WWIII

Last night was WWIII at our house. Davis has gotten REALLY bossy lately and last night- enough was enough. Every night I rock him. And 9 nights out of 10, I love it. Some nights, though, I have just gotten Holden to bed and I just wish Davis would let Bennett rock him instead. I pretty much have to tell him I'm going to exercise in order for him to let anyone else put him to bed. But it's really not bad- like I said- most nights I love it.

What I DON'T love...is when he decides later that he needs to be rocked again in the night, either because he hasn't gone to sleep in the first place, or because he has woken up.

Last night, he woke up at 10:30, screaming his brains out. Bennett went in there to calm him down, then I went in there...but he wouldn't stop screaming. So there I am, wanting to go to bed, and yet I am rocking him and on top of that, he is SCREAMING in my face. So I give him many chances to calm down and then I say "Okay Davis. I am not going to stay in here if you are going to scream like this. Tell me what is wrong..." More screaming. So, I lay him down in his bed. More screaming.

I warn Bennett, who is still up working, and I lay down to go to bed. He screams for 20 minutes and Bennett goes in. He has ripped his sheet off, his mattress pad, his pants and his diaper and he is amped up and ready for action. Bennett tries to calm him down. It's probably 10:50 at this point.

Bennett comes to bed and we talk about it. I'm like "Okay, this is getting ridiculous. I could go in there, but then he is going to make me rock him for 15 minutes, and then he is going to be upset when I put him back to bed, and I'm really tired." So Bennett is like "Don't go in there. He has to fall asleep at some point." So we wait.

10 minutes go by. SCREAMING!!!! 20 minutes go by. SCREAMING!!! 45 minutes go by. SCREAMING!!! And I say to Bennett "Wow, he is really stubborn. Should I go in there?" Bennett says "Sam, don't cave. I know it's hard." And I say "Actually, I don't even feel sad for him. He's not hurt, he's not sick...he's just being stubborn. I'm more annoyed than anything."

So I lay there and think. And as I start thinking through my options, all the while listening to him scream his ever loving lungs out, I start to think about how he must have gotten this stubborness somewhere. And I literally think to myself: Man he's stubborn. But guess who is MORE stubborn than little Davis? ME.

And so I started to get a little amped up myself. Stubborn? You don't even know stubborn, kid, I thought. I wrote the book on stubborn. I will NOT go in that room. I will not "Wock!" I don't care if you lose your voice screaming. I don't care if you choose to pee all over the damn room and have to sleep in it. I will NOT go in there. Tonight...a precedent will be set. Tonight...I will sleep (or it will appear that I am sleeping) straight through this ridiculousness.

90 minutes later, there was silence.

I went in this morning to make sure he was alive and well and not covered in pee and his bed was chock full of building blocks and he was as happy as a clam. He had reached over at some point, pulled this bag of blocks up and dumped them in his bed.

That kid is really pushing my limits these days. And it took all I had this morning not to say "Well Davis, look who is the winner..."