me off, to get under my skin, to do anything humanly possible to annoy me and set me off, IT ISN’T INTENTIONAL.

They aren’t out to make me yell, they aren’t out to get me (even though trust me, it sure as h*ll feels like it) they are just out to have fun. To enjoy life. To experience life in the way they know how. Which at times, sure looks pretty gosh darn naughty (um filling the bathtub with not 1, not 2, but 3 bottles of bath soap from under the cabinet?) and feels like a big ‘ole nuisance (um, cleaning up an entire case of eggs dropped on the floor as an experiment?)

But these moments, while frustrating as all can be, are actually pretty darn awesome. They are picture perfect in an a*s backwards kind of way. Because they show my boys not just being kids, but being people. They show them being Creative. Joyful. Resourceful. Entertaining. The list goes on and on. Yes, these moments of naughtiness are sometimes actually nuggets of awesomeness. And when they are, I stop, grab the camera (that’s you!), and pray that they keep being “naughty” so that I can catch the picture. So that I can remember forever the horrifically wonderfully amusing behavior. Yes, sometimes I even encourage them to keep doing what they are doing (GASP!) instead of reprimanding them.

And I am okay with that. Because I have learned that lots of moments that appear to be yelling moments really aren’t. They might be call for gentle discipline and reminders not to do that again, but they don’t deserve yelling. Or shaming. Or scolding. They deserve to be remembered. And I am grateful that as more days pass I take more and more pictures with you of said “naughty” behavior and follow up with gentle teaching because really, not only does that feel better inside, but it feels great to be able to watch my kids enjoy life in a carefree way.  In a way I struggle with so much as an adult.

That is what I love about kids. It’s cliché but true. They live life with less inhibitors and it can be pretty amazing to witness and can be one of the best parts of parenting. If I remember to chill out and enjoy the view. If I remember to grab my camera and not my yelling voice!

It ain’t easy. But lot’s of the time it’s worth it. I mean just look at all these kiddos enjoying life, being people, just like you and me. Okay, well, like me. Look at all the wonderful, not naughty, moments captured by your friends of kids being…

…CURIOUS!

Photo courtesy Beth T.

…PLAYFUL!

Photo courtesy Caryn B.

…RESOURCEFUL!

Photo courtesy Meghan T.

…EXPERIMENTAL!

Photo courtesy Alison C.

…DETERMINED!

Photo courtesy Becky

…ENTERTAINING!

Photo courtesy Jenny F.

…CREATIVE!

Photo courtesy Mary Rose S.

…PROUD!

Photo Courtesy Darlene W.

…INVENTIVE!

Photo courtesy Eva L.

…DRIVEN!

Photo courtesy An F.

…ENTHUSIASTIC!

Photo courtesy Robin J.

…OUT RIGHT RIDICULOUS!

Photo courtesy The Orange Rhino's 4 year old...

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Yeah, my kids are a lot of things: curious, playful, resourceful, experimental, determined, entertaining, creative, proud, inventive, driven, enthusiastic and out right ridiculous! And yeah, sometimes they are truly naughty and they make me want to yell. But more often than not, it’s not that they are that THAT naughty, it is just that I find their behavior annoying at the time because it is a nuisance to clean up, to manage, to fix. More often than not, they are just enjoying life. More often than not, they are pretty awesome. And I am glad this challenge has helped me to realize that – has helped me to see the good more so than the bad. Of course I wish I discovered that earlier. But hey, it is never too late. It is never too late.

Hello to my readers not on Facebook! I took a staycation the last week or so and unplugged from electronics and the like to enjoy some time with my family before my hubby went back to work after an extended vacation. Gotta love accruing weeks and weeks on end (although that did mean he went years and years without vacation.) Anywho, my apologies if you have emailed me and I have not responded. I am working on catching up now and will hopefully blog tonight. Until then…enjoy this picture and pretend you are on vacation somewhere tropical with a great drink with a cute umbrella in it. Cheers!

145 days without yelling, 220 days of loving more to go!

Dear Napoleon Hill,

You wrote:

“No man has a chance to enjoy permanent success until he begins to look in a mirror for the real cause of all his mistakes.”

Whoa.

I looked in the mirror last week and you are right. Looking in the mirror scared the sh*t out of me in a truly impactful and motivating way (read here, Why I used to yell at my kids). Realizing that I yelled at my kids because I could, because they couldn’t yell back at me made me beyond uncomfortable. I truly feel that looking in the mirror last week, while dreadful, will permanently lead me to remove yelling from my parenting style.

So thank you.

The Orange Rhino

*

Words can’t really say how uncomfortable I feel to have realized that I yelled at my kids because I could, because they don’t have the POWER to bring me down like an adult. Well, words could but the truth is I don’t want to see the words on paper. I don’t want to admit to the thoughts this realization conjured up it my head. Because they kind of scared me. No, not kind of. They DID scare me.

In fact, when I went  to find a picture on line to go with my post I couldn’t share what I found because what I saw frightened me. The pictures looked eerily familiar. It felt like I was looking in the mirror and it WAS ROUGH. It made me physically uncomfortable to see pictures of “mommy yelling at kids.” It looked like this:

And this…

Did I really used to be that person? Did I used to scream down at my kids, literally and figuratively, in a way that made them shutter, and cry, and cower from me? Did I used to yell at my kids for loud that they stopped looking at me? Oh, yes, I did. I was that person in the pictures.

I shuttered looking at the images. Literally. They kicked me in the a*s. Just two pictures brought back such powerful, bad memories of what I used to look like, how I used to feel. They brutally reminded me me that Yelling is scary. It’s ugly. It’s awful. It was me. I might not have been that person every day but I was that person enough to want to change, to want to stop experiencing the raw, gut-wrenching emotions of guilt, disappointment, sadness, and anger with myself for yelling at my kids so harshly at times.

And yet here I am 145+ days from feeling these emotions and I find myself slipping a bit, taking my “success” for granted, forgetting the depth of those emotions these pictures conjured up and how I didn’t want to feel them again. I am still not yelling, I am still abiding by my Orange Rhino Challenge rules, but every once and a while I have been close to breaking the rules. And I don’t like it. On occasion I have even found myself thinking oh I couldn’t have been THAT BAD of a yeller, right? What is one little yell here and there? Is this challenge REALLY necessary?

The answer is yes.
YES this challenge is really necessary for me.
YES I was that bad of a yeller.
YES every little yell counts.

Because for me and the way I operate, one yell leads to two which leads to three which eventually leads to the Raging, Lunatic, Level 7 scream which brings such fear – my kids fear in me and my fear in myself. While I have on occasion forgotten what it felt like to yell at my kids, I have never forgotten the fear I have of being honest, really, really, really honest, about the type of mom I am. Loving, yes? Unacceptably dreadful at times? YES. What had I become?? I wasn’t the loving, patient, soft spoken yet firm disciplinarian. I was a screaming mother and I never thought I would be a screaming mother. I never thought I would make my kids fear me.

And I also never thought that I could change. I never believed that I could learn to stop yelling at my kids. But I could. I have learned to not be the parent in those two pictures. And I truly hope that this lesson is permanent. It has to be. There is no other option.

P.S. I know it is kind of interesting that a comic-type picture can get to me so much. I  guess that just goes to show how bad my feelings were about yelling at my boys that such a picture could make me feel so awful again!

141 days without yelling, 224 days of loving more to go!

Dear Exercise,

Last night my dear hubby made me want to scream. We had just returned from taking #2 to a Doctor’s appointment and I left the office nervous and my husband left feeling anything but. Which is not a shocker.  We respond in complete opposite manners to medical diagnoses and this ALWAYS leads to a fight. But last night instead of picking a fight and quickly becoming resentful of the situation, I got up, politely excused myself and turned away before I lost it. I turned to you and WOW. The. Best. Workout. In. Weeks. Hello stress relief!!! An added bonus? Working out cleared my brain (thank you!) and opened it up to a profoundish  thought, ya ready?

Why is it that my husband infuriated me beyond words last night and I didn’t yell yet when my kids used to infuriate me I immediately yelled?

Hmmmm,
The Orange Rhino

*

Why is it that I find all the will power in the world to not yell at my husband,
yet I barely used to think twice about yelling at my kids?

Why is it that in 11 years of knowing my husband I have only yelled at him a handful of times,
yet in my 6 years of parenting I used to yell on average at least 11 times a week?

Why is it that I almost always stay calm when “talking” to my husband
yet with my kids I used to go from calm to yelling in 5 minutes flat?

Why is it that I when my conversations with my husband aren’t going anywhere but downhill, I can find the strength to walk away, yet when the same happened with my kids, I started yelling and kept yelling?

Why is it that I have the ability to decipher which fights with my husband to let slide, which ones just aren’t worth the battle, yet with my kids I felt every fight is worth it? That every fight I needed to be right, I need to assert my opinion, I needed them to hear what I say and agree and follow it?

Is it because my husband is 36ish and my kids are under 6?
Is it because I am with my husband only on the weekends but I am with my kids all day long?
Is it because I am a newbie at parenting and don’t know any better?

Or is it because I know that my husband has the power to yell back at me, that my yelling isn’t a one way street? That if he wanted he could make me feel small, wrong, and awful inside? That as an adult he has the knowledge and ability to say things that would make me feel worse than how I felt before the fight? That he can bring me to tears?

Yes. I think this is the REAL reason.

I hate to say it but I do think I yell less at my husband not because of his age or the amount of time we spend together but because I know that if I yell at him, he can return the favor. And it wouldn’t be pretty. Sure having young kids who are still learning to listen, to control their behavior, will bring out the desire to yell a lot more than when dealing with a so-called “mature adult”…but at the end of the day I know that if I yell at my husband I’ll end in tears and I don’t want to end up in tears! But if I yell at my kids, I won’t be in tears, they would be. Because at their current age, they can’t yell back at me in the same way my husband can. Sure they can continue to not listen, continue to misbehave, continue to drive me nuts, but they can’t yell at me in the way that would really, truly hurt my feelings.

At the end of the day if I yell at my husband there is an immediate consequence, an immediate attack at me, my argument, my confidence which serves as a great motivator not to yell. Because yelling hurts. But, if I yell at my kids the consequence is delayed, the guilt, the disappointment in myself, it all comes later and even then it usually isn’t on the same level of crappiness as I feel when being yelled at.

At the end of the day, I yelled at my kids because I could. Because I felt that the consequences weren’t “that bad.”  Because they couldn’t yell back.

But I know firsthand that being yelled at sucks. Sucks sucks sucks. It makes me feel small. It makes me cower. It makes me feel embarrassed, unworthy. And I hate it. I hate being yelled at. There are no other words to describe how I feel about being yelled at. It is that simple. So I do everything I can to keep from yelling at my husband, or any adult for that matter because I don’t want to get what I give. I walk away until I can speak “nicer”, I stay calm, I decide to let some things slide. I don’t yell at adults. Period.

So if I know how much it sucks to be yelled at it, and I fight my hardest to not engage in yelling battles, why did I yell at my kids for so long?

Again, because they couldn’t yell back at me.

Eeeech. I REALLY don’t like the sound of that.

But it’s the truth.

And I am really glad that I have started to change the truth. That my truth now is that I don’t yell at my kids. I am glad that the so called manageable consequences grew and grew and became unmanageable, unacceptable to me and forced me to change. Because I love my kids. And I don’t want them to feel how I have felt ever again.

IMPORTANT NOTE: My husband and I do truly rarely scream at each other. I am fortunate for that. My experiences of being yelled at are from my entire life: from friends, family, teachers, strangers, etc…. I just used my husband as an example tonight because our “fight” is what got me thinking.  

140 days without yelling, 225 days of loving more to go!

Dear #3,

Oh I love you so. A few weeks back I wrote about a time when I snapped at you (read here), when I felt frustrated with you because you couldn’t use your words. I wrote about wanting to hear the words “I love you” come from your mouth, unprompted. I wrote about how much I love you, how much I am going to keep trying to be patient with you so that I can help you get over your speech delay.

And well, the effort is paying off. It is SO paying off. You still haven’t told me you loved me. But today you said something else, something equally if not more powerful and it made me cry.

We were driving in the car talking about Safari Animals and the following conversation unfolded:

Mommy:             Okay boys what other animals are Safari Animals?
#1:                      Lions, tigers, cheetahs!
#2:                      Um, giraffe?
#1:                      And RHINO, don’t forget Rhinos!
#3:                      Yeah. Rhinos’.  Orange Rhinos. They can’t Yell. Yelling not nice. Mommy is Orange Rhino.

Mommy (tears in both eyes, smiling from ear to ear, grinning so large it almost hurt. Grinning because he spoke an almost full sentence AND because he showed that he comprehended what the Orange Rhino is all about. He gets it people. HE GETS IT!):
That’s right Kiddo! Way to go!

#3:                          Yeah, Mommy is an Orange Rhino. You can’t yell mommy but you pick your nose.

Oh sweetheart, I don’t pick my nose, your brother is the one who does but YEAH for you. A full sentence! YEAH for us. We are both making progress. And I love you. And I love that you can now call out “Orange Rhino” to me just like your brothers when I get cranky. And I love that you are trying so hard. And mostly I love that I was losing faith this week. I was feeling disappointed in your progress, feeling like you would never catch up to your peers and feeling nervous that your speech delay would someday be a real problem for you.

And yet here you are, proving me wrong. Showing me that you are progressing on so many levels. Picking me UP.

And I couldn’t be happier. You made me want to scream from the top of the minivan with joy!

I love you kiddo,
xoxo,
Mommy Orange Rhino

*

I am amazed that hearing the phrase “Mommy is an Orange Rhino” filled me with such emotion. That it brought tears to my eyes. Who would have ever thunk it? I thought “I love you” or “Happy Birthday” or “Happy Mother’s Day” would have been the phrases to put me over. And they still might be. But Orange Rhino?

Really?

I think what did me in was realizing that he can now verbally be a part of something that the rest of our family (minus the little munchkin of course) has been sharing and doing together for 140 days. That he is now that much closer to being able to talk and engage with us more easily and more frequently. That he seems to really get how important The Orange Rhino is to me. That HE,  my son, picked me up. That he taught me to keep believing, to not give up, that progress does happen that I just have to be patient.

Every day is a new day. Every day he adds more words. He is working so hard, I need to focus on that. I need to believe that his language is developing instead of feeling disappointed that the process is slow.

Because the progress is there – I just need to look for it.

Does that last line resonate with anyone? Feeling like you are still yelling and making no progress? Or that progress is slow? Share your thoughts in the comments or in Facebook. Maybe you are making progress too? 

138 days without yelling, 227 days of loving more to go!

Dear Orange Rhino Blog Counter,

It is 7:47 pm on Saturday June 23, 2012, also known as 47 minutes past bedtime on the day I almost yelled. I should have known the minute I woke up that it was going to be one of those days and that I should just stay in bed. You know, one of those days when everything bothers me. Where everything makes me want to yell ENOUGH, KNOCK IT OFF, LEAVE ME ALONE!! When every moment I think I pull it together, for good, and then bam, a trigger is set off. Yeah, I had one of those days. And oh was it not fun! I’m just glad it is over and that I didn’t yell. And not because that meant I didn’t have to re-set you to 0 but because I love my kids too much to take out my issues on them. Yes, I have issues. Just because I have “stopped” yelling doesn’t mean I don’t have other areas to work on!

Let’s keep ticking towards 365, shall we?
The Orange Rhino

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Let’s review the day.

Teething, cranky, crying baby? Check.
Constipated, crying toddler? Check.
Over tired, mischievous 4 year old? Check.
Out-of-sync without school schedule, worried about Kindergarten, not listening 5 year old? Check.

And that is just the kids.

Not feeling well mommy? Oh Check, check, check.
Very tired mommy despite 4 nights of “good” sleep? Check.
Preoccupied and scared mommy because of not feeling well and having drs. appointments ahead? Check.
Overwhelmed mommy at the site of 4 moving boxes from a year ago to unpack? Check.
Moody mommy due to baby almost turning one and being in denial that this is our last baby? Check.

Have I covered all my triggers that make me want to scream? Um no. There is one big one. One that really put me over, that really put me on edge and barely able to keep it together. And guess what, it had NOTHING I repeat NOTHING to do with my kid’s behavior. Or my husband’s actions. IT had everything to do WITH ME and my insecurities.

When I feel insecure, when I feel socially nervous, when I feel less than everyone around me, I become, well a b*tch to everyone close to me. And everything bothers me, everything makes me want to SCREAM!!! And that is exactly what happened this afternoon.

We took the kids to the local pool in town. As is, going to pools with 4 kids under 6 years makes me nervous. Understandably. A pool and young kids is gosh darn hard work, it’s exhausting, and it’s nerve wracking. But alas I knew it was important to my kiddos so I told my nerves to take a hike and we went to the pool anyway.

WELL I forgot how I get when I am (1) nervous about my kids safety and (2) nervous about fitting in. Yup, you read that right. Fitting in, or lack thereof. It’s one of my BIGGEST TRIGGERS.  I have never ever in my life felt like I have fit in. I have always felt like an outsider. The third wheel (in fact, I pretty much always have been the third wheel). And if I wasn’t the third wheel, I have felt like the outcast because of how I look (physically), how I dress (lack of style), what age I am (yup, every situation I am in I am at least 5 years younger than everyone and yup everyone points that out to me), and my current stage in life being different than those around me (single, then married, working, then stay at home mom to 1 child, then 4). It is a very rare occasion that I “fit” into the social environment that surrounds me.

And it is so hard for me. Because really, who likes to feel like an outcast, to feel like they don’t belong? I don’t. And well, I have felt that way for as long as I can remember. I know so much of this feeling is me and not reality. And trust me I KNOW I need to work on it. Especially after today. Because today it impacted how I react to my kiddos, it impacted the experiences I can create for them.

One step onto the pool deck and all my feelings of inadequacies hit me in the face and I became tense and short. Everywhere I looked where thin, fit, beautiful moms. With well behaved children (my 2 year old was screaming. Loudly.) Everywhere I looked were groups of people, of friends, having fun together. We were there alone. No one said hi to us. Nor should they have, but still, I felt out of place. I felt weird. I felt like an outcast.

And when I feel this way, I get REALLY anxious and snippy and unpleasant. Add this to my already existing nerves about managing 4 kids at a pool… and well all I wanted to do was cuddle up under a beach towel and hide or yell at anything that annoyed me (which when I am overly anxious is EVERYTHING.)

Well hiding wasn’t an option and yelling at my son for screaming wasn’t an option (nor would it help). Yelling at my kids for pulling at my swim suit wasn’t an option (nor was it necessary). Yelling at my son for having to go the bathroom AGAIN wasn’t an option (nor was it nice). Yelling at my husband for making us go to the pool wasn’t an option (besides, it wasn’t his fault, I agreed to go). Yelling at the world that I felt uncomfortable, that I just wanted to go home where I didn’t feel all eyes watching me wasn’t an option.

The only option I had was to get over my trigger. The only option I had was to find the strength to keep it together. And I found it in my kids. I found it in their laughter as they splashed each other and then worked together to soak me.

I survived the hour of what felt like torture and I came home and managed to slowly come out of my shell. Somehow I became pleasant again and lost the desire to unnecessarily yell at everyone for everything. Oh wait, not somehow. I know how.

I posted on The Orange Rhino Challenge facebook page the following:

“Posting here so I do not yell.
Today has been a hard day.
It seems every single trigger has been set off. At least once.
Trying my hardest people.
Trying my hardest.”

And guess what? The second I pressed “post” I felt better. I felt my desire to yell drift away. Just writing the words “So I do not yell” and “Trying my hardest” reminded me of my goal and to keep on trying, no matter how anxious and preoccupied I still felt. And then a few of you chimed in, in support and I really felt better. And I made it through the day. And the day became “The Day I Almost Yelled…but Didn’t!” Phew.

135 days without yelling, 230 days of loving more to go!

Dear Captain Obvious,

Where the hell have you been? I have only been a parent for 5 and ¾ years (not ½ as I am often reminded!) If you had just shown up in my life a few years ago I could have avoided a lot of unnecessary yelling. Like, a lot of it. Anywho, I am grateful you at least showed up recently and pointed out the error of my ways to me. Pretty sure my kiddos are grateful too – your lessons have kept me from screaming.

Cheers,
The Orange Rhino

*

I have learned a lot over these last 130+ days of not yelling. And it has understandably taken a lot of hard work: a lot of soul searching for why I really yell and then a lot of patience, energy, self control and creative problem solving to keep me from yelling. So it is kind of funny to me that in all of this hard work that I have been doing that I completely MISSED some OBVIOUS answers to certain situations that daily drove me to want to scream.

I mean really.

These answers were so obvious that I am almost embarrassed to share them.

Ya ready?

SCENARIO 1: The Pillow Fight

My boys like to take the pillows off the couches in the family room and make forts, swimming pools, spaceships, etc…. For a while, I was okay with this. Lots of benefits: creative play, quiet time for me, brotherly time for them, problem solving skills development when fort crashed, role playing (life guard, swimmer) the list goes on and on. And then one day I tripped on a pillow and went flying across the room ever so NOT gracefully and so now, I am not okay with the pillow situation. The pillows (or the kids?) daily seem to piss me off.

Inevitably the pillows end up on the floor at the precise moment that I need to walk across the room to get to the couch to feed the baby. And I can’t get to said couch, the couch which has no cushions on it to allow me to sit comfortably, because of the pillow obstacle course.  If I am not the one tripping on the pillows then someone else does and usually goes into the corner of the coffee table because anyplace else would make my life too easy. And if my darling boys aren’t tripping on the pillows then they are fighting over them – fighting about who is going to pick up the heavy one and put it away, fighting over who ruined the fort in the first place, fighting over who started with the most pillows.

In short, these pillows became the vain of my existence. So we created a new family rule: the big pillows stay on couch, the little ones can come off. Yet every day, at least twice, I still have to remind the boys to put the big pillows back and when I did, it took all the energy in the world to remind them nicely of the rule, of the compromise, instead of yelling. It took all the energy, and I mean all the energy, in the world to not scream. Why these pillows drive me nuts I don’t know. I mean really, pillows people, I am talking about pillows!!!

But they do. They make me want to scream. And oh have they made me want to scream in the past too, this isn’t just a new thing. I think one point I *might have* picked one up and thrown it across the room while saying something along the lines of “get these friggin’ pillows off the floor now before I trip again!” (Shhh…please don’t tell anyone I threw something!)

So one day two weeks ago a light bulb went off.

DUH.

All this not yelling has taught me to find the real source of the problem, to find the trigger that makes me want to yell. Well in this situation it was pretty bloomin’ clear. It wasn’t some deep, insightful, answer. The problem was the blooming pillows! The answer to not yelling over the pillows? REMOVE THE PILLOWS from the couch you dumb as*!

So I did (well, at least the big ones, they were the biggest pain in the a*s) for an entire week. See?

The truth? Nobody noticed that the pillows were gone. No downside to removing pillows...only upside.

Oh the kids b*tched and moaned (along with my husband who was greatly inconvenienced as lots of big sporting games were on TV, sorry babe) but it was worth it.

The pillows returned and not once have we had a discussion about it. Not once.

It only took me how many years to figure this novel idea out?

And how about this scenario: The Shoe Fight.

#3 and I were late to speech therapy one day last week. I stood still, impatiently tapping my foot and asking him to hurry up as he struggled to put his shoes on. My impatience grew and grew and I could feel the yell rapidly approaching my mouth.

Then the light bulb went off again.

DUH.

HELP him put his shoes on. Don’t just sit back and be annoyed and be late! Help him!

I mean really, I couldn’t figure that one out? How many times have we been lately because I watched my kids struggle to get ready and didn’t help them? Yes they need to learn to do their shoes, to put on jackets, to buckle up but STILL there is always room to help and to guide.

Sometimes the solution to not yelling is all about me and my “deep, intangible” triggers. It is about my personal issues and struggles and moodiness and it requires my finding the self control to remind myself that I am not mad at the kids, that I am just pre-occupied.

Sometimes the solution to not yelling is all about empathy and understanding why my kids are acting the way they are, why they are struggling, and LOVING THEM anyways and HELPING them instead of yelling at them.

And sometimes, well sometimes, the solution to not yelling is fortunately as simple as can be. It’s about removing the TANGIBLE TRIGGER, it’s about removing the damn pillows (or tossing the sippy cup that always spills, or donating the shoes that are too hard to Velcro).

Sometimes the solution to not yelling is SO OBVIOUS that it is SCREAMING at me.

What is the one Tangible Trigger in your life that you could remove today and immediately eliminate one typical-yelling situation?

132 days without yelling, 233 days of loving more to go!

Dear Kitchen,

Oh how I love you when you are clean, when you are clutter free! When the only things by the sink are hand soap and dish soap. When the bread is in the bread drawer. When the kids school work is hung on the wall instead of in a pile waiting to be hung up.  When the craft supplies are in their cabinet AND in their proper container. When the day’s mail is in the mail basket. When the backpacks are hanging on their hooks. You get the idea. I love you when your counters have nothing on them but what belongs. Don’t feel bad, I like you well enough on the other days, but when you are truly clutter free? Oh you make my heart sing!!!

xoxo and PLEASE stay clutter free,
The Orange Rhino

*

I wrote the above blurb last week when I was torn between wanting to blog and wanting to organize, wanting to clean. I obviously chose cleaning since this never got posted! I started writing but quickly realized that my desire to blog as a means of staying yell-free was counterproductive because with a disorganized closet taunting me daily, it was just a matter of days before I lost it. If I didn’t clean, if I didn’t get the majority of my world clutter free soon, l would scream. I mean really scream. And not just at the air. I would scream at my kids.

I know it sounds silly to most. Even my dear husband doesn’t get it. My mom doesn’t get it. But the site of clutter literally makes me unhinged. I go berserk. Okay, maybe that is a bit extreme but at times clutter does make me feel overwhelmed. I start breathing heavy, I start getting antsy, I start feeling impatient. And inevitably if a “clutter attack” hits, I start snapping at my kids for no reason. And when a really bad “clutter attack” hits, like in the past, oh do I scream bloody murder.

I still vividly remember walking into the kitchen one morning not too long before the Orange Rhino Challenge and seeing piles of sh*t f all over the kitchen counter and the family room. Everywhere my eyes turned loose papers taunted me, primary colored toys taunted me, shoes taunted me. They all said “neener neener neener, we’re out of place, don’t you hate it….”(um, Yes!)

My son then innocently and ever so sweetly said “Mommy?” and I roared, I mean ROARED back at him “What do you want?!!” Understandably, he burst into tears.

“I just wanted to say good morning and give you a hug.”

Well, who was the pile of sh*t now?

Moi.

I looked at my husband. Tears in my eyes. “Honey. Everywhere I turn is sh*t to be put away. It is never ending. I know I am supposed to let it go but I can’t. It reminds me of ALL I have to do and yet never get to. It reminds me of how chaotic my day is, how I am never caught up. It drives me nuts!!!”

“It’s okay,” he reassured me but really, it wasn’t. I wanted to scream some more. I wanted to grab garbage bags and fill them with all the piles of paper and out of place toys and then head to the dump.

But what I really wanted that morning, and EVERY MORNING, was not just a clean counter, but some order. Clean counters bring me calm. Clean closets bring me calm. Clean bedrooms bring me calm. Because they represent order. And right now with 4 boys under 5, I hardly have real order and I crave it. It keeps me grounded. It keeps me sane.

Ever since I made my resolution to spend a mere 5 to 10 minutes a night to pick up my clutter piles last week, I have felt that calm. And it. is. Awesome. Fabulous. Beyond amazing. Every morning when the boys and I come downstairs into the organized kitchen, I smile. I might be surrounded by four ravenous and screaming boys demanding milk and cereal and this and that, but my counters are clutter free and it brings me peace. And it keeps me from yelling and snapping. Seriously.

How do I know?

Because this past Saturday we had a wedding and I didn’t have 10 minutes to pick up before heading out. Then on Sunday we went away for Father’s Day and I still didn’t pick up. And this morning, once I finally unloaded all our stuff from yesterday and started to clean up I realized all the sh*t that had accumulated.

And I immediately became grumpy. I looked around and saw a world of “to-do”s of “to-put-aways” and I felt overwhelmed and inevitably I snapped. An acceptable snap per my rules, but still.

So today we have cleaned. And I feel better. And tonight I will get back to my resolution of just 5 to 10 minutes of picking up to stay on top of the problem. Why? Because it keeps me sane. It keeps me from yelling.

Every little bit counts. Such a cliché, and of course, so true. Every little bit of cleaning up keeps me that much more calm. And every little bit of more calm keeps me not yelling. And every little moment of not yelling, well, is a HUGE win.