Sneak away, fly away. Watch me as I get away. Anyway, I can runaway.

It's that time of the relationship again.  You know, the one I always have when I'm getting too happy.  Things are amazing.  Nothing is going wrong.

Run.

Don't wait, don't give them a chance to hurt you.  Because it's going to come down to that.  It always comes down to that.  The one person, in the past history of my dating who didn't hurt me, who told me I was beautiful, and never said anything but wonderful things to me, I cut out of my life and made sure to burn that bridge so hard he'd never want me back.  Why?  Because I couldn't stand the idea of waiting for whatever was going to happen.  Because when he did what everyone else had, it was going to be that much worse, and ending it early was better than letting it happen.

Now I'm in the same spot.  Almost 5 months in, and things aren't going wrong.  Not like they always happen immediately, but...  And now I have a little, and if things go wrong again, he's going to be hurting, and I have no desire to put him through that again.  Losing the ex-asshole was really, really hard on him.  I can handle my own hurt.  I've got plenty of practice at that, and a therapist who will lovingly kick my ass all over the place until I'm better.  But he doesn't have my experience or practice, and I never want him to go through that again.

Part (most) of me wants to pack up and run.  See if I can get a transfer somewhere, and get the hell out of here.  Nothing works better to get out of these moments than running.  I've been here so long, that sometimes the urge to run is overwhelming.  I never loved Georgia in the first place, but there's something about being stuck here (yay divorce!) that makes it even worse.  I know I can't, and it's a bad example to set, but I just want to be so very far away from here.  It's never felt like home.

I think the worst part is, there's nothing he's doing wrong.  It's all in my head.  I know it's all in my head.  (Sadly, my head is a creative and terrible place some times.)  But I constantly watch, and wait.  It's the stupid self-doubt.  Who could love *me*, and why?  I've never found myself attractive (the entirely of my school career was me getting bullied about how ugly and worthless I was, so you know, understandable), I spend so much time around brilliant people that I end up doubting my intellectual worth, but mostly, who on earth could possible want me.  Me with all my insecurities and doubts.  All of my overpowering emotions.  All my fears, and half-assed dreams I'm never going to realize.  I can't possibly imagine *anyone* who would want that.

Thanks for your input, now shut up.

Everyone has their 2¢ about how it is you should raise your child.  If you have/adopt a child, suddenly a million people will spring out of the woodwork to tell you what you're doing wrong, and most of them don't bother to leave their own box to give you advice.

I have a hard time explaining my son to other people.  He's not fragile, but he's an emotionally delicate kid.  He is easily angered and upset.  Sometimes getting his clothes on will end in a screaming, hysterical melt down.  But he's loving, funny, and really smart.  Seriously, the kid learned the alphabet by 17 months, and has been reading since he was 3.5.  He's got a ridiculously good memory.  And, damn, the kid is just funny.

Given his...unusually volatile temperament, I'm pretty sure I've heard about a million times from friends, family, and random strangers that I'm just too gentle with my son.  I need to let him just scream himself out when things go wrong for him.  I need to spank.   I need to force him to figure things out on his own.  I need to give him time outs.  I need to stop interfering when he melts down.  I need to threaten more.  I do exactly none of those things 99% of the time.  Instead, I assume my son needs help figuring out how to do what's so frustrating to him.  Him having a screaming meltdown does not absolve him of working through the situation.  It doesn't mean he never has to say sorry.  It doesn't mean he gets away with murder.  I talk him through it, we work out a solution, and he learns something.  Sometimes this takes endless repetition, but he's 5 years old.

Yes, I absolutely could let him scream.  I could mock him, or insult him, or call him a whiny baby/brat.  I could tell him that no one likes a whiner.  But as someone who's had adult meltdowns because she couldn't control her feelings, I know how shitty that is.  It took me until I was thirty years old to learn how to deal with things properly.  I couldn't "work myself down" at all.  Letting me have a panic attack about whatever it was going on at the time taught me exactly nothing except how ridiculously powerless I was.  I learned to cope.  Panic attacks could easily be dealt with by a pair of nail scissors, a box cutter, or my nails if I was desperate.  Sometimes it took one cut, sometimes it took a hundred (and I'm not exaggerating about that.)  No one taught me how to handle myself in a thoughtful, reasoned way.  I just knew how to survive the moment.

I want better than that for my son.  I sometimes see him hit and scratch himself when he gets upset.  While this may not be conscious self-mutilating behavior, I know that endorphin high can be habit forming.  When he has a meltdown, we try deep breathing first.  I'm firm about it, because he's out of control, and needs to be guided.  If that doesn't work, I find differently textured things for him to touch, and we discuss that, because it distracts his brain.  Then, once he's calm, we snuggle up and talk.  Yes, I could be stern momma, but I need him to know that although I may not love his behavior one bit, I love him.  Some days, this takes every last ounce of patience I have.  But when I hear him tell me that he knows even if he's bad that I'll love him, I know I've made the right choice.

So please, when you decide to tell me, unsolicited, that my parenting choices are crap, maybe you might want to ask me exactly why it is I do what I do.  Also, nothing personal, but go fuck yourself.  Just a little.