Olivia\'s 2007 Letter to Santa

Olivia writes to Santa every year and the following is the letter for this year which she wrote early last week.



Okay, looks like mommy has some explanation to do for "yelling at Olivia with no reason". Although I bet there was a reason which I couldn't recall right now (probably nothing big), I did apologize to her after I saw this letter.

It was one of those days that I had so much in my mind about work and was irritated that I had to work again at night.  And it is true that when I am in such mental state, normal misbehavior of the kids can get on my nerves and I tend to raise my voice if they don't listen to me. Even though I think "impatient" is probably more appropriate to describe the tone of my voice, the kids perceived it as "yell".

Knowing I have this tendency, I have tried to tell myself to keep calm and reason to the kids patiently when they don't listen to me, try to push the envelope or purposely challenge me. However, it doesn't always work out and every time after I raised my voice, I felt bad afterwards especially when it was for small things. And if I realized that was the case, I would tell them why I "yelled" at them and that I didn't do it on purpose and I wish they would behave next time in the same situation.  

It's a learning process for me to try not to carry the stress home in certain time period when I am overloaded at work. And I envy so much those mothers I have seen who seem never to lose their patience and loving voices with their children.