My Big Blowup

Last time, I wrote about how my part-time job has gone from being a stress reliever to a stress inducer, and how this impacts my ability to cope with the competing stresses of parenting my sweet, funny, exasperating child with ADHD.

You know that request for one week of unpaid time off work that I mentioned yesterday? DENIED!

Want to hear about my big blowup last week? The one I referred to in my last post?

I went in to work last Wednesday morning for a meeting with my supervisor and the head of another department. They are taking away one of my duties, which happens to be my favorite part of my job. I'd known it was coming--the change makes sense for the library and the tax payers. It just sucks for me.

So I decided to spend the rest of my day doing something to bring me joy--preparing for Natalie's Gotcha Day celebration. February 12 was the sixth anniversary of Natalie's adoption. Oh, the gains she has made! I love her so!

I bought treat bags and candy and printed a note to stick inside listing Nat's date and place of birth, the name we gave her when she joined our family, and the date of her adoption. It's our Gotcha Day tradition to distribute these treat bags to Nat's classmates and friends each year. I started filling bags, then stopped when it was time to pick up Natalie and two neighbor kids up from religious ed.

Nat had been to school, then daycare, then religious ed. Too many transitions. Add in that it was 5:15 and she was starving, always a trigger for out-of-control behavior. Top that with all of our ongoing ADHD medication changes. And Natalie was a wreck.

My afternoon of "finding joy" hadn't restocked my reserves of patience and energy. After 30 minutes with a whining, flailing, impulsive Natalie, I lost it. I burst into loud sobs. I grabbed the treat bags, the Gotcha Day notes, and the candy, and threw them by the fistful as hard as I could into the trash.

I really scared Natalie. She burst into tears. "Do you still love me, Mommy?" she bawled over and over. I pulled her onto my lap and we held each other, both sobbing and sobbing.

Actually, a small break is on the way, on the homefront. Natalie is going to Girl Scout camp--for the first time!--this weekend. And Don is taking me out for dinner tonight. Nat slept all night last night after being awake for hours in the middle of the night the two previous nights running. So, I might make it without completely cracking up, after all.

But now that my week off has been denied, what should I do? What would you do?