I’m going to be an awful mother for a second and admit that I don’t know what to do with my second child at all.

I’m serious, it’s like I’m living with an alien life form, I have absolutely NO idea what to do with him.

My oldest, Harry Potter, is a little bit confusing. He’s a boy and he has ADHD. Our brains aren’t quite aligned, but I think we are on the same wavelength about 45% of the time. While he’s crazy and smells like a boy, he’s still the oldest child so that need to succeed is strongly ingrained in him- that I get.

My daughter, the Princess, is the youngest and enjoys yell crying (why is this is a thing, if you don’t know what it is I’m happy to send you a video to enlighten you), but she’s a girl. And let’s be honest she does stuff like chop the strawberries to make jam and remind her brother to put his birthday present wrapping paper in the trash- so I get how her mind works.

But the second one… I’ve got nothing man.

No seriously, nothing.

Imagine the most stubborn person you’ve ever met, multiply that by a thousand, and then add a healthy dose of mischief into it and you’ve got AsthmaMan.

Every day is a battle with this child, like a screaming battle.

Let me give you one lovely moment from today.

Today we went to the pool with friends, it was delightful, but it was lunchtime. He refused to eat, flat out refused to eat despite agreeing at home and in the car and as we walked in that he would eat (eating is our latest control issue).

Lunch was served and he refused to eat.

He swam for another hour or so, still refused to eat unless I let him eat chips- fat chance kid.

Then it was time to go, and the child that also refused to eat breakfast was melting down fast.

Before you start to worry about AsthmaMan having an eating disorder let me assure you that when he wants to eat the kid can tuck it away. Put a bowl of white bean chicken chili in front of the kid and it will be gone faster than you can ask him if he wants some avocado with that. But offer him something he deems “disgusting” well good luck with that. The best part is that “disgusting” changes on an hourly basis so you’re never actually going to guess what is acceptable and what is toxic waste.

Anyway so he’s screaming about the chips, which I would not let him have until he had some protein at his party.

We leave, he continues screaming as we walk to the car. He stands outside the car while the rest of us get in and continues to scream. He eventually decides it’s hot and screams in the car. He changes out of his swimsuit and continues screaming.

And then he buckles himself in and asks for the sandwich.

The sandwich he had spent the previous 20 minutes screaming over.

He ate it happily, then ate his chips.

What the what?

Yeah.

I’m so confused.

So he’s a unique person, one that confuses me on an hourly basis. He used to be sweet, now he’s mostly evil.

But he recently made a friend, who I get the feeling is a lot like him. Which is well.. eery. I’m not sure what to think. I watched these two kids sit in the front row at church on Sunday and all I could think was “wow those two are living their best life together”.

I’m so confused by AsthmaMan but I get the feeling that the other little boy is less confused by his actions. I’m tempted to ask him why AsthmaMan acts like an insane person next time I see him.

Until the other 6 year old explains the mysteries of the universe to me, I’m going to sit here and wonder how in the world you raise an alien life form.

But on a positive note, his screaming fits are starting to bother me less… Which I think might be a bad sign but I’m going to take it as a sign that I’m battle hardened not losing my mind, you know it’s the small lies we tell ourselves that make the world seem rosy.