Perpetual Ruminations

A Pretty Good Bad Day

It's a bit late getting in here again, 11:19 my time. Once again, it's the same daughter with the same issues and I'm still just as stumped with how to deal with it. But, I did make it in again and just managing to get a daily blog entry is kind of nice.

It was kind of a long day, the oldest daughter was having some difficulties right away this morning with her distant learning, so she emailed her advisory teacher. The school is shut down until after the first of the year, but he's managed to get advisory students in a couple of days a week so they can get extra help. He set it up so she should be able to go all week, starting today, so we had to scramble a bit to get her off to school when my wife drove in for work.

The younger girl did pretty well, but had a bit of an attitude because her sister gets to go to school and she doesn't. She loves school but a lot of it has to do with hanging with her friends, but she doesn't quite understand that even if she did go, they wouldn't be there. In her mind, it's unfair that her sister can go and she can't and she argues that if she could go so could her friends who are also advisory students.

Once she was finished with school work, she relaxed with her phone for a bit. I had taken my computer in for repairs and have been waiting for it. I received an email that it was fixed and ready for pick up. It's an hour and a half drive to the store where I took it in and had to pick it up, and when I tried to drop it off, I had to make an appointment, which had me waiting for over two hours to leave it to get fixed. So, when the email stated that I needed to make an appointment to pick it up, I didn't hesitate to click the link and do just that.

The soonest I could get the computer was today at 7:40 to 8:00 this evening, so I took it and confirmed the reservation. A few minutes later, I received a confirmation email that I was to bring with me to get my computer. Great, I was excited to have it back. But, about half an hour later I got a call from the store. I was told that the store closed at 7:00 so I wouldn't be able to get in at the reserved time. I explained why and what, and he apologized for the whole mess. He said if I could get there before seven, I could pick it up anytime and didn't need a reservation.

So, I decided to drive over and get it, taking my youngest with me to do her Christmas shopping. This got things stirred up again because she doesn't like long drives and would rather stay home on her phone with friends. We talked for a bit and she seemed to do pretty good again, we went to pick up the computer and then to get something to eat. After I let her do her shopping and we drove home. The evening went fine, then she went to her room and watched an hour of television and came out to read before bed. Instead of settling in, she insisted that she wasn't tired and didn't want to go to bed.

I explained, again, that if she wasn't able to sleep after spending time on her phone and watching television, I would have to set the times back and get her off the screens so she could sleep. She instantly developed an attitude about if I didn't get my way I would take things away. I didn't want to get a fight going tonight, so I dropped it, she read for a half-hour and is now still trying to get to sleep. I know screen time can interfere, but she tends to do pretty well. It's more her general attitude that I'm up to spend time in here, then she should be able to stay up, too.

I know it's nothing more than her not going to school and being upset because of the restrictions, She has no way of directing her frustration towards our elected officials or the virus behind this, so it's directed at me. But, I'm getting tired; I can't do anything about any of it and it's making everyone's life miserable, but how do I relay that to a thirteen year old?