
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: THURSDAY, April 27, 1995                   TAG: 9504270024
SECTION: EDITORIAL                    PAGE: A-11   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: EMILY HAMILTON
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

BUT MY KID WILL NEVER ...

IT HAPPENED in the lighting department of the Kmart in State College, Pa., in the winter of '85. I was 4 1/2 months pregnant with our first child (at the "Is she expecting, or just fat?" stage of my pregnancy), trying to recall if we needed 40- or 60-watt bulbs for the living room lamps.

There, not 6 feet away, a toddler-size girl broke from her mother's grip, threw herself on that cold tile, and started flailing her arms and legs, all the while piercing the aisle with siren-like screams.

I couldn't help it - I stared. Then I backed up, turned away and continued to surreptitiously view the situation from the corner of the next aisle. I couldn't believe what I saw: a grown woman, older than me, helplessly watching a 26-inch person's uncontrolled anger. I grimly rubbed the protruding part of my stomach, silently, confidently confirming with my child the assurance that nothing so base and embarrassing would ever be allowed to occur with my offspring.

Now jump with me to a fall afternoon almost two years later. (Why are you already smiling?) We now lived in beautiful Roanoke, and my 17-month-old son, Jay, and I were at some store at Valley View Mall. (I can't recall the specific store - perhaps, because of the nature of the memory, it has been repressed.)

Jay had disobediently removed his body from the stroller, and was cruising with malicious intent toward a ground-level clothing display. I aborted his mission by grabbing his hand, saying "No!" and purposefully helping his little frame redirect itself back toward the stroller.

And then, as if out of nowhere, Jay pulled his hand out of mine, gave me a look that, were he older, could have translated into something obscene, and threw his body on the floor, kicking and screaming.

I couldn't believe it. I was one part shocked, one part horrified, and all parts humiliated. Where had I gone wrong? Why was this child, being nurtured by parents with only his best interests at heart, throwing all that love and concern down the toilet? And, where did he learn how to do a temper tantrum in the first place?

(Having seen temper tantrums for years now, I theorize that there is a small, clothbound manual in sign language that toddlers secretly pass to each other via diaper bags, outlining the Standard Operating Procedure for Temper Tantrums. This hypothesis explains why all tantrums basically look the same.)

Without going into the methods that help discourage children from choosing tantrums, I need to say that eight years and four children later, three of my children no longer "do" them. Alas, the fourth child is almost 18 months old, and just last week started showing signs of discontent and rebellion.

Perhaps he got the manual from that cute, 19-month-old girl in the church nursery.

Emily Hamilton of Roanoke is the mother of four boys.

by CNB