Two.

Confession: I can’t f*cking stand my son.

To be clear, he’s two.

Ugh. The kid wakes up before the sun rises every day. Demands Mickey Mouse Clubhouse. AND the iPad. Both. He wants two screens cause one isn’t good enough for this psychopath. He demands orange juice. Or milk. Or both, or more specifically, whichever one he doesn’t already have. He’s hungry. Of course he is. By the time I get breakfast ready he won’t eat it. If I gave him apples he wants a banana. If I gave him cereal he wants eggs. He’s sobbing because he can’t find his milk. It’s in his hand. He thought he was holding the orange juice. And now we’re fighting about what he was crying about.

The kid was potty trained, and then he decided that he didn’t feel like peeing on the potty anymore so he just pisses wherever the hell he wants. He would wait until we arrive somewhere in the car and then pee in his car seat while I walked around the car to get him. When I open his door he’d say, “I peed. Hehehe”. He’s an asshole. And now he’s an asshole that wears pull-ups.

When I call his name to come here he squints his eyes and lowers his forehead and stares at me until I ask three more times and then I yell. Most of the time he will come over when I yell. But only in the event where it doesn’t really matter too much if he comes or not, he will say the dreaded, “no”. Only then am I forced to choose my battles. It doesn’t really matter if he comes over to the door, I’m honestly not ready to go yet anyway. And yet, he said no so I have to stand my ground and reprimand him. Right? It’s a toss up. I yell enough. Trust me on that one.

Sometimes I will hide in plain site…like folding laundry in the bathroom with the door open and then listen as he walks all over the entire house looking for me. “Mommy! Where are youuuu?!” Sometimes I even let him wander around outside looking for me as I watch from the window. It’s either me or the iPad. He must have one, or both at all times. I have physically thrown the godforsaken iPads into the trash more than once only to remember that if he wasn’t addicted to that stupid thing he’d be even more of a leach on me.

He instinctively knows every single time I get a call from a client. He’s quiet when my mother calls, or a friend, or even a colleague. But a client calls and the kids instantly loses his freaking mind. Shrieking for absolutely no reason. Stops immediately when I hang up. I’m starting to wonder if he actually has psychic abilities cause the kid is spot on every time.

When I dance, he tells me to stop. When I sing he tells me to stop. He fights me when I try to buckle his car seat. Before I can even turn off the ignition he starts screaming for me to let him out. He pulls his sisters’ hair. He steals their crayons and markers then hides somewhere until no one is watching and colors all over the walls. Sometimes he actually waits until I’m watching and then whips a crayon out of his pocket and starts to scribble really fast on my walls and then when I yell he puts it back in his pocket and pretends that nothing happened. Asshole.

He insists that I join him in the bathroom while he poops. He won’t eat his dinner and then he picks his nose and tells me he’s hungry. He doesn’t just splash in the tub, he actively scoops water and pours it outside the tub onto the floor. When I’m angry he runs from me, and then he falls and busts his lips and cries and then I must console him and find an ice pack instead of being angry. This child has more scrapes and bruises than I’ve ever seen on a child, and I’m not even sure where most of them came from.

What’s his is his, what’s his sisters’ is his, what’s mine is his. He thinks he runs the show over here y’all. That little fucker thinks he’s in charge. Well, he’s not. But this post isn’t about how I reprimand my children, or whether they get enough attention, structure, or love, or if he’s acting out for some psychological reason that you’ve read about in a parenting book, or better yet googled. It’s about the fact that he is two. And that he’s an asshole.

He is the worst type of asshole because the moment he wakes me up with a head-but around 5:30am, I start longing for bedtime so that I can put him to bed…. 13.5 hours later. Sometimes I count the hours all day. He finally goes to sleep at night and shortly thereafter I climb into my own bed and exhale in the silence. I try desperately to enjoy the quiet, and the calm. My large, comfortable king-sized bed. Candlelight. Silence. And yet, I lay with my eyes open because somehow I miss that little turd in the next room over.

He drives me absolutely insane all day long. But as I lay here I am reminded of this afternoon when he found a stick (that he shouldn’t have had in the house) and came running to me asking for a marshmallow. When I caved and gave him a marshmallow he asked politely for one for each of his sisters too. And then he carried three marshmallows and a stick down to the basement to share with them together. This morning when I handed him the iPad, tossed him on the couch and turned to make a run for it toward my work computer and he said quietly, “Mommy, want to sit with me? I will scooch over….” Have you ever heard a two year old say, “scooch”? So we sat together for a while and I ignored the dinging of my emails coming in. This evening when he asked me to read him a book. Yesterday, when he was growling around the house playing the monster and I couldn’t stop laughing at his ridiculous monster sounds and then he started laughing just because I was laughing. When I told his sister that I love her and she said, “love you”, and then his other sister that I love her and she said, “love you too” and then before I could even get to him he says, “love you three”. The way he randomly starts counting down from 10 – 1 and then shoves his fist in the air and yells, “Goofy just blast off!!!!” The way he closes his eyes when he fibs.

I yell at that child more than I should but he still runs to me every time I give him a silly little smirk. That boy hugs me like I am the only thing that matters in his entire world. Like I’m the only thing that will EVER matter in his world. He is physically and mentally strong, but his love is even stronger. I am the only one who can calm him when he is distraught and I cherish that honor. After all the years, months, days, and hours that I prayed for a little boy, it is a privilege to be his Mommy.

I finally drift off into a deep, exhausted sleep. And like every night before, I am startled awake between 11pm-2am by the sound of a desperate two-year old crashing through my door in search of his Mommy. And although I thought I’d never be the type of Mom who’d allow a child into her bed, I smile in the dark at his groggy face at my bedside and pull him in next to me. His sleepy cheek is against mine and all is right with the world. I snuggle right up to that little boy cause he won’t be little forever. And I won’t be his whole world forever.

So yeah. I can’t stand my son, but my love for him is fierce. He won’t be an asshole two year old forever, and I won’t always be able to calm him so easily when he’s sad or scared, but he will always be my boy. And he will always know that my love for him is powerful and unwavering. With a little vodka, Mickey Mouse, and a whole lot of love we’ll conquer the terrible two’s together. And that, is all that matters.