The tantrum heard 'round the world

When we were in S.C. for Christmas, Biscuit got to play with his cousin's snare drum. He seemed like a natural. He took the sticks in his hands and just banged the daylights out of the head of that drum. He only hit the rim a few times.

What I failed to remember is that he also got called down several (okay, many) times for hitting things OTHER than the drum with the drumsticks. He hit furniture, he hit toys and yes, he even hit a couple of people.

So that was the end of his drumming career.

For some crazy reason, the only part of the experience that I remembered was how easily he took to playing the drum and how much he seemed to enjoy it. I totally blocked out the flying sticks. So in Target last week, I saw a drum similar to the one he played and bought it.

It was actually a music kit. It has a snare drum with two drumsticks, a tuning key and a strap if he wanted to wear it like the little boy with the bandaged head in the Revolutionary War painting. It also included a tambourine, an ocarina and a harmonica, all of which I decided he could have when he gets a little older.

So while The Daddy Man was changing Biscuit's diaper, I took the drum out of the box, set it in the living room floor and propped the sticks on top. Grandma and Grandpa Mills were here, and I thought they'd enjoy watching him play it, too.

We sat around and waited until we heard the pitter-patter of little feet, and then he saw it! He grabbed the sticks and went to town. He banged and banged and banged. Our little Ringo!

And then my memory started to return. In his excitement, Biscuit ran toward me grinning from ear to ear but also waving those drumsticks in the air. So imagine my surprise when in his glee, he smacked me in the head repeatedly with the drumsticks before I could even figure out what was going on.

As soon as I gained my bearings, I grabbed the sticks from him and said, "NO!" (probably a little louder than I needed to).

What happened next just blew me away. Epic tantrum! A tantrum like we've never seen before! A tantrum to END ALL TANTRUMS!!!

He flung himself in the floor, flailed his little arms about and started screaming like someone was chopping off his little Biscuit head. I was in shock.

I have never experienced this behavior from this particular child, and quite frankly, I had no idea what to do. So I just sat there. I thought if I just sat calmly and stared at him, he would see that he wasn't going to get a reaction from me.

And if the Biscuit's fit wasn't enough on its own, I had to get onto The Daddy Man for pointing and laughing at Biscuit! He thinks it's funny when little kids pitch a fit because they didn't get their way. "YOU ARE NOT HELPING THE SITUATION!" I scolded.

Watching Biscuit go through his tantrum was the hardest thing I've had to do in quite some time. I wanted to grab him up and squeeze him and tell him I was sorry for being mean and taking those drumsticks away.

But I kept saying to myself, "It's for his own good. You cannot and will not raise a bratty child. You will say no to this child when necessary."

Finally, it ended. The whole episode had shaken me up so badly that I had to leave the room for a few minutes.

When I came back, the first thing I did was make eye contact with my Biscuit Baby. He came over and crawled up into my lap, and I knew everything was okay. I also knew that as hard as it was, I can do what needs to be done to teach him.

And of course, not that I would admit it to them (not to their faces, anyway) but I keep thinking, "Wow. My parents went through this same thing with me all those years ago." I wonder if they're desperate to say "I told you so!"