For the fourth day in a row, Fynn is throwing tantrums of epic proportions. Kicking, screaming, hitting, crying fits. He wasn't this dramatic or hurtful when he was two. But now he's three. And he's so three.
Today it's because we are leaving a friends house. We have to go home. He kicks and he screams, out the door, into the pouring rain and then into his carseat. Screams and thrashing as I buckle him in, my back getting drenched as it takes three times as long as usual to secure him into the seat.
I don't want to go home! I don't want to go with you! I want to stay!
Cries and screams ensue. My chair is kicked from behind with anger and passion I had no idea a three year old could muster. But he does.
If he knew the word hate, I'm sure it would be thrown around a few times, just for good measure.
The rain pours down, pitter pattering on the hood of our car. He yells that he wants to go outside. I tell him it's raining.
It's NOT raining! I don't want to go home!!!!!
He screams. I yell back that I don't want to go home either.
And I don't. I have no desire to go home, to cook the same dinner I've cooked day in and day out. Where the walls of February collapse around us by the end of the long, dark days. But still, we are homeward bound.
At one point Paige chimes in with her shrill toddler girl screams. Just because she can. Fynn screams at her for making noise, screams at me that he still doesn't want to go home. Over and over.
On the highway cars whip past us, surrounded by mist and rain drops and fog. Screams and yells and kicks and headaches. Arms tired from clenching the wheel, eyes tired from fighting back the tears and squinting through the windshield wipers.
I turn the radio up to drown out the sounds of the backseat.
I don't WANT to listen to MUSIC mommy! TURN IT OFF!!!
Louder and louder. I drown the voices out and keep driving. The voices fade but the crying never does.
For once I'm thankful for the streams of water running past my driver and passenger side windows so the commuter traffic can't see my hot tears, as they stream down my cheeks and drip off of my chin. Pooling on my fleece, disappearing between drops of rain.
And I ask God to protect me, to give me strength as I cry tears of fear and sadness. Fear that this is the way it's going to be. Sadness because I feel beaten down by a three year old, weak and tired from fighting. Always correcting and staying positive, and reinforcing and being stable and consistent. To have it get us here. Defeated.
The song changes on the radio to the Goo Goo Dolls and my tears run faster as the lyrics pound in my head, loud enough for me to listen:
I need some place simple where we could live
and something only you can give
and that's faith and trust and peace while we're alive
and the one poor child who saved this world
and there's ten million more who probably could
if we all just stopped and said a prayer for them
So take these words and sing out loud
'cause everyone is forgiven now
'cause tonight's the night the world begins again
I wish everyone was loved tonight
and somehow stop this endless fight
just a chance that maybe we'll find better days
We make it home, through continuous screams of I don't want to go home! now alternating with Leave me ALONE!!
Inside the bags are thrown down, jackets torn off, demands start. For movies, for cookies, for being anyplace but home.
I grab him and hug him hard, through his yells and both of our tears. He yells that he doesn't want to be here. I hang on for dear life, fending off his thrashing and tell him I love him. Maybe fifty times, until his his body becomes soft and limp and he's crying into, instead of against, me.
We cry. Together. As Paige toddles over, trying to climb over us, giggling as she's pulled into our embrace.
The storm is passing, but it's not over yet. We wait, embracing the last moments of pounding rain and epic winds.