One small Howler Monkey looking for a good home…must be ready to play/entertain 24/7, must be willing to bend over backwards to provide just the right food, must be able to cuddle constantly, and it is imperative that you are either deaf or insensitive to very very loud howling.
So, I had big plans for this morning, stuff to accomplish, progress to feel good about. We are in the process of getting another bedroom i.e. taking over part of the storage room that is tacked onto the current bedroom so A and I can sleep in there. We are thrilled at the thought of being able to sleep in our bed again. Don’t get me wrong, sleeping bags on the living room floor are exciting and cozy and romantic and all…
The process required cleaning and prepping the existing room so that stuff can be moved out/around in order for a hole to be knocked in the wall to put a door in. Little t’s clothes were the main thing to get out of the way, so I started on that. I figured that while I was at it I would record and take photos of all of his clothes. Now, I didn’t do this cause I am organized or anything…I did this because of our teammates are home right now having just had their third child. It is a boy and I thought that they might want to use Little t’s clothes instead of having to haul over or find those sizes as well…so I took pictures so they can see what we have. I was busy doing this and stacking and sorting and packing, etc.
Enter Howler Monkey…5 seconds after I started this project… See Little t has this thing he does when he is sad or mainly when he is bored and wants attention. He howls/cries as he wanders around the house and more importantly as he clings to my legs begging me to pick him up and play with him. I am not talking like a little whimper…I am talking howl/moan/groan very very loudly and very very consistently.
Little t is a smarty pants (yes I am biased) and he plays really well by himself…for like 5 seconds. After that, he is all about me entertaining him. He did better at playing by himself a few months ago. But now…wow…it just doesn’t happen and I really struggle to know what to do. Like this morning, he was rested, fed, changed, had plenty to play with and yet spent the entire hour and a half trying to cling to my legs and pull at my shirt. When he wasn’t clinging, he was still howling; looking for something to get into, play with, or pull off shelves. Remember, the goal was to clean the room (and I expected it would take about 20 minutes). An hour and a half later the room was even messier than when we started – full of toys and books and pictures and stuffed animals and random kitchen utensils I had brought in to try to distract him while I worked. He would play with the new thing for 5 seconds and then come back to me…howling the whole time. I would take a few minutes to play with him and get him really interested in something….he would start playing on his own and I would step away to work…after a few seconds he would realize I had stopped and would begin to howl. Silly boy.
By lunchtime, anyone who entered our house would have wondered where the tornado was that had caused such a mess and how I got a jungle animal all the way here to the desert. I had a splitting headache and had accomplished much less than I was hoping…and yet the howling continued. I finally surrendered and put a movie on for the Monkey while I made his lunch, counting down the nano-seconds until it was nap-time.
The howling immediately stopped…the kid is a movie freak and sadly that is the only way I can get things done, in silence, while he is awake. I am trying to not give in and let him sit in front of the t.v. all day, but it sure is much more pleasant (and quiet) than the Howler. I know he needs to learn how to play by himself and we are working on it….but 5 minutes of howling is about all I can take.
Here is the thing, I know it sounds like I am annoyed with him (I am slightly) or that I don’t fully appreciate the little bundle of cuteness…I do. I love the kid, I am crazy about the kid, he makes me SO happy. I went in 3 times last night to watch him sleep because I love him so much (and also partly because we don’t have anything to do after 5 around here and we were really bored…). I do I do I do love him like crazy…but this loud tortured sounding alter ego who randomly takes over my child when I don’t pay attention to him 112% of the time has got to go…I want my boy back! The one who drives his tractors as he putters, who sings to himself, who plays with his animals, who reads his books – quietly. I like him a lot.
Oh those days! Both my kids went through it too. Hang in there! The sweetie pie will be back.
ReplyDelete