Not my Best Day

I have had a very frustrating day. Didn't sleep well last night. Headache all day. JEFF!

I have had a headache the entire day. I woke up with it and it's still there. I've tried Advil, caffeine, sleep, fresh air, and simply ignoring the problem. No luck. It ranges in pain from just annoying to 'I think my head is going to burst!'

I got an email from one of Jeff's teachers today. She said that he hasn't turned in any work in over a week. He's pulling a 30%. When I asked Jeff about it, I got his standard answer. "Don't worry about it; I'll bring up my grade." I immediately gave him a hard time for leading me to believe that he'd been keeping up with his work even though he missed school for his retreat.

I also told him he was grounded for not turning in his work. In true Jeff fashion, he justified everything. Even though he hasn't started his first major paper, he has until Friday and he'd get it done. Even though he hadn't turned in his two journal assignments, he had actually finished them...just forgot to take his thumb drive to school. Etc, etc, etc.

Have I ever mentioned how much I hate arguing. Maybe I haven't, since I haven't had to do it in so long. I need to live in a world where I never have to argue. I'm really bad at it. I HATE it. It makes my head hurt, my stomach churn, and I'm less than effective. And I never win. I throw in the towel EVERY time. NOT a good thing when you're supposed to be parenting.

So, even though my hard and fast rule is that if you don't go to school, you DON'T get to make plans for the evening, Jeff is at a volleyball game. I have to admit that one of the reasons I gave in to this argument is because I simply needed a little peace in my day. Shame on me! It's inconsistent parenting like this that most likely led to the behavioral problems that relocated Jeff to his dad's for two years.

I even cried out of frustration today. First time in a long time. Ugh!

I'll try to do better tomorrow.

It's not been my worst day ever, not by any stretch. But I am really looking forward to tomorrow because I fully expect it to be better than today.