Only the Strong Will Survive

When Courtney was 3, her grandma bought her some summer clothes. One outfit was a pair of yellow shorts with little orange popsicles on the cuff and an orange shirt.

For some reason, Courtney LOVED those shorts.

We had only been living in Georgia for about 6 months and were renting a house. I had sent Courtney upstairs to get dressed. From the kitchen I can hear her opening and closing the dresser drawers. Each one is being slammed harder than the previous. She comes downstairs in only her Blue’s Clues underwear and announces, with her hands on her hips, that she CANNOT FIND HER POPSICLE SHORTS.

I can see her in my mind as clear as if it had happened yesterday.

It was hysterical.

I explained to her that she had worn them the day before and that they were in the wash. She decided to wait for them to get done being washed and dried and REFUSED to wear anything else until they were ready.

That was one of my first lessons in how strong willed the child was going to be.

She was in Kindergarten and she wasn’t any bigger than when she was three. She didn’t agree with what the teacher wanted her to do – coloring is clearly for babies. So she packed up her book bag set on her desk and told the teacher to call her mom to come get her.

Oh, they called me alright.

And I had to get on the phone with her and tell her that I wasn’t coming to get her and that she had to do what the teacher told her to do whether she liked to or not. She actually told me on the phone that she would stay today, but we would discuss the rest of the week when I got home for work.

She is in high school now, so clearly I won that battle.

She was in 2nd grade and was being mainstreamed part of the day with the “typical” kids. She decided she no longer needed to be in the special education class. To prove this, she decided to not spell her spelling test words correctly. She left out all of the vowels. In her mind, these words were below her and she didn’t need to take this test. When the teacher told her she failed and had to write each word 10 times, she begged the teacher to let her take the test again. The teacher agreed, and low and behold the child passed with flying colors.

She is 15 now.

And more strong willed than when she was 3.

She is the only one in the house that has a room upstairs. We have always put her stuff on the bannister. That way, she can just grab it when she is going up.

Lately, I have noticed that she isn’t taking her things up with her. So, I started putting her stuff on the actual stairs.

I kid you not – the child jumped over her things TWICE and never carried them up to her room.

When I pointed this out to her, she just looked at me and told me that she would eventually take the stuff up, just not right now.

*Take a deep breath, Melissa. Pick your battles, Melissa*

I thought it would get easier. I thought I would be able to reason with her as she got older.

Hell, I can’t even bribe her to get her to do something she doesn’t want to do.

In a way I am glad that she is strong willed. I am pretty sure that it is going to work in her favor one day.

But right now, I am pretty sure I am going to kill her.