Nobody Told Me There'd Be Days Like These...

Why is it, do you suppose, that the typical parenting books that everybody starts out with end when the child turns two or three? Is it because no one wants to buy a 1,700 page tome? Is it because by the time children are three many of them are off to pre-school or head start or full time day care and therefore they require professional manuals (i.e. books for the "child care professionals"), and parents wash their hands of them? Or go directly to the psychologist's office?

Now, honestly, the books I did get (as gifts, my pride prompts me t add), the What To Expect series, were probably the worst books I have ever read on the subject of child rearing. Well, unless you count the book by the Pearls. That probably was worse.

And I'm being partially facetious here. But honestly, why didn't any one tell me about the "terrible five-almost-sixes"? I haven't read the book yet, how can I just get one sprung on me -- a 5-almost-6-year old, that is, and expect to know what to do?

The wise mamas in my life have been telling me this is a developmental stage, it is an "awakening", a huge transition. Tales of otherwise contemplative little girls (even) turning into little Tasmanians and getting violent. It's all about figuring out who they are, I'm told.

The one we have at our house has been putting us through several days/weeks of ... well, intense need for spiritual togetherness and maternal tenderness, kid gloves, and about 5,000 pounds of patience. I hope we've just about gotten to the bottom of the "awakening", because I could use a peaceful interlude.

But I have an idea I'm in the wrong profession if that's what I want the most....

Really, I know that this is the stuff that sanctification is made of. Just one other quick question.... What Else lies ahead that no one has prepared me for?!