The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

So we are on two weeks of break from school, and sometimes the days get long. By the time I'm making dinner, my patience can be quite thin. Yesterday, Erik was bugging, bugging, bugging me in the kitchen, not with anything particularly bad, but the cumulative effect finally drove me over the edge. I pushed him out of the kitchen and scolded him. He started to cry, which annoyed me more, because I first assumed he was crying about not getting to be in the kitchen, pestering me. I asked him in exasperation, "Why are you crying?" He said, "Because you yelled at me! And you hurt me!" Talk about a low point in parenting. However, it gave me the chance to model a sincere apology. I told him I was sorry, it sounded like I scared him and I was sorry I hurt him. It's a fine line, I can't expect him to understand my perception of the nuance of the situation: he had behaved badly and wasn't listening, I was justified in my anger, but not in what I did with my anger. I can only hope that although he couldn't understand it now, someday he will be old enough to parse situations like that. I asked him to forgive me, and he did, but I still felt pretty bad about what I'd done.

Tonight while we were playing, he told me I have a tender and loving heart. I truly feel forgiven and washed clean.