To be Mama (Terror)

** Story of violence ahead, please do not read if you would like to judge me.

It has been hard yesterday. 

The day started fine. Fine is a variable term, by the way. I noticed that Figlia was up at 7:30 a.m., which is early by about half an hour for her. Lately, I have been putting my nap-avoider to bed around 8 p.m., because I do want a hold on my sanity. She begged for drinking my cup of tea, which I successfully got away from her by finishing the thing in big gulps.

She went to school, and she came back. She went to pick up her grandpa from the hospital (we have a driver). She came back home, and refused to come inside. I knew she was hungry, and my father who is extremely impatient is extremely irritable if the meal is not on the table when he reaches it. So, I tried all known routes to get her to come in, since we usually have our lunch together. The whining had started already. 

She got in, and I coaxed her to sit on her table and chair, but then she insisted on holding the driver's hand and crying, and refusing to eat till I had a fill of her whining. I am the unreasonable one, you know. 

I fed her food. And she momentarily quietened down. My father went upstairs, and I wanted to eat my food. She insisted that she was ready to poop and she brought her diaper. My daughter knows how to wear the diaper but yesterday was a demanding day. I got up between my meal, washed my hands and got her in the diaper. 

We have an open hall on the upper floor, and she went upstairs. I used the three minutes to gulp my food. 

Once upstairs, she started calling me...she does not stop till I have followed her instructions, and that is what I did. 

I noticed that she was cranky...I tried to bring some quiet, but she would not go to our room. She found a new corner of the house, and sort of pulled down pictures of our ancestors (they are in glass frames, and I was afraid of them being broken). Then she found powder stuff that she anointed all of them with. 

Nothing I did to distract her worked. Eventually she got the powder on herself, and then generously rubbed vaseline on her head. I was bugged. It was her second day of refusing to let the comb touch her hair. By this time, she was done with potty business, and she refused to get washed or changed. 

Cranky...Cranky....Cranky.... she was crying every three minutes or so. I eventually got her to bath, and after it she was relaxed enough to lie in my lap for a full fifteen minutes, and then her antics started again. She tends to recite whatever she has done in school, and used that opportunity for a loud recital. 

Between this time and the next half hour, something happened, and I slapped her on her cheek.

Her face was a mixture of surprise and pain. Her high-pitched whining was instantaneously replaced by a low whimper. She couldn't believe it that she had been hit. I could not believe it either. I remember M suddenly turning a lot inside. He/She was either affected by my inner turmoil, or I had managed to successfully terrorize two kids in one stroke. 

I just held my breath from that time to her due bed time, and could not sigh enough when 8 p.m. arrived. Our last duel was on the fact that I could not get the tune right on the rhyme she wanted to listen at the bed time. 

It was not a good day.