with heartburn. I hate heartburn. This is the third time this week that I have awakened to nastiness in my esophagus. And the second night in a row that the beast had night terrors. 2:15 like clockwork, he woke up screaming. Thankfully, he went back to bed immediately, but it definitely scared the be-jeezus out of me.
The worst part is, I have no one to blame but myself.
I scare my child. I don't mean that I yell at him until he quivers and trembles, or beat him senseless, or anything like that. Essentially, I lie to him and.... exaggerate situations so that he listens. I see nothing wrong with this. I mentioned before his fear of the Easter Bunny. It started out harmless enough. We went to the mall to get a picture of him with the giant bunny. He was excited. Until it was our turn. The beast didn't realize that the bunny was alive. When the Easter Bunny reached out his arms to hold the beast on his lap, chaos ensued. The situation ended when my just-turned-three son picked up a pink, glittery decorative egg and chucked it at the Easter Bunny with all his might and then ran screaming from the little fake cottage area. Needless to say, we didn't get the picture.
Anyway, my mom felt really bad for him... Her poor poopy-head and all. ((She's called him that since birth... Ironically, it has nothing to do with actual poo.)) I saw a golden opportunity. One day the beast was being particularly beastly. And before I knew it, I told him the Easter Bunny was upstairs hiding under mommy's bed waiting to come get him if he didn't start listening. And it worked. The kid hid under a blanket on the couch watching his shows quietly. He got up only to pee. Ever since that day, the Easter Bunny has been the boogy man of our house. The story has gotten more elaborate. Eventually he got so scared that we had to promise him that the police had locked up the Easter Bunny in jail. Now we tell him that the police will let him out if he's bad. So we've instilled a healthy dose of fear of police to our 3 year old. Great.
But that isn't why my child has had night terrors the last two nights.
Yesterday, we made a quick run to Wal-Mart. As in the usual Wal-Mart manner, four of their 30 lanes were open, and the lines were wrapped back into the clothing section. A very nice employee glanced in my cart, saw my 7 items and told me to go check out in the jewelry dept. My kind of service. I hauled ass over there, hoping no one overheard her tell me we could check out there and inadvertently beat me to the oasis that would allow me to get out of there quickly. And damned if someone didn't beat me there. So while we stood waiting our turn, the beast was checking out the Halloween section that was just across the aisle. Up on top of the shelves was this giant yard inflatable of a spooky house with trees and ghost all around. Here's how the conversation went down.
Beast: Look, Mommy, a Halloween house!
Me: Yeah! And look at all the scary ghosts!
Beast: Those ghosts aren't scary.
Me: Those ghosts work here.
Beast: Nuh-uh.
Me: Yup. When kids are bad, they fly down from the tree and eat their faces off. Then they chop off the bad children's feet and send them to jail for the Easter Bunny to eat them.
Beast: Oh no.
Me: Yup... On Halloween, you'll see the kids who were bad in the store. They have to wear masks cuz the ghosts ate their faces off.
Beast: I'm going to be a pirate for Halloween. ((at this point his eyes will not leave the display))
Me: Yup... So you better be good because we didn't get you a mask. And if you don't have a face, you can't go trick or treating.
Beast: Mommy, can we go home?
The guy in front of me was laughing so hard he had tears, and he gave the cashier the wrong amount of money. The cashier stared at me in stunned belief. The look on her face told me everything. While she was amused at the situation, she clearly did not agree with my parenting style. Not that I cared. It worked. He was good in the store. What's a little fear when you can get through a Wal-Mart trip unscathed?
And now he has night terrors and I have heartburn.
Thank you, Karma... You've been very helpful this week. Hopefully we get along better next week.
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