A story about how facing tantrums and frustration led our family of three to tears.

Raising a 0-year-old and a 3-year-old brother.
It is harder than I thought.

Parenting never goes as planned.
Even though I know that in my head, I spend my days feeling frustrated by my children's incomprehensible behavior.

My husband is currently on paternity leave.
He has been working harder than ever at childcare to take over for me while I have a neck injury. My husband is usually mild-mannered, but I would like to share an episode where he snapped at our son's behavior, and for some reason, all three of us ended up in tears.

My husband is in charge of bathing the children.
I am in charge of moisturizing and dressing them after the bath.

First, Dad and our 3-year-old eldest son go to the bath.
After that, at a signal from the bathroom, I take our 1-month-old second son to the bathroom.

I finish up housework while they are in the bath, waiting for our second son to come out.I wait for our second son to finish his bath.

“They are calling from the bath”

I go to pick up our second son at the signal.
After that, I take care of moisturizing and dressing him. Often, our eldest son comes out of the bath at this time.

That day, our eldest son ran into the room, followed by my husband's loud voice.My husband shouted loudly as our eldest son ran into the room.

“Wait! Dry yourself off properly first!!”

Our soaking wet eldest son slipped and tumbled onto the floor.He slipped and fell on the floor while soaking wet.

From there, it was quite a disaster.Things got really difficult from there.

No matter what Mom or Dad said, or how we tried to persuade him, he absolutely refused to dry off. The way he resisted—crying loudly and throwing a tantrum—was beyond our control.He was crying and throwing a tantrum, and there was nothing we could do.

Our second son started crying in response halfway through, the room was soaking wet, and it was a living hell.Our second son started crying along with him, and the room was soaking wet; it was a nightmare.

I decided to leave the handling of our eldest son to his dad and just watch from the sidelines.I left it to his dad to handle our eldest son and decided to watch quietly.

My husband, who is usually kind, was showing his frustration this time...My husband, who is usually gentle, was clearly showing his frustration this time...

“Don't come crying to me if you catch a cold.”

“It's not right that you only ask things of me, but won't listen to a request from Dad.”

"Fine, do whatever you want. Dad and Mom have already told you so many times."

"This is the last time. If you want me to help you get dressed, it's only right that you ask properly."

He kept trying to persuade him desperately.
Without giving up.

During all that time, of course, our eldest son was naked.

As for Mom...

Honestly, I was happy.

Child-rearing is full of things that don't go as planned and don't make sense.
There are mountains of such moments.
The fact that we were working through that together while worrying about it.
The fact that Dad was also desperately facing our child.

That made me feel happy.

Also, I thought it was amazing.

If it were me, I think I would have given up. I might have forced my eldest son to let me wipe his body and put his clothes on, even though he didn't want to. Or, I might have tried to distract him by letting him watch TV or something similar.

I couldn't help but think that his dedication to facing our son's "no, no" until the very end was amazing.

"No to everything!"My eldest son had stubbornly refused to have his body wiped or to get dressed, but after many twists and turns, in order to get help putting on his clothes,

he was able to say
"Please."
to his dad.

After that, Dad had tears in his eyes while hugging our eldest son.
It seemed our eldest son was also sobbing.
For some reason, I was in tears too.

For a while, Dad held our eldest son and said,
"I'm sorry I said too much."
"Mom and Dad both care about you so much."
expressing his feelings.

It is important to be able to express your own opinions.
However, it is also important to be able to listen to what your parents say.

I think there were times when Dad took our eldest son's "no" seriously, only to end up venting his own frustration or saying things that might have been too harsh.

However, I felt that by facing each other earnestly and clashing with our emotions, there were things we were able to understand about one another.

There are many things that both Mom and Dad say because we care about our children.
For the children, there must be many times when they think, "I don't want to."
There are also times when we cannot prioritize our children's feelings. Even so, if we keep communicating what we are thinking and how we feel as parents, perhaps something will get through?

After this incident, that is what I found myself thinking about.

Things not going as planned.
Times when we cannot prioritize our children's feelings.

It is precisely at those times that I am forced to think deeply about how I should be as a parent.
It really makes me think.

This time, I learned a lot from watching Dad.

Raising children is such a profound experience, isn't it?

Let's keep saying what we want to convey, over and over again.
That you are very precious to us.

If that feeling is flowing deep within our hearts, I believe it will reach our children.
Even if it takes time, I am sure it will.