Not my proudest moment...

Today did not start out well.

Well, it was good when the kids were still asleep.  I got up, had my coffee, made it to the gym.  Feeling good.

I get home and Drew is a nightmare.  Just in a horrible mood.  Crying over everything. Screaming at his brothers.  Making everything so much more difficult.  When he is like this, the older boys get on my nerves more.  The normal noise that they make is amplified by 1000.  I asked them several times to be quiet.  I asked Chris to stop picking on Luke.  I asked Luke to stop blowing on the horn.  (a funnel that Drew got from somewhere and they have used it as a "horn" ever since).

And still, we get in the car, and Drew is crying.  And Chris is being obnoxious.  And Luke is making noise with that damn funnel.  And then Drew starts yelling at them to be quiet and the car is filled with so much noise that I'm sure it registered on the Richter scale.

So this is the part of the store where I wish I could tell you that I calmly stopped the car (in the driveway, we hadn't even made it to the street yet), and gently but firmly asked them all to refrain from waking the freaking dead with their ridiculous noise.  And that they promptly and politely complied.


....


That is not what happened, I'm afraid.  Something inside of me snapped.  And I yelled, at the top of my lungs, "STTTTOOOOOPPPPPPPPPPPPPPP IIIIIIIIITTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT!  STOP IT! STOP IT! STOP IT!".  For a solid 20 seconds I yelled at the top of my lungs.  The older boys laughed at first and then just stared in amazement.  And Drew immediately burst into tears.  Terrified, horrified, I'm three years old and my mom has lost her marbles tears.

And so, I stopped the car.  And I got out, and I walked back to Drew, and I hugged him.  And I apologized and explained that he felt bad because I yelled, just like I feel bad when he yells.  I wiped his tears away.  Told the older boys I was sorry.  Told them all I loved them.  (Drew refused to say it back).  Got in the car and had a quiet ride to school.

All is well, Drew has forgiven me and loves me again.  The older boys are fine as usual.  I feel a little guilty, I normally don't lose it like that.  But I know it happens to all of us.  When we reach that point, and the stress is so high and the noise gets louder and no one is listening.  And we explode.  I don't like that I behaved that way, but at least my children know that I am human and make mistakes just like them.  At least they know that it's what you do AFTER you make a mistake that matters.  And how you learn from it.  And next time, I will just stop the car, get out, and scream into my jacket.