My sweet child, Hannah has a set of lungs on her like nobody’s business. When she puts her mind to it, she can break glass. I always know it is coming too, when I see her close her eyes, ball her little fists up at her side and open her mouth wide. There is a delayed reaction of maybe 5 seconds of silence. Just enough time to run for cover. Otherwise you are gonna have hot scream blowing in your face.

That was how the morning went. Second grade is still sometimes a heart wrenching separation. The day before, the whole class had to lose 3 minutes of recess due to talking. Devastating. Though Hannah was not one of them, she was part of the consequence. That was a lot of tears to process. I had the thought last night, that it might be a tough morning. There is a long bus ride to school that is hard for little ones. Who do I sit with? What if a bigger kid says something mean to me? Then she found out that it was not her day to have the ipod to play on the bus. Then I said I would not be able to drive her, to relieve her from this bus ride.

I saw it coming. The eyes closed, fists balled, mouth open…I braced myself. Yep. Girl has got some lungs!!

The problem is I didn’t see it going. Going away that is. Girl has also got some endurance!

That baby screamed at me the entire morning. Through getting dressed. Getting in the car. Buckling in. Driving to school. All the way until we parked at the bus.

I guess I am writing this because I have come a long way. I have handled meltdowns poorly so many times. There is not enough time to write about all those. So I am gonna write about what was good this time.

I am gonna write about what I have learned, and who I have learned it from that seems to be true.

Two people guided me through this morning. The first is my hero in the field of marriage and family, John Gottman. His book “The Heart of Parenting” talks about how to raise emotionally intelligent children. It also lays out the benefits these children with a high EQ have over other children. Here it is in a nutshell:

l. We have evolved, in part, because emotions are contagious. Negative emotions between parent and child especially so.

When my Hannah starts to belt one out, it makes my own body want to scream. (and ball my fists, lay down on the floor and stomp my feet). So the airlines say it best, “put the oxygen mask on yourself before you put one on your child”.

2. How our parents handled our negative emotions taught us what we know. They are our ‘feelings about feelings’. They are our attitudes about strong negative feelings in ourselves and our children. Many of our parents either dismissed them, swept them under the rug, ignored them, punished them or any other tactic possible to get them to go away. In their defense, refer back to #1.

I have also tried every one of these tactics. And I know better!

3. Parents of emotionally intelligent children view strong negative emotions as opportunities for connection.

What I don’t mean, is that they give in to terrorists demands or allow themselves to be smacked and mistreated. When in the middle of a ‘hot mess’ of screaming and kicking, no one can really connect. But what they do, is hang on to themselves. Put the oxygen mask on and breathe.

I didn’t give in to Hannah this morning. It was not her turn with the Ipod. I was not willing to drive her to school. She had to get on the bus. Period. But I was able to stay compassionate about the real issue. That this is hard for her. I shared my own struggle with going to school at her age. I cried every single solitary day going to school. I shared her brother’s struggle when he was her age. He would brace his arms and legs against the door jam, and I would pry him through it to get him in the car. All this was between her screaming at me, “Your a mean mommy! This is all your fault!” of course. But when we got there and she faced the bus, her tears were dry, and she didn’t have to go to school feeling disconnected from me. She knew I got it. She knew she was “worthy of love and belonging” to quote Brene Brown.

And that brings me to the second person I can thank for guiding me this morning…Nana. Richard’s grandmother. I never ever saw her lose her cool. She was calm and kind and compassionate to every single person she came in contact with. And her word was law. Because she was so respectful of others, she got that back. I think that we can punish and scream at our kids to get them to be respectful and kind, or we can BE respectful and kind to them and show them how it is done.

I am sure that I will mess it up again in the future. Lose my handle on myself. Get angry at this tantrum that is ruining my morning. So I ask forgiveness now. That is the gist of this “Day of Atonement” we are headed into Friday night. We admit to God that we are gonna make a bunch of promises to be better this year, and then we acknowledge that we are gonna for sure mess up. So please forgive us.

And what a loving parent God is, to give us another chance, knowing that we are for sure gonna mess it up. I look at my own kids and think that if they learn from their messes then they aren’t really messes after all. I will always be ready with a hug and another chance. I just have to remember to give that to myself too. We get it right sometimes, and other times we don’t. It is most definitely a work in progress.