I was getting the full angry face: top lip in, bottom lip out, furrowed brow. Collette was mad. We had a standoff. I won, and now she was giving me the stink eye.
It probably shouldn’t have mattered. So she was upset -- big deal.
But in that moment it
was a big deal. I mean, who did she think she was, poking her lip, out and getting an attitude with
me?
She defied me! Her mother!
After all the sacrifices I make on a daily basis to keep her comfortable and happy, she actually had the nerve to tell
me what she wasn’t going to do.
The only one who had the right to have an attitude was me!
“You’d better get rid of that attitude,” I warned.
“Why,” she asked. She didn’t wait for an answer. “What if I’m angry? Why can’t I have an angry face if I’m angry?
Hmm … she had me there.
Her bottom lip jutted out defiantly as she crossed her arms over her chest.
“You better poke that lip back in before I poke it in for you!”
That’s what my grandma would have said. Usually a precursor to “You better stop crying, before I give you something to cry about.”
I was such a little cry baby back then. But then, I didn’t know how else to respond to “poke that lip in,” except to cry. I never understood why pouting was forbidden either.
I took a deep breath.
“Why are you angry, Collette?”
“I just am.”
“Well, alright then. Be angry,” and just like that it was over.
After the incident, I reflected on where my anger came from and it all came back to “How dare she be upset?”
How dare she? Because, where I come from, children don’t get to be upset. I was brought up with the idea that whining, crying and expressing any emotions other than happy, content or appreciative was a sign of insubordination.
“Why are you acting like that,” some adult would ask. “Do you know how hard your mom works? You’re hurting her feelings when you cry/pout/mope.”
Would it really have been so bad for me to just cry a little, or sulk for a while?
My mom didn’t mind my attitudes. My pouty face usually made her laugh.
But every other adult seemed to pressure me into being a stoic, strong young woman.
Did I really want Collette to feel like she couldn’t be angry? Or sad?
How many times have I told her to “stop all that crying?” or “stop acting like a baby?”
That’s not very nice; but that’s how I’ve been treating my baby.
So I approached the issue the way I handle all of life’s problems: I Googled it.
According to one website,
empoweringparents.com, kids pout and sulk “because they haven’t always learned the skills to express their frustration in an appropriate way,” and as long as parents react to this behavior, children will stick to it.
But my daughter does know how to express her frustration. She’s always telling me what she doesn’t want to do and why she doesn’t want to do it and my answer is always. “Too bad! You’re doing it anyway.” Which of course leads to more pouting.
At the end of the day, it seemed like the problem wasn’t in the pouting as much as it was my reaction to it. Kids are going to pout , and whine and cry. It doesn’t help anyone to punish them for reacting to life. Let it go and eventually so will they.
