Drama Queen and Hot Head

The thing is, I've got a daughter who epitomizes the term "Drama Queen." For example, Daughter is still attached to a "woobie" she's had since before she was a year of age. It is her beloved "Taggie Book." She will be going along in life appearing content one second and the next second she will be a puddle of tears, crumpled on the floor sobbing because she just realized Taggie Book wasn't at her side, and where oh where is he? Today she pulled this stunt, and I was tired. I was really just. so. very. tired. She had been doing the drama thing frequently all morning long, and then just before noon she crumpled into her dramatic mess because she just didn't know where Taggie Book was. I sat across the room looking onto her and thinking about just how tired I was feeling. I was silent as I observed the show. There were tears. There was sobbing so hard that all I could make out were the words "Taggie Book!" every few sentences. There was stumbling to her knees. There was a very red face. I watched. I yawned. I considered making some popcorn to munch while I watched, but I didn't because I was very. very. tired.

Daughter repeats this type of drama frequently in a variety of circumstances. If I walk into another room in the house (after informing her where I am going, mind you), a second later she will run through the house sobbing loudly and uncontrollably because she can't find me. She misplaces any random object she just had her hands on, and she goes from content to hysterical in a split second. Today, for example, she was using her tape dispenser to help create one of her artistic masterpieces. She was sitting in the middle of her bedroom floor working diligently at this when suddenly, out of the random blue, she began wailing that she couldn't find her tape dispenser, and in between tears she demanded that I needed to head up the search party and it must happen NOW or else the world was really and truly going to end! I was in the middle of taking care of a smelly diaper (compliments of Son). I had bigger worries than Daughter's tape dispenser (which I knew could be found just where she left it a nanosecond ago). I was trying to get a dirty diaper off the octopus that is my son, who wouldn't stop squirming and kicking, and I was concentrating really hard so as not to find his heel in the poop mess or to find the dirty diaper flung across the room and onto the light tan carpet. Of course, the tape dispenser was eventually found right in the middle of the room where she was sitting when it mysteriously "disappeared."

Oh, and remember the dramatic display just before noon...the one where Daughter couldn't find Taggie Book? The one where I sat back and watched and felt more tired by the second? I finally (wearily) informed Daughter that Taggie Book was, in fact, tucked tightly under her left arm during the entire dramatic display.

Did I mention that I'm tired?

And Son...well the issue with him is that he has a temper like you wouldn't believe. He has very strong opinions about what he wants. When his opinions do not control reality, the sky falls in. It really does. The other day he wanted a balloon out of the cupboard. He wanted to chew on it in its deflated state. I felt strongly that this was not a wise or prudent activity for a 19 month old, and so I did the wise and prudent thing: I said "No!" He blew his top. Really. I was looking for the remains of his head on the ceiling. He screamed and stamped his chubby little feet and sobbed and banged his head on the floor, and in between all this chanted "Bloon! Bloon!" for forty five minutes. Yes. Forty. Five. Minutes. I tried to redirect him. I tried empathy. I tried holding him to comfort him. I tried being firm. I tried ignoring him. Ultimately I ended up locking myself in my bedroom so I could accept a work related telephone call. Of course, as soon as I put myself on the other side of the door, Daughter began doing her thing, and so I ultimately found myself locked in my closet, which is in the master bathroom, which is in the master bedroom. Finally, when I had three doors between me and Hot Head and Drama Queen, I could hear myself think. I seriously considered just staying there for the rest of the day. And it was only 9:00 am.

The real offensive part of this whole deal is that I recognize these personality quirks in my children in a way that I really wish I didn't. I know too well that they didn't get these qualities by random good luck. I know too well that they didn't inherit them from Dear Husband. Nope. They both got the best of ME! Actually, I can't take FULL credit. It's in the gene pool on my side of the family, after all. God Himself, deserves all the credit. But why, oh why, did they EACH have to inherit one of the two most troublesome personality quirks that I could possibly pass down to them? And why, oh why, do they each have to display them in TANDEM so frequently? And why, oh why, couldn't at least ONE of them have inherited Husband's much more laid-back come-what-may approach to the world?

I'm tired.