[Maggirayne]

Originally Posted by Marsha

OK, I do not know if this was right or good, it felt bad.

Ainslee was having one of her nights.,Crying about everything, tired, not tired, want to watch the show,wanted a bath, baby talk ad nauseum including just plain babble (she has to be pretty bad to resort to babble), and freaking out if Riley came over or if Riley touched her or if I moved her on my lap...

She's been like this for 4 evenings straight now, and it gets old. And I was mad because having to deal with her was eating up a lot of time, and I knew when I took her to bed, dh was gonna take Ri to bed and then I wasn't going to get to spend time with Ri because Ainslee had hurt her feelings earlier by yelling at her to get away and then when I told Ri she could stay sitting beside me, Ainslee screamed loud enough to make Riley WANT to move away....

Ok? It's exhausting, and my self talk was all "now she's ruining my evening and I won't get to spend time with Ri and blah, blah" and meantime she's freaking out because she keeps saying I look mad or I sound mad and she won't calm down until I'm not mad, etc.

So I said: yes, I'm tired and i'm cranky, and my ears hurt from your screaming, and I"m upset because you screamed at Riley and drove her away and I don't get to spend time with her this evening, and I love you, but I 'm not getting to enjoy the time I spend with you.

I am sure that was totally gult tripping and shaming, but it was better than having the thougths show on my tightly pinched lips and terse manner, I guess.

Originally Posted by Marsha

LEt's just say that her reaction wasn't pretty. I know I shouldn't take people's reactions as the barometer of what I should say...but let's just say that I generally tend to do that. and then agonize endlessly if they react badly. Dd tends to have anxiety/ragey stuff, so no matter what I say, the end result is the same. *I* felt better about what I said than placating or berating her.

Well, it sounds like she was unhappy over everything. And regardless of what you said did, her reaction wouldn't be pretty. How old is she? 7?

So you were expressing how you felt. What you said was all your feelings, not blaming her, but expressing how you felt because of her actions.