These Kids are Driving Me CRAZY!
ByFor the past month or so I’ve been on the edge. Ask anyone who lives near me. They will tell you that I’ve barely been able to complete a sentence, much less hold a conversation.
This time of year is always the busiest for our family. Soccer is in full swing, both for Matt’s college team and for all four of our boys. School has started. The tomatoes, green beans, corn, apples, peaches, peppers, and grapes are all demanding to be dealt with right now.
Throw in the fact that I also had house guests and a couple of out of town trips to take in the midst of this.
Oh, and I also have a website.
AND, Matt is in the midst of a job transition which I will hopefully tell you more about soon.
I’ve seriously been tense. Don’t get me wrong…I’ve enjoyed every last bit of my month of crazy activity. I just have a lot on my plate…plus I have raisins stuck to my floor under the kitchen table and I just can’t seem to get around to prying them off.
It may not come as a surprise then for me to say that lately my children have been driving me crazy. Suddenly their noise seems noisier to me and their hunger seems hungrier and their needs seem needier.
While trying to make my way through some big messy pots and pans one day last week, and feeling the pressure of everything else I needed to get done over the weekend in the midst of a soccer tournament…my boys were wrestling and building a fort (at the same time) and bringing more toys into the living room so that their fort would be complete. I also noticed a big bowl of soup “cooking” on the living room end table. The soup appeared to be something like a gallon of water with bunches of pepper sprinkled into it. Great. Just what I needed. MORE messes.
With a big sigh I thought to myself, “These KIDS are driving me CRAZY!!!”
I hid myself in my kitchen with my hands in the dirty dish water and tried to take a few deep breaths to get ahold of myself.
It was then God helped me realize that really and truly, it wasn’t my children that were driving me crazy. They were being good. Building a fort with lots of blankets and toys isn’t naughty. Neither is wrestling around on the floor, since they were just doing it for fun and no one was getting hurt. They were just providing themselves with their boyhood daily ration of wrestle time. And the “soup”? Water and pepper clean up easily enough. And oh yes, these boys are old enough to clean it up themselves.
It wasn’t the kids that were driving me crazy at all.
No, the problem was really my own heart. My lack of peace and joy were driving me crazy, not my kids.
While I thought I had been giving my stress and overwhelmed self to God the past few days, I really hadn’t been. Oh I’d been praying, you can be sure of that. But probably my prayers of “God, please let a friend call and invite my kids over to play so I can get some work done around here” didn’t really count as me taking time to sit at Jesus’ feet and reflect on what HE needed me to do for the day.
It’s amazing what a heart transplant will do. Once God helped me figure out what the real problem was and I spent some time asking Him to transform my mind and heart…my life and household were suddenly much more peaceful and enjoyable.
Suddenly the kids weren’t driving me crazy anymore…yet they had not changed anything about their activity (or hunger or neediness).
I’ve decided that “These kids are driving me crazy!” is another lie Satan wants women to believe.
Next time I feel like my kids are driving me crazy…I’m going to do a heart check.
And then I’m going to crawl into a fort with my kids and enjoy a nice bowl of pepper soup.
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This post is linked to Works for me Wednesday.
Satan’s lies, boy are they wicked! I think we need to expose each and every one of his lies for what they are.
Preach it sister :)
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I’ve had the same conversation with myself last week. It was a rough week. School is in full gear, it did seem to be really busy and no one wanted to be doing school knowing this week we leave for vacation. It’s worth taking 5 minutes alone to talk with God and get the mind and heart straight!
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Thanks for your post — it has really made me look at things differently, and I appreciate the “check.” I love your suggestions on checking your own heart–I’m going to try to do this more. I know it could result in less scolding and much more love and fun in our house. Thanks again!
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I so needed this today! Thanks for sharing your insight.
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Thank you so much for this! I really needed it! And I too will give myself a “heart check” the next time my little guy is driving me crazy. :)
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WOW! How I needed this post!
My son is 9 and he is an only child. We have begun our third year of homeschooling – and that came about because I was being blown off when I asked why my son wasn’t acting the same way the other little boys did. LOTS of testing later, we know that our son have a language comprehension problem and possibly Asperger’s Syndrome. I’m doing much better at handling it the last few weeks, but WOW can he be needy at times. At 9 we really have to speak to him like a 3 or 4 year-old to get anything done and we are battling our insurance for his allergy shots AND to get some kind of speech therapy for him – since he’s not in public schools he doesn’t qualify for any of their services. It has gotten old and SO stressful and I truly needed a reminder that it is Satan’s voice I hear when I think that my son is stressing me out or that it is too much to provide for him the things he needs day to day. Thanks for heeding God’s call to post this! <3
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Sarah Reply:
September 7th, 2009 at 11:32 am
Misty,
If you are paying property taxes, your son should qualify for the services of the school district. I hope you can find something to help, I know that can be super frustrating. My now 4 year old had some speech difficulties as well and now that he has gotten (state funded) therapy, we can understand and enjoy him so much more!
Laura,
Thanks for the reminder and heart check! I can get so wrapped up in what I want to do that I forget to stop and give it all to God to let Him order it in His way, then enjoy the peace that comes with it! :-)
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Thanks – I needed this today!! As you say, so often it is my heart that is the real difficulty!
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Oh Laura.
How wonderful that you have brought this lie into the light. Thank you! Just that one sentence is wisdom gleaned for me.
Sarah
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beautiful post!
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Dear Laura, When my babies were young,like yours,I felt the same way. I came to realize that the world teaches us that we should be “praised” with a celebration of a false holiday…Mothers Day! A lot of my friends would get so hurt when they were not honoured on that day…..so I began a campaign, for myself,and to free all the mommies out there. Mothers Day is another day to walk in motherhood and better your listening,cooking and my all over teaching skills!! and I realized that this isn’t a job its an exciting time to make little people big!! Now my 2 girls, 25 married with a grandbaby, 22 and will be married in 2 weeks,and 2 boys 20 and 18. They all love the Lord and serve Him in and out of Church and “they” rise and call me blessed on their own which is sooooooooo beautiful! You are a Virtuous Woman now walk there! Go forth and bless your babies and your houseband and your life will be so blessed. I will be praying for you and all those momma’s of babies!
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Thank you, Laura!
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How true!
Reading this was just what I needed today! Perhaps it is something about the business of this time of year that gets to us Moms. And to think that an even busier time of year will soon be upon us… Christmas!!!
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Laura,
Thank you so much for your openness. It’s one of the many reasons I love your blog. I too have been feeling a bit “on edge” recently with all that is going on, and I thank you for your encouragement and reminding us who to lean on in our times of craziness. God bless you and your family!
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Great post, Laura! Thank you. I think it’s something we all need – moms…and dads, too!
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Oh so very true. Our children are probably more consistant that we are. It is simply our reactions (tolerance, patience etc.) that changes.
Praise the Lord for his fairthfulness and longsuffering towards us!
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Thank you for this wisdom.
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Instead of a “Like” button (like the one on Facebook) I need a LOVE button for this one! Thanks for being so transparent. We could all use a heart transplant from time to time!!
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Thank you for this.
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Thank you. I am amazed how God orchestrates the affairs of our lives to intertwine and encourage/humble/help each other at just the right times. Our whole household is sick with a minor cold. I have been quite testy when I know better. Thank you for the gentle reminder. God is good!
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Wow – this is the second blog about this similar subject I’ve encountered this evening. I’ll say what I said in the last blog — I have been serializing about Titus 2 and recently did “The Blessings of Loving My Children.” I hope it can be an encouragement to you: http://greggsgal.wordpress.com/2009/09/01/the-blessings-of-loving-my-children/
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This is exactly what I needed!! My 2 year old FINALLY went to bed (at 10:15), my house is a mess, and I still have homework to do. And while I often feel like there aren’t enough hours in the day, I think I just need to reorder my days more in accordance with God’s will instead of mine.
Thank you, Laura, for providing that reminder for me. Your blog is usually one of the last things I read at night, and this post actually brought tears to my eyes.
I think it’s time for a little heart to heart tonight before I go to sleep. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
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Thank you. My heart needed to hear that, thanks for sharing.
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Boy has this post struck a cord with me today. THANKS! :)
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This is such a fabulous post. I just linked back to you.
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Thank you for writing this – I really needed to hear it.
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Thanks for posting this reminder! It is definitely a lie that Satan tells us. He’s tricky like that. This was a post I was needing right now.
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Great post! So true.
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I really needed to read this! I’ve been feeling like everytime I turn around it’s because I’m disciplining my kids and I feel worn down, tired and out of good ideas for getting the point across to my 5 year old.
I haven’t been spending my time wisely and have skipped time with the Lord in the morning.
Great post!
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I love this post…all soooooo TRUE!! I love it so much I linked it today from my blog!! Hope you don’t mind me sending some extra traffic your way (smile)…..Have a blessed reast of the week!
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I completly agree with all of what you are saying your blog is so true
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