Best Yes: Week Four

My kids are the WORST when they don't get enough sleep. They scream. They wail. They hit each other.  They become impulsive in the worst possible ways.  Do they succumb to impulsive urges to nap a little later in the day? Do restful activities to conserve energy like coloring or reading? Quietly just go to bed a bit earlier and faster? No way! 

My boys get impulses to run clumsily around the living room, gleefully throwing easy to trip on toys everywhere that either trip each other or they simply trip over their own feet.  My eldest son dissolves into temper tantrums that render him unrecognizable and although he is five, has already broken both arms! He broke his left before bedtime when he impulsively stood on the couch and them fell and his right before nap time time when he impulsively decided to ride a laundry basket down the stairs.  See what I mean about making bad decisions when tired?  Instead of choosing activities that will restore them, like, oh, I don't know, sleeping?!?!?, my sons choose to tackle one another or hurtle themselves off furniture or downstairs.  (My eldest son even climbed his dresser about ten minutes before lights out and  almost killed himself once last year, but was miraculously unhurt.) 

I mention this now because as I was watching my tired children make bad decision after bad decision right before bedtime a couple of days ago and praying to God that I would not blow up at them or my husband myself since I had had a rough time making good verbal decisions myself that day, I suddenly realized that my sons (as hard to handle as they are right before bedtime), are apples that have landed fairly close to the proverbial tree. I really am not much different than they are in God's eyes. I get tired myself: tired of cleaning, tired if parenting, tired of cooking, tired of taking care of others, and just like my sons, instead of taking restful time to pray or walk or get away, or read my bible or blog, I throw myself into another afternoon of riduculous activity that only serves to tire me out further and make me even more short tempered with those I love!  (Does this sound familiar to anyone? I can't be alone in this!)  Instead of realizing that my impulse to snap at my husband is God's way of telling me that I need to take time to reconnect with him, I impulsively and self righteously get mad at HIM!  

Just like my kids try to show me they aren't tired when I already know they are, I take on more and more as if to show God, "see I can handle this! I don't need you to tell me to rest", really I do.  Just like my kids need me to enforce strict bedtimes and safety rules and keep a nap routine. They won't do it on their own; just like I won't make wise choices on my own without God.  

Lord, I am so sorry I waste the time I should be resting in your arms and listeningnto your wise counsel screeching about how dirty the house is or taking on random projects that wear me out more. I will try to do better, Lord, and to listen to both the warnings you give me in my own body and in my heart!