Apparently I don't have a lot of patience.
Or at least according to my kids........
I've been reading a biography on a man named Russell M. Nelson.
Many people know him, but those who do not, he was a famous heart surgeon (the man who pioneered open heart surgeon, actually), father of 10 kids and currently an Apostle of Jesus Christ.
Last night I was reading the part about how he and his children described their wife/mom, Dantzel.
They kept saying things like most patient person ever, angelic, never raised her voice, never complained about dad not being there, things in order and basically never made a mistake.
She MUST be something else because
1) she NEVER saw her husband during his medical training. And heart surgery residency is forever long before they ever had those cap on working hours.
2) She had 9 girls and then 1 boy. AND ANYONE who deals with that amount of estrogen on a daily basis has my NEVER-ending respect. Because she went through having a 7 year old girl 9 TIMES OVER!!!!! (I can't imagine)
Well, I started thinking, I wonder what my kids would say of ME!!! Because all the stuff I read about her, I had a sneaky suspicion would never be the memories of my kids for me.
The 4 older kids were in a room and I asked them,
" Would you guys say that I am patient?"
Basically in unison all three boys said, "Oh NO NO NO!" and Aleeya said, "Yes! I think you are! I think you are patient!" (she's such a pleaser. She knew that was the answer I wanted)
"Really? You don't think I'm patient? I mean, I could reeeeeally lose it with some of the things you all do and I don't, but okay. If you don't think 'patient' describes me, what two words do you think DO describe me?"
They basically couldn't think of ANYTHING at first so I made them think of two things. After a while Bronson said, "You are nice.......and a good cook."
"Oh, okay, thanks. Camden, what two things would you say described me?"
Camden: "YES, I would DEFINITELY say you are nice, but I can't tell you why I think you are because then you would stop doing it."
"Go ahead, why do you think I'm so nice?"
Camden: "Well, sometimes you forget to make us recite our scripture before we can watch tv or play the kindle and dad NEVER forgets to make us say our scripture. And the other thing?.......um.......You are really fast. You can put your make-up on fast in the van to church, you get us out the door fast, you make our food fast, you clean up fast. You are just fast."
"Wow. All right. Emerson, are you sure you don't think I'm patient?"
Emerson: "DEFINITELY. Because you yell 'Shut up'".
"WHAT?! Emerson, I have NEVER yelled that."
(Although I have WANTED to many many times)
Emerson: "Yes, you did. When you were popping out Camden in the hospital you yelled 'Shut Up' to dad."
"Emerson, a woman can yell whatever she wants when she is popping out a baby, and you can quote me on that. But back to the two things. So what WOULD you say to I am?"
Emerson: "Yea, okay, I guess you're nice. anddddddd.......um.........what do you call the word when you have a lot of babies?"
"Fertile."
Emerson: "Yea, you're fertile."
(This coming from the kid that asked me last month if I had a baby in my belly yet. I told him I didn't and he lost it and yelled, "WHAT?! Have you been taking that medicine to stop babies from going in your belly?"
WHAT?!?!?!? Where in the WORLD did he hear about that?!?!?! I have NEVER talked about that stuff with him. Wonder where he heard that.)
Okay, so far according to my boys I am,
Nice (three times over)
a good cook
fast
and fertile
(Sounds like a perfect epitaph to me, right?)
Then I asked Aleeya. She said I was "Good and patient."
I asked her if she KNEW what patient really meant and she said,
"Oh yea. It's when one of us are in the bathroom and you are waiting to go and you just wait and not yell, 'GET OUT OF THERE, I have to go NOW!' "
Yes, I AM a mom that allow my kids to eliminate without interruption. If only they got their
"fast"-ness from me, and then I wouldn't have to wait as long for them to finish!
5 comments:
Hahahahaha I'm laughing so hard about this! And if I may offer a little perspective as a grown-up kid of a veeeeeery patient mother -- I think those descriptions of "patience" only come when kids grow up and start to realize all the times their mother could have strangled them and didn't. I certainly didn't think very many nice things about my mother when I was young, but as I grew up and began to really understand what was going on in the households of my friends, and started to realize the challenges of parenting myself, my appreciation of my mother's virtue (patience among them) grew by leaps and bounds. Also, as I've gotten older, I've started to forget the daily "annoyances" my mother perpetrated upon me or begun to see them in an entirely different light. I'm sure if you went back in time to ask Elder Nelson's kids, they would say a lot of the same things about Sister Nelson as your kids say about you. ("Fertile" in particular slayed me, haha.)
I'm sure you've seen this in yourself, but I just wanted to contribute my own two cents. ^_^
I bet one day your kids will look back and say mom is creative, free spirited, encouraging, competitive, giving, etc. if patient never makes it onto the list, it's still a pretty awesome list!
If anyone can compare to an apostle's wife, it's you. And, I agree with AnnMarie... Find an interview from their kids when they were younger, not older looking back. Hindsight is 20/20!
Fertile is great.. Wonder if he has read or seen The Giver and picked up on the birth control.
This just made my day! I laughed out loud at Emerson's answer...fertile?! Where does he come up with this stuff! And Aleeya is right, you ARE patient if you don't yell at them to get out of the bathroom when you need to go!! However, Camden needs to understand that "shut-up" is possibly the nicest thing you could say while giving birth without any drugs to take the pain away!! He has no idea, how "nice" you are for only saying "shut-up"!! GREAT POST! I love hearing stories of what the kids say and think!
Love thier comments! So funny. I've told Lee that sorry, he can never stand up and say I've never complained about church things! I'm impressed that Camden told you what he was thinking! I am that way with my kids. When they're already on the computer I remember that I forgot to have them do this and that beforehand. Oops. Though I do remember most of the time!
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