You call THAT a tantrum?

You know how it sounds when a toddler gets a shot? It's a cry like a really complex wine or artisanal chocolate.

There's the deep despair bottom note. Guuuuuuuhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh. You can hear a combination of frustration and anger, but in all it is a fairly palatable cry. The middle note is all about catching your breath and demonstrating, in case anyone has missed it that, "hup,hup,hup, I'm crying over here. Really sad."

And then there's that top note - that shrill crisis screech. It's full of rage and horror and immediacy.

My daughter actually does fine at the doctor's office, and her vaccination cries are usually short lived.

On the other hand, if you are at the ballet on a long-planned girls' day with aunts and grandmas and good friends from NYC, and you have to make the long trek to the ladies' room in the rain, and it's already almost 3 p.m., and your Little Bee has not had anything that looks remotely like a nap, and you demand that she hold your hand because there's a crowd, and you have to wait in a long line in (did I mention) the rain, and the pretty dresses you both wore are getting soggy and cold, and when a stall finally opens up you lead Bee in there and close the door behind both of you so you are in there together when she had thought she would be in there alone (hup,hup,hup) apparently that is enough to set off the most blood curdling, terrifying, "Holy fuck, is someone torturing or kidnapping a child in the next stall?" wail you have ever heard.

No, I mean it. I will put this cry against any tantrum, whining, meltdown or wail your child has laid out there, because I am so confident that I can beat all your tantrums. Bring it. Because if you were to hear this, your ears would bleed and you would want to put me in jail because there is NO WAY a child should make that kind of sound unprovoked.

The secret is that, as far as my daughter is concerned, she had been provoked, and my suggesting that she use the bathroom was the last straw.

As she stood stiff, red-faced and SCREECHING in the bathroom stall, I went ahead and used the bathroom as quickly as I could, then got the HELL out of there. But the screeching didn't stop when we got outside. I knelt down next to her and informed her that, if she didn't calm down, we were going to have to leave the ballet, which she adored, by the way. A.D.O.R.E.D.

But she was not abut to calm down. The more she cried, the more she was going to cry.

She wouldn't allow me to carry her, and if I tried to hold my umbrella over her head or guide her to walk underneath it, the screams intensified as though I were zapping her with a taser. The result was that we both got soaked walking back to our seats to get car keys, raising concern every step of the way.

Left and right I got the "some people shouldn't have children" looks. People tried to intervene.

"Is she OK?"
"What happened?"
And one woman scowled deeply at me and, seeing my daughter walking in the rain, asked if I would LET HER give Buttercup her shirt to keep warm.

By the time we finally got to the parking lot, we were both crying.

I was so angry at my daughter. Furious that she wouldn't listen, that she wanted her way so badly down to every detail and when she didn't it, she howled in the middle of a large crowd like her name was Luka.

I was angry that we had planned this entire outing around getting Lila, her mother, the pregnant Sunshine, her sister, and Lila's college roommate/former bridesmaid to gather from distant corners so we could take Buttercup to the ballet, and the day was ruined.

We sat in the car for an hour. An hour of inconsolable screaming. I held out a little glimmer of hope that she might cry so hard that she would hyperventilate and pass out take a nice soothing nap.

She didn't, but she did calm down enough to accept some consolation, and within another 10 minutes or so, she climbed into my lap and rested her head on my shoulder.

Lessons:

- Shorter ballets or performances at a different time of day.
- Bring my own car so that we're not waiting in someone else's car for the show to end and making everyone feel awkward because, they love her and everything, but the last thing they want to do is get into a car with her.
- If it's raining, stay home.
- Ballet diapers!
- Ballet Kleenex!
- Ballet Xanax!
- Bring her Dad so that, when she begins wailing repetitively "I WANT my daddy I WANT my daddy I WANT my daddy" I can say, "Okey, dokey - there he is."

Things did get better, especially thanks to Lila, her mom and her college friend, who all
sort of took turns engaging Buttercup through supper and, since things were going so well, a little shopping.

But I have still been at the edge of tears all night.

My daughter takes on life as a full-contact sport. She is not laid back about anything. Ever.

And, good God, it's a lovely thing to see a child - or any person, for that matter - so engaged in her own happiness or excitement or affection. She blooms, then blooms again, and again and again and again.

And that is just pouring a glass of chocolate milk.

But when this thing happens - this particular type of tantrum - I am helpless. I am cursing myself for thinking we could make a short daytrip to the ballet. I am whispering out of her earshot that I hope she liked what she saw because we are never going to the ballet again. I am putting her in her carseat in the car and standing outside of the car in the rain because I fear my brain will leak out of my ears if I sit inside next to her.

But then she is calm, and I am calm. We've had a good day, and I am hoping she will bring home good memories. It's dark, and we are making the long drive home. Sunshine, in her tie-dyed maternity dress, is falling asleep with her fingers laced over the little bit of skin and muscle that separates her from her own daughter, due in just two months.

I wonder whether Buttercup would have fewer of these banshee tantrums if her first year had been an easier one. Sunshine's baby has been listening to her mother for months now. She feels those fingers laced over her knees or back. Buttercup did not hear my voice or feel my hands until she was a year old.

Buttercup, sitting between Sunshine and me, tries to find a comfortable position so she can fall asleep, too. It takes a while. A long while. She wraps her arms around my neck and pulls my face close to hers for nose kisses.

"I love you, Bee." I tell her.
"I love you, too," she says.

I'm sorry, I think to myself. I'm sorry I couldn't help you out better today. I'm sorry I couldn't ensure that our first trip to the ballet was unsullied by tears. I'm sorry I couldn't calm you down when you really needed me to.

I'm sorry I didn't get to talk to you and rub your back before you were born. And I'm sorry you lost the person who did.

I'm so sorry, Bee, that I can't be her.

Comments

[Margaret]

What a beautiful post.

I think your apologies near the end will strike a chord with all a-parents (and pre-a-parents, like me). Wondering how much of who our child is was formed before we came in the picture is a part of our parenting role, isn't it?

[moreena]

Oh...beans! And Bud Light. I shouldn't be reading you after an evening of beers and Grey's Anatomy (the really sad one, you know, the one where people die?)

Here's the line that gets me: "I wonder whether Buttercup would have fewer of these banshee tantrums if her first year had been an easier one."

Because you have really perfectly described Annika, and the guilt and worry I feel about her, too.

Rest assured that there's another lovely child out there who can charm you silly one moment and have you weeping in frustration the next. And all with maximal drama. And, I, too, feel this niggling doubt that somehow her life experience has had something to do with her ... difficulty.

Hooo. Time to go dry my tears, and lift my cheap beer your way.

[CPA Mom]

You are an amazing mom and an amazing writer. Thank you for the glimpses into your world. It's nice to know too that I am not the only one who feels these feelings when our children act this way.

[Elizabeth]

This post is both touching and hilarious ("Ballet Xanax"!) I'm so sorry for your poor little Bee, she had no control over the situation and therefore no choice but to use what she does have, her voice. An adult could have said "I have a headache, I'm going to wait in the car".

Also, as an adopted child myself, I found your last three lines particularly moving. I wish my Mother had said words like that to me just once.

[Marie]

Wow! I love summer when I have time to rediscover my favorite writers. You are amazing. Thanks for sharing these bits with the rest of us mere mortals.

[Stepblog]

What beautiful writing.I'm an adopted person too, and now a stepmom. I wonder if I missed / am missing something by not having that natural connection. But I honestly believe B's biological mom would not have had any more luck than you at calming that storm.

[gabby]

I was adopted too (so many adopted commentors! whoa!) and I can say without a doubt that the woman that raised me is my mom. The woman that gave birth to me is simply that. Sure I wonder about her, but its always "does she have tons of freckles like me?" and definitely NOT "why did she give me up? I'll never forgive her!" because I know I've had a better life than I would've had with her for one reason - I am with the family that wanted me. I don't know any adopted people that would change that fact if they could.

[raehan]

This post is just exquisite.

Thank you.

[raehan]

and I spelled that wrong, didn't I?