Something is Seriously Wrong

All things considered, I know I've been extremely fortunate as Eric's dad. Healthy baby, active, good eater, outgoing personality, curious, affectionate. What more could a parent ask? 

I had the rare luxury of spending several hours with my child every day for the first year of his life. In Astoria, our bond was forged through daily rounds in the Bugaboo to the bakery, Dunkin' Donuts and the bagel shop, and continued in Korea with Eric strapped into the front pouch of the Maclaren, accompanying me on my meanderings--out of his cradle, endlessly watching. Since he's picked up language, we've shared stories, dislikes and instruction, talked at length about our feelings, friends and family What he lacks in verbal expressiveness or comprehension I am not impatient to remedy. He is right at or around the proper level of awareness, ability and emotional maturity for his age. There's nothing wrong with him.

It's our communication. Right now, there's something wrong with it. It's not broken--but we're as out of sync as I can remember. I'd like to say it's just a slump: I've been busy with work, or he's been overwhelmed adapting to some new stimulus or mommy and daddy have been fighting a lot. But it's not that. He's super aggressive towards me lately. The barrage of double-kicks and suicide leaps from the sofa are only a little annoying, but the casual defiance disturbs me. It's different from the probing sort he used to use as shortcuts to determine what he could and couldn't get away with. Now, when he rips my hand from the keyboard while I'm working or flails at my glasses when he's upset, I can't help but feel that there's a message there: I'm very not happy with you.

The trick, of course, is to see everything with equanimity. Not to read too much of the current mood or circumstances into a given interaction. I'm normally pretty good at not doing that. And on the surface, it looks like simple resentment which might be remedied by a little attention, a little validation or a little understanding. But I'm pretty sure it's not just that; or perhaps it's that plus something else. I can't shake this feeling that we're misaligned in a way that we've never been before. That what he requires from a father right now is not merely going unmet, but has evolved. It's not that I'm simply not there for him, but rather that the whole arrangement is just not working for him right now as it should.

It's a long list--the list of things I fear may be negatively contributing to our current disjuncture:

• He's spending too much time alone with the sitter.
  
• He's watching too much TV.
  
• He doesn't get outside enough/play enough.
  
• He's sleeping too late and not enough.
  
• He's spending too much time on the computer.
  
• He misses certain people.
• He's not eating right.
• I'm stressed/too tired from work.
  
• I'm not involved enough in his concerns.
• I'm not consistent in my discipline or routine.
• I'm not encouraging his interests enough.
• I'm unhappy.
• I don't play with him enough or the way he wants.
• Mommy's stressed/too tired from work.
  
• Mommy and daddy are fighting too much.
• "Daddy's angry."

The last one is the one he always mentions when I ask him "What's wrong?" According to Eric, it's my cardinal sin. The sequence of a lot of our troubled interactions recently have gone like this: 1) Eric misbehaves; 2) I warn him; 3) Eric persists; 4) I express my anger/disapproval either verbally or physically; 5) he cries and accelerates the misbehavior, sometimes with violence; 6) I either punish him or isolate him. Well. That seems pretty obviously bad.

Despite the list, I believe the question goes beyond his dissatisfaction with my discipline. Parenting as I see it is not simply a seesaw contest between my strengths and my weaknesses as a dad. There's another underlying element which is impossible to talk about with any objectivity but is rooted in the constantly evolving dynamic of the relationship. No single element in our history, I've realized, is definitive in any ultimate sense. Is eschatological the right term here? In other words, as much as I cherish those early days pushing Eric around in his stroller, watching him absorb the world in passing, and as much significance as I attribute to carrying him around in the carrier and, literally, shaping his worldview, these things constantly ebb and flow in significance. We, as parents, must take care not to overly adhere to any specific practices or principles over the evidence of their efficacy, lest in our zeal we risk loving these things above our children.

This I firmly believe. 

That's not to say that I'm abandoning the paternal virtues of patience, gentleness and articulation. It's just that Eric and I are at an important crossroads. I need these virtues but my virtues must constantly adapt to meet my son who is, himself, evolving. The wifer has given me some advice which I found difficult not to discard at first (since she suffers from the opposite vice), but have since come round to: no more ultimatums. What have I got to lose by trying? No more counting to three. No more threats of impending punishment. When he disobeys or lashes out? Be more patient and understanding. I will try this tack but, at the same time, I think it's foolish to blindly plumb the depths of your endurance hoping your nature will rise to the challenge. I want my patience to have some tangible purpose. I mean, besides temporarily improving my relationship with my son. I want some knowledge to come from this exercise. Some practical thing that helps me understand why we're getting along better. Or maybe something I can discuss with Eric. Something that will help me understand him. Even if it's only temporary. And when Eric grows beyond the capabilities of that understanding, something I can discard as easily as an outgrown toy. So maybe he will understand that Daddy's growing, too.

Bus Trips and Night Fits

On Saturday, we had spent an eventful day together in the children's park, just Eric and I, walking, playing soccer, playing frisbee, blowing bubbles and flying his first kite. We even bumped into Eric's classmate, Clare, and her parents. The ideal combination of outdoor exercise, exploration and interaction. If mom had only been there it would have been perfect.

It was a beautiful Sunday and a young lady gave up her seat so Eric could sit alone, cross-legged and content, looking out the window for the bus-ride to Ilsan. When he fell asleep, another concerned woman urged me to sit and hold him so he wouldn't get hurt if the vehicle should happen to lurch. I thought about arguing but she was insistent and his head was already flopping to one side as the bus turned round a bend. So I sat and put Eric on my lap. Contentment.

The bus was full of youngsters and young ladies in Sunday clothes so I had no reason to feel guilty for sitting until a couple with a baby stroller came aboard. I'm pretty sure the rules of etiquette do not demand the father of the sleeping three year old give up his seat to the young parents with the stroller, but I felt uneasy nonetheless. If Eric was awake, we would have both been fine standing.

Got off the bus and took a cab the rest of the way, a short ride under the minimum fare. He woke up and was feeling a little cranky. I pacified him by letting him curl up on one lap with my arm supporting his spine. I call it the Koala. He likes it. Grandma met us in front of her house with Eric's bike for him to ride home but because he had just awoken, he was neither gracious nor inclined. Grandma's enthusiasm was, of course, undeterred. Eric couldn't wait to get inside and de-pant himself. I told him I'd be back by 9 and he seemed content to let me leave, eager to once again reap the pleasures of Grandma's indulgence.

Eric seemed happy to see me when I got back at the appointed hour but was a little insistent on playing together, even though it was time for us to go. Apparently he had been active non-stop since I left and had not paused to eat. Grandma fed while we played the "Finding Game" on the iTouch. After, we walked together as a trio to the bus station and Grandma seemed a little hurt that Eric insisted I carry him. On the bus, we found two seats up front and settled in for the ride. I carried him sleeping from one bus to another at the Yonsei transfer and for the remainder of the ten-minute walk home.

He was awake when we got in the door and mommy greeted him and babied him before he could get too cranky. Lights out for the night. Good, since I needed the time to complete the work I couldn't finish in Ilsan.

That night, again, his sleep was fitful. I heard him cry from the living room and when I went in to soothe him, he was sitting on the floor, distraught. I asked him what was wrong, but he was in no talking mood. Pee pee? Apparently not. I moved him to the bed but he wailed in protest. Did he want to be hugged? I hugged him but he resisted. I decided to just sit with him until he subsided. I asked him again if he wanted to pee and this time he assented. It was dark and he couldn't see the toilet. "I couldn't see," he said in his ungrammatical way. I didn't want to hurt his eyes so I turned on the outside light and let it stream into the bathroom but Eric was furious. He had a fit on the bathroom floor. It was around 3 A.M so I appeased him by turning on the bathroom lights. He squinted and finished his business but continued to blubber. I carried him to the bed and lay with him for several minutes before he faded.

Eric doesn't like it when he rouses from sleep and mommy or daddy isn't there. These days, he flails about in annoyance and frustration. Sometimes he uses the high-pitch wail that signifies anger. Recently, I thought that he was having bad dreams as I caught him arguing or protesting in his sleep; however, now I'm beginning to worry that he has serious doubts about mommy and daddy's reliability. If I'm honest with myself, I can't blame him.

Sometimes, even when we spend the day together, I can't escape the bubble of my own head. It's like I end up watching myself play with him instead of engaging him more thoughtfully, deliberately. I'm not faking anything. It's just that I've got a lot on my mind these days and sometimes I think Eric can sense I'm not all there.

On the other hand, I'm grateful that Grandma saw fit to let us take the bus home. The last time she insisted we take a taxi because there was a slight chill and silenced me by shoving a wad of bills in my hand. I was indignant and got off the cab with Eric the moment we were out of sight. Those shared trips, even the waiting or walking, are precious moments for me and I think for Eric, too. The challenge of keeping him behaved or engaged is somehow never as taxing on a crowded bus as it is in the confines of a taxi. And there's something reassuring about sitting next to him silently as the world passes by outside. Maybe the promise of a finite destination. Participating in the journey, instead of merely enduring it. The spontaneous glimpse, the momentary curiosity or the tremulous discussion that arises from my son. These are the moments as a father I dreamed about.

So, at last, this paradox: I love my boy, no more so than in those careless moments when he falls asleep during some mundane pilgrimage. At those moments, charged with the duty of his safe passage, I feel strangely validated and at peace. How many more sojourns will we share, I wonder, before he is big enough to want to travel on his own? I, myself, can almost never bear to sleep on any sort of journey for fear I'll miss some precious detail along the way... And yet, at home, at rest, I cannot comfort him when he rouses from sleep. His wail betrays anguish and frustration. It brings me guilt. I want to silence his cries with a firm hand over his mouth or punish him for not otherwise verbalizing his complaint during daylight hours. But I can't. I wait for the storm to pass. In the morning, like today, I reflect on my inadequacies and I pray for some sort of insight into my son's unrest.

If only our bed was the back of some bus and every night brought a distant destination...