What phase is this now?
“It's just a phaaaase, it's just a phaaaase!”
How often I have chanted this mantra since becoming a mother. I say it to justify everything. My baby cries all day; 'it's just a phaaaase!' My toddler throws his peas against the walls; 'it's just a phaaaase!' My preschooler only wants to go to school in fluorescent glitter dresses; 'it's just a phaaaase!' When you're in such a phase, you think you'll never get out of it, you're afraid your child will always remain that terrorizing brat. But by now I know better. It all passes. Eventually. I now also say it to the struggling mother with a crying baby in a sling, to the father who just walks around with the stroller, to the mother with a stomping toddler in the supermarket, to the father with the stains from the spinach meal on his shirt. It will pass!
I found the phase of 'the crying baby who is just too big to nap on your chest, but just too small to play with anything' very intense. The baby wants everything but can do precisely nothing. Baby frustrated, you overheated and frustrated. I felt this phase lasted a long time. And not fun. The phase when my daughter wanted to go outside every day like some kind of drag queen on drugs was fun. I enjoyed watching her develop her own style. Her style was not my style and not always appropriate for the occasion (imagine going to a hospital check-up in your Elsa dress with flashing lights and pink plastic clacking heels), but it was cheerful and fun. She now wants to wear more black and tiger print, so this hysterical phase is unfortunately definitively over.
One phase I don't miss either is the tantrum phase. Lying in the supermarket, lying in a bus shelter, lying in front of your sister's classroom, lying in front of my bike. And all this with loud screams and dramatic wailing. I don't miss it. My neighbors don't miss it either, I think. He also had them at 2:30 in the morning, because he wasn't allowed to have a biscuit with chocolate sprinkles. Stupid mother. And then the next morning, sheepishly grinning at the neighbor. 'It's just a phase, right?'
The phase we are currently in, I hadn't heard much about either.
My son is in the phase 'I want to be first, I want to be at the front, I want it now, you have to listen, I want the most, my sister can't have anything, you are only my mother, and I'll throw a tantrum until everyone is driven crazy by me, because I suddenly have testosterone'. Challenging, I tell you. My daughter is in the phase 'I think I'm already 16, you don't understand anything, but you still have to do everything for me, because you are my servant, I want everything in leopard print, I stomp upstairs if I'm not allowed something, and scream loudly, and I don't listen to anything, because I'm actually already a teenager'. Also challenging. These two phases combined with each other ensure that we all have an argument by 7:15 am. Exhausting.
It keeps me going knowing that this is just a phase. And that this too shall pass. And that I'll think at the next phase, oh that phase wasn't so bad. That's what I keep telling myself. It's a phase. It's a phase.
What stage are you at?
X
MARLOES
