You Are Making Me CRAZY!

I love my child, I really REALLY do. He is beautiful and smart and funny, and he cracks me up all day long. He is snuggly and sweet, and he has the cutest toes on the planet. He's wonderful. He's growing up just the way he should, he's right on time or ahead of the curve on his developmental stuff. So I adore him, and I don't think there's any question about that.

But sometimes he makes me CRAZY!

There is a small side table nestled in a corner made by the edge of the futon and the edge of this chair my mom had. He can't reach it from the front or the back, which is why we keep our laptops and drinks and stuff on it. As soon as he figured out how to climb on the futon he has made a beeline for it, and no matter how many times I say "Oh-Oh!" and redirect him, or say "NO!" and startle him, snatch him up and put him in his crib for a few minutes, or whatever, he just goes for it over and over. He knows, now, that he's not supposed to. He'll inch up there, look at me, inch a little closer, look at me, giggle, and then reach his little arm out, look at me, and smile because he knows he is MAKING ME CRAZY.

He has discovered his inner whiner. Usually it's justified: he gets hungry, he gets sleepy, and he can't respond well to things like dropping his toy or running into the wall, and he starts whining. Or he will whine if I get up and leave the room for a second, and come follow me, and tug on my pants, whining up a storm. And I can look at the clock and recognize that those whines are justified whines that say "Mommy, I need you to take care of me right now and feed me/put me to bed/change my stinky booty." But then there is the whining that starts as soon as he gets up from a nap, or immediately after a snack, that have no clear cause except he's just crabby. I try everything...fresh water or juice in his cup, a clean diaper, sometimes all new clothes (I get crabby if my clothes don't fit well, too!), snuggling, playing on the floor........none of it works, and he will just stumble around whining for an hour or two, and it MAKES ME CRAZY because I have no idea how to make him stop or what to do to make him happy, short of duct tape and Benedryl.

Diaper changing is becoming more dramatic and less simple. He used to just lay (lie?) there, stare at me or the ceiling, coo and gurgle, and let me change his bottom. Now he screams as though I am sticking hot needles into his baby junk, thrashes his legs so that if there is poop in the diaper or on his tush it gets all over everything, tries to turn over and crawl away, grabs the wipes from my hand and throws them across the room, screams again, tries to shred his diaper, and then sobs most piteously. It's horrible, it takes 4 times as long as it needs to, and it always ends with me pinning him to the floor with my leg and getting poo on my hands. I look forward to the weekends when Aron is in charge of diaper changing because it is DRIVING ME CRAZY.

He has started trying to feed himself with his spoon, and I think that's great! I long for the day when he can sustain life on his own, and I don't have to spoon feed him everything that isn't finger food. It would be nice to be able to eat together, as a family, instead of feeding him first. But these early attempts at self-feeding are not fun. I am patient, and calm, because I want him to keep trying and I want it to go well for him and feel like a success. But inside it DRIVES ME CRAZY when he flings a spoon full of oatmeal in my face, drops a spoonful of yogurt on the floor, and hits himself in the eye with a spoonful of mac and cheese.

But I love him. Boy oh boy, do I love him!