When Only Mama Will Do: The Mommy Centric Toddler

Toddlers don't handle family emergencies well.

As we had reason to learn on the eve of Hurricane Irene, when, while many made tracks out of the city, my father-in-law came in to receive medical attention. Diabetes had weakened him, and the failings of age made it difficult for him to care for himself. My wife spent all of Friday night with him at the hospital, the beginning of several days of stressful preparations to find him help, during which family members came and went. Conversations carried the charge of urgency, and the heaviness of worry.

Our toddler son, ever sensitive, attuned to it all like a little antenna. He slept badly. He requested television all the time, wanting to watch the same two programs ad nauseum. And he clung to my wife, perhaps sensing her anxiety, or else anxious himself that she might suddenly disappear to deal with some new wrinkle in the crisis.

These events only exaggerated what has become the new norm. The kid's got it bad for Mommy.

Whereas he used to turn mommy-centric solely on the weekends (), his obsession has dripped into the everyday workweek, what used to be quality daddy-son time. When I wake up in the morning, he cries and howls “no daddy!” When Mommy leaves for work, he tells me to go away, “far away.” He resists leaving the house, instead sitting by the window in wait for her. During midday siesta, he rouses himself after an hour expecting her to be there, then attacks me when he finds she's not yet home. I guess in his mind, since she comes home after nap, then rushing through nap should get her there faster.

So I met Wednesday morning with some trepidation. My wife and her brothers would be taking her father back upstate, leaving me alone with the tot for more than 24 hours. What could I do to keep his mind off mommy? 

My plan: make it special.

Wednesday night I scheduled a picnic at the Brooklyn Botanic Garden with one of his friends, a twilight play date that would keep him up past his bedtime, but hey – when Mommy's away Daddy and son will play! And leave the toilet seat up. The next morning we would keep the good times rolling with a trip to Bergen Bagels, then Underhill Playground, where I'd run him around so he'd be tired for nap.

Ah, but you know where this is going.

It all started out well enough. The picnic play date wore him out – he fell asleep quickly and with no fuss. I settled in bed next to him a bit later, playing the co-sleeping role my wife usually takes. He slept soundly through the night. Better than me, up and down with worries and bad dreams. I missed my wife's soothing presence as well.

I awoke to a flurry of kicks, and cries for mommy. “Mommy in red bed,” my son said, referring to the color of the sheets on our bed in the next room.

“No,” I said. “It's just daddy today. Mommy will be home later.”

With that, he really lost it, thrashing, crying, attacking – a full 11 on the tantrum meter. “Calm down and we'll go get some bagels,” I said.

His body froze – legs bent in mid-kick, tiny hands curled, clawing at his hair. “Bagels?” 

“That's right,” I said. “Bagels! And you can even stay in your pjs while I stroller you there.”

“Bagels,” he said again.

I smelled victory in all its toasted sesame seed glory. Then it all fell apart. 

“Bagels now,” he said.

“That's right, we'll get them now.”

“No. Eat bagels now. With mommy!”

“Uh...”

As you can imagine, he lost it again, and again after that, and once more when I finally got him in the stroller. “Work with me here, man,” I kept begging him. 

But a toddler doesn't work with anyone, not when his routine gets thrown off, making him scared and frustrated, and not when he's with someone as familiar as dad. As my scars prove, he's comfortable showing me his dark side, unleashing his fear and anger on my body. It's hard not to take his daddy prejudice to heart. Why am I, his constant daytime companion since month three, now his most hated foe?

A part of me had hoped that with his mother gone we might snap back to our old light-hearted ways, with him playing Sancho Panza to my Don Quixote. But no, the morning went abysmally.

After much pleading, lots of tears, and a repeated barrage of the dreaded M word, that trip to the playground finally happened. Once there he proved more needy of attention than usual, losing his temper if I talked to the other adults. At nap time he struggled for an hour before falling asleep. He seemed perturbed because I told him mommy wouldn't be home till later tonight, not after work as usual. He just couldn't seem to understand, if she wasn't at work, then where was she? Why wasn't she here? 

All I could do was offer him plenty of hugs, even in the face of his worst tantrums, and remind him that everything would be ok soon enough. Much the same tactic I took with my wife, when she needed support.

By Friday, the situation with my father-in-law had resolved, and our schedule returned to normal, with me the odd one out, the third man. Though that continues to be an uncomfortable position, my extended time alone with him provided me theories on his mommy-centricism.

My son has yet to fully grasp the flow of time, he knows only the rhythm of our family life. Breaks in the routine, either weekends or holidays or emergencies, confuse and scare him. And he's in a completely ego-centric place right now, as evidenced by his amoral, almost sociopathic violent streak. It seems to frustrate him that he can't manipulate the world to his own ends, that he can't ask for Mommy and have her this instant.

Add to that a tendency toward being high-strung, something he likely inherited from anxiety-prone me. A therapist once explained that my nerves, like a guitar, are tuned a little bit higher than the norm. My son has always met changes in routine with much upset, and his desire for mommy perhaps comes from the fact that the world is a scary place right now, nearer to making sense than ever before, but still out of reach for him to affect. Mommy's his security blanket, his panacea.

Who knows – maybe my energy ratchets up the tot's anxiety, maybe we're an echo chamber of bad vibes. Things certainly got tense during those many hours with the two of us on our own.

Whatever the case, this phase he's in is nuts. All I can do is go with the flow and offer him love, trying not to take it personal when he doesn't want that comfort from me, keeping a calm and unaffected demeanor even when he gets nasty.

Easier said than done.