Saturday night, after writing my last post, I caught Squishy again, sneaking things upstairs. I was already fried, and this made it worse. I went to tell the gnome, because he was so far just continuing to act selfishly, with no actual help. In fact, he had called Squishy just to scream at her for a half hour, which left me having to deal with her curled up in a ball and sobbing.
As I told him, he insisted that she needed to be up there, again, just fixated on him wanting to bring her up there, despite what was going on with her, or caring about health and safety given the situation. He tried claiming that I was "keeping her" from him. Started yelling that I can't legally keep her here.
I know it's all a load of shit, but it was still frustrating. That while dealing with everything else, he could only think about what he wanted, and too fixated on himself to actually consider the safety of his kid.
I tried to decompress, until I knew I needed to get ready for bed. And as I was in the shower, I got a thought that seemed far too ridiculous to be true, but might be just stupid enough to be real.
Was Squishy getting in trouble because staying grounded meant she stayed here?
I got out of the shower, and poked my head into her room. She was still awake, so I posed the question to her. Her eyes got wide with relief and appreciation as she confirmed everything. She said she was afraid to go up there for her safety, but said she didn't think I would believe her if she told me earlier.
I wanted to cry with relief. I told her that we could make a plan, where she would still need to earn things back, because she still did them, but it would be easier for her to get ungrounded, little by little, so that it took a longer amount of time, and she would feel safer when she had finally earned everything back.
She was suddenly excited for the plan. Genuine happiness, and I could tell she felt lighter overall.
And since then, there's been a couple of little things, but nothing near what she was doing. She's in a better mood, and far more agreeable. We're both prepared to deal with the gnome, but that's much easier on it's own in the scale of things.
Sometimes, the weirdest ideas are the ones that fix everything.
As I told him, he insisted that she needed to be up there, again, just fixated on him wanting to bring her up there, despite what was going on with her, or caring about health and safety given the situation. He tried claiming that I was "keeping her" from him. Started yelling that I can't legally keep her here.
I know it's all a load of shit, but it was still frustrating. That while dealing with everything else, he could only think about what he wanted, and too fixated on himself to actually consider the safety of his kid.
I tried to decompress, until I knew I needed to get ready for bed. And as I was in the shower, I got a thought that seemed far too ridiculous to be true, but might be just stupid enough to be real.
Was Squishy getting in trouble because staying grounded meant she stayed here?
I got out of the shower, and poked my head into her room. She was still awake, so I posed the question to her. Her eyes got wide with relief and appreciation as she confirmed everything. She said she was afraid to go up there for her safety, but said she didn't think I would believe her if she told me earlier.
I wanted to cry with relief. I told her that we could make a plan, where she would still need to earn things back, because she still did them, but it would be easier for her to get ungrounded, little by little, so that it took a longer amount of time, and she would feel safer when she had finally earned everything back.
She was suddenly excited for the plan. Genuine happiness, and I could tell she felt lighter overall.
And since then, there's been a couple of little things, but nothing near what she was doing. She's in a better mood, and far more agreeable. We're both prepared to deal with the gnome, but that's much easier on it's own in the scale of things.
Sometimes, the weirdest ideas are the ones that fix everything.
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