The first time my 3-year-old says these words to me, I silently lift him up, carry him into his room and deposit him on his bed, ordering him to sit there for three minutes — a classic time-out.
When the three-minute timer beeps, my boy emerges wet-eyed and tear-streaked, wounded. He has said the worst thing he could think of, and in return his worst fears have been realized: He's been exiled, banished. For a child as sociable as he is, as craving of interaction, it must surely have been torture for him, those three minutes. He's solemn as he declares he will never, ever say that again.
Never is a long time for a 3-year-old. Too long, because the next day I hear it again: those ugly words, flung like a dare. Punish me. Make me cry. In response I promptly burst into tears of my own — not fake, I'm-trying-to-get-you-to-empathize tears but real, frustrated, raw tears, the tears of a woman who doesn't understand where her sweet boy has gone.
"Mommy? Why are you crying?" he asks tentatively.
"Because you keep saying you want to punch me and it makes me so sad!" I say. His lip quivers and soon he is crying too as if he's the wronged party, as if he's the one who's been betrayed.
"Now I'm sad like you!" he cries. "We're both sad!"
We're both sad. I think of all those times he cried as a baby and my job as a mother was just to make him happy again: dry, warm, fed, loved. How much simpler it was — happy, or sad? — before I had to worry about guilt, shame, fear.
Later that day, knowing I've handled it poorly, I turn to the Internet for advice. I can't be the first mom whose son has said he wants to hurt her. The Internet has answers for me, as it always does, about how I should have reacted, the mom I should have been in that moment; the mom who's composed, who doesn't want to say hurtful things back, who can love her child unconditionally even when he's angry.
When he was younger, when there was just happy, or sad, I'd sing a song to comfort him when he was upset about going to daycare. I love you all the time, I'd sing, to the tune of "The Farmer in the Dell." I love you all the time, I love you all the time, even when I'm not with you I love you all the time.
The next time he explodes with anger I am ready for it with deep breaths to drown out the blood pounding in my ears. I move myself out of kicking range. "I love you," I say loudly over his tantrum. "I love you all the time."
It feels hokey. It feels insufficient. It feels unjust — how can I let him say these things to me? But I force myself to look at him — my boy, his chest heaving, his feelings too big for his body. I tell myself, It's not about you.
That night, we are coiled into his small bed together, our foreheads touching. He asks me to stay. I stroke his forehead, the way I did when he was a small baby going to sleep.
"I love you all the time," I tell him. "I love you even when you're sad, I love you even when you're mad. I love you all the time."
He shuts his eyes, tightly. He nods along.
"I love you all the time," I say. "I love you even when you're grumpy, I love you even when you're silly, I love you all the time."
His eyes slide open and he smiles — the smile I remember, the smile I adore.
"You love me," he whispers, his breath filling the space between us. "Even — " He pauses. "Say the words all again."
And I do.
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