Am I yelling or am I just a normal parent?

I guess many parents worry if they've gone too far when disciplining their children. With our son, who was diagnosed with Aspberger's a few years ago, it is obvious we had many battles we shouldn't of had as some of those acts of defiance he had were in reality related to his condition and should have been handled differently. Since his diagnosis we have been more diligent in how we discipline him (we basically have to talk him off the edge of the cliff when he hits a wall) . Still I knew I was making mistakes as I still got upset over little things and reacted poorly, especially as he is now 12 and is starting to show flashes of some of the typical teenage behavior. So this summer I finally took affirmative steps to fix whatever bio-chemical misfiring in my head was causing me to lose it for which my doctor prescribed the generic version of Celexa which seems to have resolved many of anger issues. With the reduction of yelling by me since I started on my anti-depressant I thought I had turned a corned. However, our 7 year old daughter is really testing me these days. Makes me wonder how sedated I'm going to have to be during her teen years.

This is the first year she is leaving for school later than our son and I realize I have been spoiled. Last year, when both were in the same school, our son used one aspect of his condition, a fear of being late, to motivate our daughter to be ready for the bus a few minutes early. In years prior, my wife had always taken our daughter to pre-school so this is my first fall getting her off to the bus solo so I was unaware of how slow and sluggish my daughter can be in the morning. As I am time orientated like our son, this thunder storm should have been predicted. It was only a matter of time until our two air masses collided. Well after almost 4 weeks they finally did. We had our first big KA-BOOM moment Monday morning.

The fault is partially mine. I forgot she is not as self motivated to get ready for the bus as our son in the morning and when my phone chirped it's 6 minute warning, which used to be plenty of time for the kids to get jackets on and for me to leash the dogs for the quick walk to the corner, I was a bit surprised to see her still barefoot sitting at the table. I told her to get her shoes and socks on as we were going to be late. I guess I didn't emphasize the need for speed as she lollygagged over to her favorite pink boots instead of putting on her sneakers and socks. As it takes awhile to get those boots on, and she has a busted wing, I told her to put on socks and sneakers. So began another slow walk to her bedroom, followed by a slammed door. Oh boy. I told her to open the door and, when she didn't, repeated my request and then opened it myself to find her struggling to put on long socks she has trouble putting on when she doesn't have a broken arm. As I look down in disgust I hear the dogs barking in excitement for their walk as I  realize that time is ticking. Long story short, we had another delay as I finished dressing her. And then another when I told her, a bit loudly and more excitedly now as time was ticking, she had to wear her rain jacket as her sweat jacket wouldn't go over her temporary cast easily. She then made the move she had made whenever I yelled at her -- putting her fingers in her hears. At this point I wasn't aware I had been yelling, but I've noticed my voice still gets louder when I'm upset, even if there is no emotion behind it. So, of course, when we finally started walking down our driveway I saw the bus on the corner. I told our daughter she would have to run for the bus. No response. I finally yelled RUN! She got the message and, like many children across America cutting it close, ran for the school bus, which she made. Mission accomplished, got her off to school without a major blowup, all is well -- or so I thought.

Later that evening, while my wife was out, our daughter wrote us a note that we were not to read until bedtime. Most of it revolved around our son's upcoming birthday, but the first three sentences were directed to us. The second sentence was a request to stop asking her how her arm was since, as she pointed out in the third sentence, it felt fine. The first sentence was directly at me -- it told me to stop yelling. That crushed me. I thought I had gotten much better at that but not in the eyes of one of the more important judges -- our daughter. My wife pointed out that it was good our daughter felt secure enough to point out this fault to me but it still reenforced my feeling that our daughter views me as someone I'm not, or at least don't want to be.

My father has been gone for almost a quarter of century. As the years march on, memories fade, so that only the more distinctive ones remain. I recall my father being pleasantly surprised when I agreed to join his office summer bowling league when I was 18. He was surprised I wanted to bowl with him, which I did. Though I am still surprised he didn't realize that an 18 year old from Queens would also look for any excuse to not spend a day working in the local supermarket so he could wander around Manhattan, especially as my father worked on the border of Greenwich Village (the location of his office, which has been replaced with luxury housing, was grimy but coming back by the late 80s -- it is now a very hip, but expensive, area of Manhattan -- the bowling alley, a dump back then, is now a major bowling party place). I also remember my father driving us to Florida and Walt Disney World every summer to visit family in the Miami area and have some fun in Orlando, at least until the gas crisis of the late 1970s. I recall my father crying his eyes out on the couch the night my brother died in a car accident. But what I really recall about my father was his temper and how he yelled at us. That is the one, overriding theme of my childhood. Angry dad. Raging dad. Walk on eggshells dad.

Is that how my daughter is going to remember me despite my best efforts, as an angry yeller? Do I still have anger issues to work on (at least the therapist and I will have something to talk about next week)? Or is she being over sensitive to normal parent discipline which includes, on occasion when you want to make sure you are heard, raising your voice? Or is it just my 7 year old being a 7 year old who knows how to push buttons? She knows how to get her brother riled up and now, that the anger seems to be gone and the eggshell walking slowly being forgotten, I wonder if she is amusing herself by pushing my buttons having forgotten what the consequences could be (never hitting, just yelling)? I guess if it is the later, I should be relieved but I wonder how long it will be until I stop second guessing myself.

Grace Under Fire?

One thing that has always bothered me about myself is my sometimes lack of grace under fire. I had hoped that the antidepressants I'm on had buried that but now I am not so sure. On Yom Kippur how I react under pressure was put to the test and while I passed, it was not with flying colors.

Erev Yom Kippur (Tuesday evening) was a fairly normal night for us, a normal night as of late anyway. For those who don't know, Yom Kippur is the Jewish day of atonement, where all adults atone and repent for everything they have done over the past year by praying and fasting for 25 hours, which seem to go incredibly slow unless you go someplace like religious services where you supplant the thoughts of how hungry you are with the wondering if the rabbi will skip a few prayers this year and move this service along so you can go home and molest the bagels, cream cheese, whitefish and lox waiting for you at home. 

Due to her breast cancer and followup treatment, my wife wasn't fasting this year and neither were the children (of course). Additionally, due to all the other craziness going on around here this summer, we're trying to keep the children on as a normal a schedule as possible, which includes karate for our son from 6-6:45 on Tuesday evenings. As sunset and the start of Judaism's most holy day was 6:47 on Tuesday, I made a parent call to ease up on the religious restrictions this year (not that we are all that observant to start with) and let my son go to karate. By time we got home, it was late and I was tired so I decided to skip the evening service. 

So, around 9 or so, as I was in the family room reading, with the TV on as background noise, our son was in the living room playing Minecraft on XBox with his buddies online and my wife was giving our 7 year old daughter a bath. Now I didn't see what happened next but I sure heard it. My wife had stepped out of the bathroom to do something in the living room. Our daughter, who has become especially nervous since my wife's hair fell out from chemotherapy in July, was upset at being ignored and ran out from the bathroom to find my wife. Did I mention our hall and living room have laminate flooring that can be slippery when wet? 

Our daughter ran out and of course slipped and fell. As she fell she put out her arm to catch herself. I didn't hear the thud but I saw heard the howls of pain. She was crying her wrist hurt from her slip and fall. Good thing she has two attorneys on retainer but I'm not sure how we could sue ourselves. We noticed it was a bit bruised but that she was otherwise OK, including able to move her fingers. Figuring it was a bad bruise, or sprain at worse, we put her in a soft splint we had and, after she had calmed down, put her to bed.

The next morning, we asked how she was. She said OK but that her arm still hurt. She was able to move everything around, though if we pressed above the wrist she felt pain. Still figuring it was a sprain, we decided we'd call her doctor, get a scrip for a local place to get her x-rayed and continue on our day, which included going to temple. My wife, who is running out of paid time off due to chemo, was going to work anyway so it all fell on me. No biggie. And for the most part I stayed calm, except for a brief 5 minute period where I yelled, or at least raised my voice, at the children. Again. Something I thought was done. And I still don't know if I raised it over anger, stress, or just to be sure I was heard over the TV.

When I called up the pediatrician's office, they told me all they could do was refer me to an orthopedic surgeon since a possible broken bone was beyond their practice. And here is where the problem began. I couldn't hear the phone number they were giving me. At first it was because I was in the same room as the TV, which was louder than it should have been, Even after I moved out of the room, it was still so loud I couldn't hear the number. I told my daughter to turn off the TV, she didn't choosing to just lower the number. After I finally got the number I went to the family room and, while I didn't lose it, I was pissed. I yelled at my daughter to turn off that TV. Which she did. I then told her, calmly, but loud, to keep the volume lowered then told my son, sitting on the other couch playing video games on his iPod who also didn't hear my pleas for silence, or at least less noise while I was on the phone, to keep the volume of his iPod low enough to hear me. The kids looked at me upset, not as upset when I used to really yell at them, but upset anyway. I took a deep breath and then more calmly, but not calm enough in my memory, told both of them if they don't want me to yell or raise my voice they have to meet me half way and listen when I ask them to do something, reminding them that I sometimes do not know if they have heard me and are just taking their time in responding or they just didn't hear me due to the sounds of whatever electronic devices they are absorbed in.

Now here is my problem, two days later, I still don't know if I yelled at them in anger or because I wanted to be heard. As I indicated above, I sometimes do not act appropriately when stressed but the antidepressant, along with helping me control my anger, has been controlling my anxieties, which sometimes lead to anger (or as Jedi master Yoda put it, fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hate leads to ... pain? ... something not too good, you can look it up). I guess it is good that I am second guessing my actions as I continue my journey to be a better parent and spouse. Perhaps my reactions were those of a normal stressed parent trying to be heard over competing sounds. But I don't know. I wasn't mad about having to go to another doctor for an exam (though not thrilled either), I really was upset over the noise and that I couldn't hear the phone, even in another room. And while in the past I sense I would have been raging over this, I am disappointed in myself for not completely keeping my emotions in check. I'm not saying I should be the unemotional Mr. Spock, but I should at least be as calm as .... now that I think of it, no one on Star Trek was calm all the time. Scotty usually seemed to keep his temper in check, so I'll go with ... calm as Mr. Scott (excluding times he was all worried about something or another).

Perhaps this is just similar to my fear of gaining weight if I start working in NYC again and lose my workout gym time in the morning due to a longer commute. As my up and down weight over the last 25 years show, even after I make a big deal about putting unhealthy eating in my past, bad habits seem to creep back (one snack at a time in the case of my weight). Will I always fear that a sudden burst of anger that surfaces is the old me saying hello again or is  my reaction to that burst just something normal that I am now able to otherwise control? Thanks to my parents I don't seem to have a good thermostat to determine what is normal and appropriate when responding to domestic issues, which is interesting as I don't have the same problem at work. However, at work I don't have co-workers singing how much they hate their sister as their sister walks up to her brother and farts in his face while screeching at him at a pitch that I worry will break the windows, causing one dog to howl in pain from all the noise while the other dog worries how the cat, sitting on top of the refrigerator, is debating on whether this is the perfect time, while everyone else is distracted, to drop bombs from above on to the little dog's head (cat at least stopped dropping the dog treats when he realized the dog approved of those terrorist attacks).

As to my daughter, her arm was broken. We couldn't get an appointment with the orthopedic surgeon so we went to the ER instead where they made the diagnosis of a bone fracture, much to my surprise. She had a buckle fracture, basically an impacted fracture common in children who fall and use their arm to brace themselves. She had to get a temporary cast, which posed a problem as we were dressed for temple and she was wearing a dress with arms too tight to fit over the temporary cast. With the choice between cutting her sleeve or putting on an alternative outfit, she quickly chose alternate outfit. Initially we couldn't find scrubs that fit her but fortunately I was wearing t-shirt under my dress shirt so she got a nice white dress to go with her white temporary cast (an older female nurse later came in, muttered "MEN!," and came back with child sized scrubs). It was after that my daughter got upset, which ended up with us going to my wife's office so our daughter could be consoled by her mommy.

With the morning services shot, I figured we'd aim for the afternoon service but our daughter, ever the fashion diva, insisted she couldn't go in scrubs, even if she was just going to sit in babysitting, though she could go out for lunch dressed like this (hint hint). Now I normally like Yom Kippur as it is the one day of the year I try to really observe religious restrictions, including not eating and going completely offline for the day. I found that it is very relaxing to avoid going online for the day and ignoring the outside world and just spend the day meditating as the rabbi and chorus pray and sing. I also enjoy thinking of the food waiting for me at break fast time, which I usually buy between the morning and afternoon services at the local supermarket (unless I buy them the day before at the bagel store that closes for the Jewish holiday). Not this year.

While at the hospital, waiting for the doctors, as my daughter watched the Disney channel on the TV in her room and my son played on his iPod, I found nothing to read in my daughter's room so I took out my phone and went online, at which point I felt myself rejoining the outside world (as if driving to the ER and interacting with medical staff hadn't done the same). So when my wife suggested we go to a nearby diner for lunch I figured, well I went online, might as well eat. So I did. I have to admit, I really did miss my bagel and lox treat for dinner (I felt I hadn't earned the meal so I skipped it this year, at least I made late afternoon and the concluding service which I decided covered lunch) but this year being a dad took precedence. At least I didn't get pissed over that. And why would I? Kids happen, or something like that.

Really, aside from the brief period of when I was making the calls and our arrival at the ER, I was pretty calm and rational. Never lost it, didn't really have a reason to, but I kept my cool. Still, it bothers me that I felt my anxiousness coming up when I was making the calls to the doctor, again when I told the children we were going to the ER and one more time when my daughter was walking very slowly through the hospital parking lot (I am constantly reminding her to walk more quickly and directly through parking lots in lieu of her usual wandering, unpredictable pace and path). I feel I was not the perfect dad, calm, cool and collected. Though I mostly held it together, I know I was a bit more cross in the living room and the parking lot than I should have been. And I still don't know if my anxiousness and reactions to those events was just a normal parent reaction when your child is sick and you are worried (which for me is very tough, my brother's death at 15 led to me becoming an overprotective parent anyway) or a sign that all is not as well in my head with my bio-chem balance as I thought they had become, even though I did not lose control and turn into an enormous green rage monster as I may have in the past. Something to bring up with the therapist next time.