Lifestyle

Starving the Beast

You guys, I really am an ass of monumental proportions. I really don’t know what is my deal lately, but everything (and I mean everything) makes me angry or cranky or hypercritical or entitled or snipey or sarcastic (which, as much as it is funny to watch on television, is not really helpful to situations or a particularly kind way to deal with small children). Even attempts by Hapa Papa and poor Cookie Monster, who so desperately wants to please me, fall flat and either make me meaner or only temporarily make me feel better. Then I revert back to my horrible, beastly, selfish self.

I really want this to be a hormonal problem. Or an “other people” problem. Or even a situational problem.

But really, it’s a character problem. My character problem.

I really hate that.

I mean, even the way I wrote the first paragraph is telling. I’m some poor victim, reacting and blindly lashing out at all the cruelties and insufferable indignities my lousy children and husband are lobbing in my general direction. It’s their fault I’m cranky or mean. Why can’t they just get their shit together? Why am I the only one who has any sort of fucking sense?

But I know, deep down, that it is all my fault. I am choosing to be an ungrateful, cruel, short-tempered, exacting, whiny little child throwing a pique because I can’t have all the things all right now in the manner that I am accustomed to. I have no care for how my actions affect my children or Hapa Papa or anyone else. All I am thinking of are my needs. My wants. My preferences. My desires. Everyone else could just go suck on a rock.

Of course I know what I’m doing. I am a grown up who is not completely oblivious to social cues and how people work. And yet, I keep feeding my selfish inner beast. I choose to be a jerk and each time I give in to my baser desires, the choices become less and less obvious and become more and more a way of life and a way of being. It is becoming harder and harder to stop. (Oh, let’s not sugarcoat. I rarely rein in my sharp tongue these past few days and weeks. I’m not even sure for how long it’s been going on. This is a super big problem.)

Telling myself to knock it off already isn’t really helping either. I’m just going to have to accept the fact that vices are easy to fall into, but climbing out of them is like detoxing – rather difficult and full of withdrawals. I think first and foremost on the list is for me to just STFU. That awesome zinger I want to throw at Hapa Papa? Not helpful. (Particularly when he’s been graciously swooping the kiddos out of the way of my immediate wrath.)

Constantly criticizing Cookie Monster for whatever four year old thing he did to get attention because his mommy has been a real bitch lately? Not kind. (Gamera constantly scolds me for being unkind to Cookie Monster. She is quite a fierce little sister. Also, when I scolded her this morning, she growled, “You can’t talk to my ear! You don’t know what you talking about it!” She escapes most of my criticism because she is very good at manipulating me. Cookie Monster, however, is like a giant golden retriever puppy. All enthusiasm. No cunning whatsoever.)

But really, who wants to be a screeching banshee all the time at their kids? I’m not even yelling at them so much as tearing them down, little by little. Gamera might hold up just fine since she’s a brawler, but Cookie Monster? That sweet boy’s soul is withering right before my very eyes. (Although, come to think of it, he’s a pretty good manipulator, too. He constantly looks up dolefully with his big, brown eyes and says all wobbly, “You scream at me, Mama.” Even when I didn’t! Just because he knows I will immediately apologize and then he’s wriggled out of getting in trouble. My children are way too smart for me.)

Anyhow, before I got sidetracked by the brilliance of my own children, where was I? Ah, yes. Shutting the proverbial fuck up.

We are going DefCon1 on my inner beastie. It is times like these when I pray desperately, “Help me not be me!” I think it will take both divine grace and all my humanly power to fight my natural evil inclinations. I know at the root of it is my heart being a hard and recalcitrant piece of coal. I can only hope that a combination of God’s mercy and my tackling the outward symptoms of being mean will help.

As for being silent ? That will require a miracle. Or some metal wire.

Author

Virginia Duan is the entertainment editor for "Mochi Magazine," a freelance writer, and an Asian American author who writes stories full of rage and grief with biting humor and glimpses of grace. She spends most of her days plotting her next book or article, shuttling her children about, participating in more group chats than humanly possible, and daydreaming about BTS a totally normal amount.

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