You know those children's stories that explain some natural phenomenon, like "This is how the turtle got its shell?" Well, this is a story I like to call, "This is how Milo got his claustrophobia."
It's Friday night and my four year old daughter Annabella and I are snuggled on the living room couch reading The Story of Holly and Ivy, which is this sweet little book about a sweet little orphan girl in search of a family and a sweet little doll in search of a sweet little girl. We are enjoying this precious little mother-daughter moment that's so absurdly darling that it could sell a million greeting cards for any holiday.
Upstairs my two year old twin boys, Milo and Huck, are torturing each other. I can tell this by the screaming and the door slamming. After a while Milo's screaming is no longer the happy-to-be-tortured kind. It's muffled, so I assume that Huck has shut him in one of the bedrooms and he can't get out. They're at this interesting stage where they're very good at closing doors, but not so good at opening them.
I get up slowly from the couch and casually head upstairs. These boys are always biting, pinching, scratching, head-butting, and otherwise attacking one another. I do not want to be a mom who fights her children's battles, even if they're with each other. Plus, if I stepped in every time they weren't getting along I would literally not be able to do anything else. And besides, they share the same DNA, so it's a fair fight.
Huck meets me halfway up the stairs.
"I put," he says.
"You put what?" I ask.
"I put Milo."
"You put Milo?"
"I put Milo in the laundry."
Even then I'm not alarmed, since I think he means the laundry room. It's not like that hasn't happened before. But as I reach the top of the stairs I realize that Milo's screams are really muffled, so I run to the laundry room, open the door and although I don't see Milo, I still hear his muffled screams.
They are coming from inside the closed dryer.
I open the door, grab him out of there and hold him.
He's fine, really. He says, "Hold me like a baby," which I do and he snuggles into me and pretends to whimper. Both of my boys love this crying baby routine. But right now it's me who is really hyperventilating, thinking about what might have happened if I'd decided to ignore the screaming and let them work this one out on their own.
I still plan on letting all my kids fight their own battles, play on the playground without spotters, and say hi to strangers when they play in the front yard. But from now on I will probably keep the door to the laundry room closed and never, ever teach them how to turn the dryer on.
*I wrote this post by request from Miriam over at MotherTalk. She didn't pay me, but she did invite me to take part in their Blog Bonanza where hundreds of bloggers are asked to write on the same day about the same topic. This particular topic is kids, play, and danger. The Bonanza is designed to help promote The Dangerous Book for Boys and by writing the post I was entered to win a copy of the book.
Like I needed a reason to write about dangerous boys.
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