If you have a clingy child, you know that it is no simple task to set him down, leave him with a sitter or get housework done without him on your hip.
Some might say we are spoiling our kids. Others might say we are torturing ourselves beyond what is necessary.
But what we are really doing is meeting the unique needs of our unique children, making life more interesting in the process.
These are some snapshots of what everyday mama life is like with a clingy toddler.
Church Nursery
Having made the long journey from the back of the parking lot into the church building with a led-weight diaper bag over my shoulder and my perfectly-capable-of-walking-toddler in my arms, I head to the nursery check-in counter.
Standing in front of the check-in screen, I momentarily wobble as my daughter shifts in my arms, causing the diaper bag to sway, the weight of it nearly knocking us into another mom checking in her child.
I offer my apologies to the smiling mother and plop the diaper bag on the floor with a thud before turning my attention to the other load throwing off my balance.
“Sweetheart, do you want to get down?” I know this will be an absurd idea to my daughter, but it’s worth a try.
She shakes her head emphatically, causing her long, soft hair to swish back and forth across her face, confirming she is not interested in making Mommy’s job any easier.
Switching her to my left side so that I can use my right hand to press the appropriate buttons on the screen, I hear one of her shoes fall to the floor.
“Oh dear, we lost a shoe.” I bend over to retrieve it and my daughter giggles as she dangles upside-down, her hair effectively sweeping the floor as I reach for the escapee.
I stand back up and attempt, once again to check my daughter into the nursery, but my efforts are quickly derailed when she suddenly throws her upper body backward, hoping for another upside-down ride.
Quickly grabbing her around her back with my free hand to keep from dropping her, I try to explain to her why her stunt-woman moves are not a great idea right now.
Her continued grinning and backward arching indicate she either does not understand me or doesn’t care.
“Mommy is going to have to set you down, Honey.”
As I lower her to the ground, her legs wrap around my leg and refuse to budge, forcing me to stop mid-bend at an uncomfortable angle which is sure to make my chiropractor a rich man.
My daughter continues frantically clinging to me as though the floor is covered in hot lava, her butt just inches above perceived danger as it hangs lower than her legs.
“Honey, this is killing Mama’s back!”
She is not overly sympathetic to my impending back injury as she squeezes her legs more tightly around my leg and keeps her fingers firmly entangled in my shirt – which is now quite immodest due to being stretched halfway down my chest and arm.
Giving up, I stand back up, tugging my toddler back into my arms, and resume my attempts to check her into the nursery.
Once she is finally checked in and her nametag pops out of the little printer on the counter, I pick up a pen to write my phone number beneath her name.
“Pem! Pem!” my daughter shouts excitedly as she grabs at the utensil in my hand.
“Mommy needs to use the pen, Sugar.”
I readjust her weight against my side so that I can hold the nametag down while I write. This gives her the opportunity she was waiting for to grab the nametag.
“Peh-pah! Peh-pah!”
“Yes, paper,” I acknowledge as I press the tag to the counter to prevent my little paper thief from pulling it away from me.
I manage to finish writing down my phone number and we eventually make our way to her nursery room.
Dropping her off follows the usual pattern of hysterical crying and having to pry her arms and legs off of me as I hand her over to the capable hands of the nursery worker.
But I no longer expect a text ten minutes into the service notifying me that she hasn’t calmed down. She, fortunately, now calms down and plays after I leave her, not that she would ever admit this to me.
Instead, she puts valiant effort into making sure I know how abandoned she felt the whole time by resuming her wailing shortly before I arrive to pick her up.
As I walk toward the sanctuary, I’m grateful to have the freedom to listen to a sermon without a child distracting me – something I haven’t been able to do in over a year.
I love my clingy little girl and I love meeting her needs … But every mama needs a break now and then.
Bathroom Breaks
My daughter has been napping for the past three hours, over two of which have been in my arms. This, combined with the immeasurable amount of water I consume each day to quench my breastfeeding thirst, has led to an urgent need to relieve myself.
I try to be patient as my sleepy child gradually wakes up, nursing as though she could lay in the comfort of my arms all day.
“Are you ready to get up?” I inquire eagerly, despite the lack of any indication that she is in the mood to move.
Her big brown eyes glance at me briefly before returning to a glazed, blank stare.
Suck, suck, suck.
Wondering how much patience is “enough” in motherhood, I debate the consequences of waiting a little longer to relieve myself versus forcing my groggy daughter to get up before she’s ready.
Ultimately deciding I have a legitimate medical emergency, I sit her up in my arms and rise from my faithful La-Z-Boy recliner rocking chair, feeling the pressure in my full bladder all the more in the standing position.
Suddenly aware that my time is extremely limited, I toss my nursing pillow on the floor and lunge toward the door.
As I rush into the master bedroom searching like a mad woman for something exciting to persuade my toddler to let me set her down, she digs her dagger-sharp nails into my arm, obviously fully aware of my intentions.
Fearing my bladder may actually explode, I dig my husband’s scientific calculator – the one he doesn’t let our daughter play with – out of the nightstand drawer and offer it to the little person in my arms who will decide the duration of my misery.
She rests her head softly on my shoulder, content to take her time deliberating the benefit-cost analyses of accepting the conspicuous bribery.
Dancing in place anxiously, I am reminded once again that giving birth severely alters the patience of a woman’s bladder.
Calling on all the heavenly powers of the Holy Spirit, I pray for deliverance from my agony as I crouch down to gingerly attempt to disentangle my clinging daughter from around my torso.
Finally, the lure of buttons just waiting to be pushed and a screen that lights up are too much temptation for my daughter. She releases her hold on me and becomes engrossed in the forbidden toy as I set her on the floor.
“Sorry, Honey,” I whisper, thinking of my husband’s recent admonition against allowing our daughter to play with his calculator.
I take off toward the bathroom, rivaling the speed of an Olympic runner, hoping my daughter doesn’t break the calculator in one of her famous “drop tests.”
It might not be good parenting on paper, but sometimes, bribery, temptation and breaking the rules are the only way to survive.
Cooking
The timer on the oven goes off just as the simmering pot of potatoes on the stove begins to overflow. I rush to turn down the stove temperature before snatching an oven mit out of a drawer to check on the baking chicken that is running behind.
As I am sliding the oven wrack out, my daughter wanders into the kitchen and reaches for me, oblivious to the danger before her.
“Stay back!” I raise my foot to block her path to the oven door with my leg. “This is hot!” I explain when she begins to cry. “I don’t want you to get hurt, Sweetheart.”
Trapped, I stand in my kitchen like a flamingo with a heavy, steaming dish halfway turned on the extended oven wrack and my hysterical toddler latched to my raised leg.
Afraid I’ll splash boiling liquid on my daughter if I continue wrestling the pan, I try to distract her from her current obsession with my leg.
“Baby, where’s Tigger?” I ask, infusing my voice with intrigue.
Her crying instantly stops and my captive leg is suddenly freed when she throws her hands up in the air, indicating she, too, is wondering where Tigger went.
“Can you go find Tigger?”
To my great relief, she toddles away, hands still raised, looking for one of her favorite bath toys.
Knowing I have approximately 23 seconds before she will return to the kitchen wanting to be held, I quickly finish rotating the pan of chicken, close the oven door and reset the timer.
I stand in the middle of the kitchen for a moment trying to prioritize what I have yet to do for supper that I cannot do while carrying 19 pounds of cuteness in my arms.
Having used a precious five seconds trying to decide what to accomplish next, my daughter walks back into the kitchen just as I’m opening the fridge to pull out the veggies I need to wash and chop.
“Up! Up!” She demands, reminding me in no uncertain terms that my first duty is to meet her needs.
I sigh with frustration over the fact that supper is going to be very late – which means my daughter and I will not be able to eat with my husband since my daughter’s lack of nap time today will necessitate an early bedtime.
“Alright,” I concede as I stoop down to lift my daughter. “You can ride with Mama and help me get supper ready, okay?”
As soon as I place her on my hip, she requests her second favorite thing in the world (although closely rivaling Mama for first place): Milk.
“You want some milk?” I ask rhetorically. Of course she wants milk. It will be a moment for the history books when she declines Mama’s milk.
I release the milk dispensers from their confines and my daughter is content to drink and suck away while I grab veggies out of the fridge with my free hand and rinse them in the sink.
Grabbing a cutting board and knife out of the cupboard, I arrange all of my vegetables and instruments on the counter and raise my leg (I must have been a flamingo in a previous life) to balance my daughter on my thigh.
“Mife,” my daughter says as she points to the sharp utensil in my hand during a half second break from her milk-drinking.
“That’s right,” I confirm. “This is a knife, and it’s sharp, so you can’t touch.”
My warning is met with more sucking.
Placing my foot on a cabinet handle for support, I keep one arm snug around my daughter to keep her hands away from the knife as I attempt to cut into a rolling carrot with the other.
I chase the reluctant carrot around the cutting board with my knife before finally managing to behead it with a crack!
“Dah!” My daughter narrates with her usual enthusiasm, making me smile. Life is so much more colorful with a toddler providing sound effects to everyday tasks.
Despite the awkwardness of the positioning, I am grateful for the sweet feeling of my baby girl’s little arms wrapped around me as I continue to stab at the carrots on my cutting board who are attempting to escape execution.
Motherhood is an odd mix of joy and frustration, but the beauty of it is that the joy somehow always outweighs the frustration.
Having a clingy toddler can be difficult at times, but the heart-melting moments when my daughter looks at me with trust and contentment in her eyes are priceless.
I wouldn’t trade my clingy toddler for the world. Besides, clingy is just code for extra cuddles.
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