mean mommy...

I am at the end of my rope.  My children will NOT pick up their stuff.  (This post is mostly about Brianna because I know she understands what is expected of her)  I ask nicely, we try the jar thing, I give her one thing to do at a time so she doesn't get overwhelmed.  The other night I was done trying to reason.  I got a big black garbage bag and picked up every toy on the floor and put it in the garbage bag to throw away. (Just so you know I have threatened her with this, it wasn't as if this came out of the blue).   Brianna sat there sobbing, begging me not to throw her stuff away, and still she didn't try to pick anything up.  she was inconsolable by the time Bob got home.  I took the bag in the garage to wait for garbage day.  I felt horrible the whole time I was doing it, but I wanted and needed to prove my point.  I couldn't cry or show her any sympathy.  (Although I did cry later when I splashed boiling water on my stomach as I was draining pasta for dinner...sobbed actually, and it had way more to do with "throwing away" her toys than the pain of the burn).  I am just afraid that this isn't going to get through to her...that she has too much "stuff" for this to really affect her in any significant way.  I guess we'll see what happens, but days like that one make it really suck to be the mommy, to know that while you try to do everything you can to protect your child from pain to be the one actually causing them pain in order to try to teach them a bigger lesson.