Page 49 of Despite It All
I situp and look at what she’s trying to do. Her sand is too dry so it won’t hold when she pulls up the bucket. “Baby, it’s not being mean. We just need to get some more water—”
“No! It’s being mean! We can’t fix it.” Oh, great, we’re about to have a tantrum. Lovely.
She tries to start again, but since the sand is too dry, it crumbles. I take a deep breath and put on my best calming voice to try to soothe the situation. “Stevie—”
But it’s too late, she screams and pushes away the bucket angrily knocking over a part of the sandcastle that we fixed earlier. This sends her into a full meltdown. Despite how great Stevie is most of the time, she’s still only four years old. I have to remind myself of this from time to time.
Calm breaths, Wyla. I take a moment to cool down before reacting to her because I know when I get frustrated it only makes things worse. But sometimes it’s so fucking hard not to.
Stevie screams again before the crocodile tears start down her cheeks. Okay, deep breath.
The best tactic I have with these tantrums goes in stages. The first one, distraction. “Hey, Stevie, do you see that seagull over there?” I ask her calmly, and point in its direction.
Her lip quivers as she cries, she’s tempted to look but more determined to be mad. “No, I don’t see it.” She shakes her head, intent on not looking. “I can’t see anything.”
“Hmm, can’t see anything… Well, mommy sees a seagull. You know what else mommy sees?” Jett looks at me as Stevie continues her meltdown. His face is a mixture of wanting to help and having not an absolute clue how.
I feel a little bad for a moment that Stevie’s acting this way in front of him, but it’s reality. She’s not going to be perfect all the time.
My approach also probably seems odd to him, but I got the idea from Winry. When she gets panic attacks she counts down her senses, naming things around her she can see, touch, hear, smell, and taste.
Considering Stevie doesn’t completely understand the emotions she’s feeling now and me simply telling her to list things won’t work, so I’ve had to modify it a bit.
“Mommy sees the ocean.” Step one: get her to see something and focus on it. “The ocean water is so beautiful. I love pink ocean water.” If there’s one thing I know about my daughter, she loves to correct me.
“The… the water isn’t pink, Mommy,” Stevie sputters, trying to talk while hysterically crying.
“How would you know? You won’t even look at the water.” I nudge Jett, trying to get him to play along. “Ask your dad, he thinks it’s pink too.”
“Yup, the water’s pink, Little Bee, don’t you remember?” Jett says, and scoops her in his lap so her back isn’t to the water anymore.
“Look!” She wipes her eyes with one little hand and points with the other. “The water is blue.” Her voice is calmer but we can very easily slip back into the tantrum at this point.
“Oh, you’re right. How silly of us. Can you show Mommy and Daddy something else that’s blue? Something you could touch, maybe?”
Stevie looks around in front of her. Her lips still quivering, trying to maintain her tears. “That bucket is blue.” She reaches for it and holds it out to show us.
“Are you sure it’s blue?” Jett teases her.
“Yes, I’m sure.” She nods with a sniffle. She looks back at the sandcastle that crumbled and I can see this starting to turn.
“That’s so good, baby. So, the ocean’s blue, right?” I ask, pulling her back to me. She nods. “Does the ocean make any noises?”
“I don’t know,” she mumbles.
“Let’s listen.” Jett puts his finger up to his mouth, like he needs quiet to hear the waves.
Stevie giggles at him and does the same to me. “I think it does make a noise,” Stevie says more excited now. “Like a whoosh, crash sound.”
Jett and I smile at each other. “You’re so smart, kid. Do you think it smells salty?” We’re almost there.
A light bulb goes off in her little brain. “Let’s smell it together!” she squeals. “Ready, one, two, three.” We all take a big inhale, Jett and I exaggerating a little bit for the full effect. “Yeah, definitely salty.”
Taste is the one sense that sometimes I leave out. It’s the hardest one to get Stevie to do, but thankfully I have my water next to me. “Hey, Stevie, do you want a sip of Mommy’s water?” I hold out my bottle for her to take. She takes a nice big gulp. “Does it taste good?”
“Yeah, not like ocean water.” She sticks out her tongue.
“Yeah, not like ocean water.” I chuckle. “I’m going to go talk to Mamaw and Papaw for a minute, okay? Can you stay with your dad and maybe he can help you fix the tower?”
