Supporting you in motherhood, one little blog post at a time
Full Speed actually said he WANTED to go to bed last night. Mad Dog and I were speechless. He never wants to go to bed so his request was highly unusual. Apparently the rigors of weapons camp are making him extremely tired.
I may learn to love weapons camp after all…
Lit
tle T.Puzzle and I went to pick up Full Speed from weapons camp. When the instructor declared ‘time’s-up!’ for the day, the gaggle of students bowed off the mat and descended upon their lined up bags of equipment. The tae kwon do studio is not that large and combined with the noisy, busy bunch of kids, I was feeling quickly overwhelmed. I tend to get nauseous and highly uncomfortable in tight spaces with big crowds. I did my best to keep my cool and maneuver little T.Puzzle to the side with the bags to meet up with Full Speed. Naturally, as my internal stress rose, this is when little T.Puzzle starts to act up.
“Look where you’re going!” I barked. Little T.Puzzle was careening about on the verge of 
flopping into the wet noodle formation.
“Watch your feet and don’t step on that sword!” I said.
That’s when I had an out of body moment. Not once in my motherhood imaginings did I ever dream I would tell my three year old to watch out for swords. Baseballs maybe. Swords, I don’t think so.
Can’t wait until Mad Dog signs Full Speed up for machine gun class.
Most of my time as a mother has been spent trying to channel extreme energy into positive outlets. That is why we became involved with Tae Kwon Do when Full Speed was three years old. Overall the experience has been very favorable. The structure and discipline as well as the expectations of respect have all had a lasting influence on my boys.
For the most part I’m sold. The part I’m not so keen on is all the weaponry. Mad Dog thinks the more swords the better so our compromise is to introduce weapons only to Full Speed. Of course Full Speed thinks he is the stuff now. He is attending a weapons camp this week and loving it. I am still not so certain.
When I picked him up yesterday, he told me all about his favorite weapons with excited animation.
“What happened to your face?” I asked. I noticed a red mark slashed across his cheek.
“Nunchuks,” he replied.
“Did you hit yourself in the face with your own nunchuk?” I asked suspecting he was his own worst enemy.
“Yes,” he giggled.
So you can see, it’s not a perfect system.
Tae Kwon Do for two over-active boys is absolutely the perfect sport. It’s all about structure, discipline and respect (my personal fave). As much as I struggle getting them to regular classes, the pay-off has been bigger than my frustration. To hear my kids say, ‘yes ma’am’ and ‘yes sir’ is a crowning achievement of my motherhood experience. Some days, it’s all I got.
However, I am not a big proponent of introducing Kung Fu weapons to three and five year old boys (especially my three and five year old boys). I have resisted pressure from their school to purchase the latest weapon for their upcoming graduation. It is called a bow staff and honestly, to me, it looks like a glorified stick. I don’t mind them being exposed to the ‘coolness’ of martial arts weaponry while at school (but still, you should see a herd of little students with glorified sticks, just plain frightening); I just don’t want the weapons in my home in any way, shape or form.
I expressed my concerns to the instructor. My boys are loose cannons, they are too young and they wear high-powered very specialized glasses just to name a few. He said he understood but in their particular curriculum they constantly introduce new weapons to keep kids interested. I understand the desire to keep things exciting because once you hit school-age, you have access to whole new range of sports and may choose those over Tae Kwon Do. Still, it is not enough to convince me to purchase the bow staffs. At least not anytime soon.
The instructor suggested that the boys only use the weapons at school. Then, maybe I could put them in a closet on a high shelf or keep them safely locked in my truck otherwise.
As he said to me an image that flashed in my head. I could see Full Speed stealing my keys and driving away bow staff and all.
I am still unconvinced.
Do you ever have days where things fall into place and your children behave better then you hoped for in whatever circumstance? When your kids say ‘please’ and ‘thank you’ on cue and they comply with your every command? Yeah, that wasn’t my day at all.
We are now fully back into the routine of Tae Kwon Do. I feel confident I can get T.Puzzle onto the mat without much fuss. So far so good. However, once he is on the mat, he is out of my realm of threats and cajoling. That’s never been an issue before because in a normal class session, he complies beautifully for the instructor. Yeah, that wasn’t my day at all.
T.Puzzle is in his own world right from the get-go. He barely engages in anything the rest of the class is doing. He gets called out repeatedly to join in and doesn’t. He sort of stands there with a spacey look in his eyes. The instructor begins to take notice of how he is behaving. He gets in T.Puzzle’s face and says, “Hands over your head!†T.Puzzle won’t do it. “Hands over your head I said!†Nope, not happening. The instructor grabs his arms and places them over his head. The instructor calls out the next instruction. T.Puzzle refuses again. This time when he gets in T.Puzzle’s face and says, “Do what I ask of you, T.Puzzle.†He looks at him and says, “No.†T.Puzzle says ‘no’ over and over. My stomach drops to the floor. I’ve never seen any student ever tell the instructor ‘no’ and we’ve been attending for several months.
T.Puzzle is stripped of his belt and is forced to sit in time-out. The instructor says, “Get the diapers, someone’s acting like a baby (oh crap, who told!?! The instructor still erroneously believes T.Puzzle is potty-trained). T.Puzzle proceeds to cry and all the surrounding parents turn their eyes to me. At that moment, I died a little inside.
I don’t know what was worse, the fact he openly disrespected authority or that several parents said, “How can you sit there? Isn’t your heart breaking for him?†Honestly, my heart wasn’t breaking. My kid acts like a nut all the time (his behavior, not him just to clarify) so this wasn’t shocking to me. The instructor handled it exactly how I handle T.Puzzle at home. It made me wonder, does no one else in the world put their kids in time-out even when the kid is crying like it’s the end of the world? Isn’t that sort of the point? Time-outs aren’t exactly Disney World, right?
Then, my humiliation grows. Prior to class I had filled out Full Speed’s behavior report. When I did it, I had no inkling that T.Puzzle’s behavior would be such a disaster. So, I filled it out honestly and gave him a couple ‘Fs’ (fair) because he keeps talking silly and in a disrespectful manner to adults that we encounter such as cashiers, nurses, and waitresses (etc.). The instructor reads his report, is angry (as he should be) and calls Full Speed out in front of everyone. He takes the report, crushes it into a ball and tosses it across the room. He says he expects better from Full Speed (and so do I).
In every other report that the instructor read, the kids had ‘Es’ (excellent) across the board. I’m supposed to believe that all the kids, and the oldest in class is only seven, acted like perfect angels every single day of the week? What. Ever.
I’m clearly feeling frustrated and wishing there was a wet bar in the parents’ corner. I can imagine perfectly where it would fit. The bar could be bamboo with a nice Tiki theme. There would be a fun, Tom Cruise-like bartender straight out of the movie ‘Cocktail’ who would wow everyone into distraction with his marvelous cocktail-making theatrics.
Instead I am left with two boys who couldn’t hold it together and a world of disappointment and embarrassment. Looks like ‘Mother of the Year’ is out of my reach again this year. That is unless there is a category for most alcoholic drinks imbibed by a Mom in a single day. On second thought, I better get my acceptance speech ready just in case.