Words a Dad Does Not Want to Hear
“Hey, dad!” he called from his room. I was down the hall, in the office, at my desk, cleaning up my writing head for the day so I could be all there for the boy who was supposed to be putting on his pajamas.
“What is it?” I called.
We’d just gotten back from taking his sister to karate. I told the boy that we’d get ourselves together, maybe read a book, then go pick up his sister, and all of us would get ice cream, which in my house is one magical word.
“I’m peeing!” he said, as happy and as chipper as I think I’ve ever heard him.
“What?” I said.
“Oh,” he continued. “I’m peeing! I’m peeing right now.”
I was starting to get concerned. He didn’t sound like he was in a bathroom. He sounded like he was still in his room. And since he’d turned five last month, he’d peed in his nighttime diaper so much less frequently that we have considered letting him sleep like a big boy, in underwear alone. Then a night comes like last week when the diaper leaks, and he wakes up wet, and then he begins to cry, and he wakes the whole house with his tears, and we think, hey, let him continue to wear the diapers at night. What’s the big deal?
“I’m peeing in my room right now, daddy!”
Those are words that a father does not want to hear from his five year old son whom, last he saw, was standing naked in his room.
“You’re peeing in your room?” I asked. “Right now?” It seemed like it could not be possible. I stepped away from my desk and looked down the hall. And there he was, my son, standing at his open gate, on the threshold, really, between the bedroom and the hallway, and he was peeing on the carpet. All this dialog happened within fifteen seconds.
I stepped down the hall. The bathroom, you see, was the next door over. A toilet was less than five feet from where he was standing.
“Why didn’t you use the toilet?” I asked. It was all I could think to say.
He just stared at me, put his hands together and shoved one of his forefingers into his mouth. He does that when he’s scared he’s in trouble.
“Why didn’t you use the toilet?” I asked again.
This time, at least, there was a shrug.
“Go to the bathroom,” I wish I’d said. Instead, I screamed, “Why didn’t you use the toilet?” It was my loud daddy scream, the one that says daddy has been pushed to the limit. The sound a son does not want to hear from his father.
It was that look he gave, the fingers in the mouth, the shrug: it enraged me. When I saw it, I wanted to shout in his ears, grab him, and shake him, and make him just say something, dammit! I know that look well, as it’s the same look I probably gave my own father when I thought I was in trouble. Look sheepish. Say nothing. It’s better than saying anything at all.
Except when it’s not.
He began to cry. I took his arm and pulled him into the bathroom. I sat him on the toilet and then I shut the door. I did the best thing I knew to do: I walked away. I went back down the hall, stared out the window, and breathed.
I heard the toilet flush, and soon his little face peered around the doorway. He had his fingers in his mouth. He was scared. But he was brave. My brave, brave son. All my anger slipped away.
“Come here,” I said, stepping out from behind my desk.
We met each other and I wrapped my arms around him and he wrapped his arms around me. I let the moment settle, and then I said, “I’m sorry I yelled.”
He hugged me tighter and said, “I’m sorry I peed on the floor.”
I sent him downstairs for a towel, and he jumped up and down on the floor like it was his personal trampoline. He was having a blast.
Teachable moments come from everywhere. Learning to let go of an emotion is hard, no matter the emotion. In my case, it was anger. In my son’s case, it was fear, maybe a little bit of shame. The way we learn to move on from those emotions, to not let them take us over, is to get them out of us (hopefully in healthy ways) and then let them go.
Even the words you don’t want to hear.
