Fat Arse Friday and my terrible week

Yeah. I know it's Saturday. Well, technically it is Sunday but I just got home from work so it's still Saturday in my world. Friday was busy in my house. I did not turn on my computer, which is saying a lot. I forgot to way myself until Saturday morning.
So...

Total weight loss- Zero.

Total weight gain- 12 ozs.

I know. I suck. I'm not entirely disappointed though, as on Wednesday I was up 3lbs. And with all the chocolate almonds I ate? I can live with 12 ozs.

So from Wednesday on my week sucked.

First we have a leak from our shower. And where does it leak? Onto my craft table, destroying a file folder of tags destined for Beccy This is the second leak, the other one is from the kids shower and drips onto the freezer in the garage. Our pipes need a major seeing to apparently.

And then there was Liam. God forbid, I could have swung for that child. Wednesday afternoon the girls had an appointment at the pediatrician (it is quite alright that Saoirse doesn't eat...she is holding steady in the 50th percentile. Sophie was Sophie. Friendly and talkative, the doctor proclaimed her as perfect. She too is sitting around the 50th percentile for both weight and height. Sophie is such a people person, I don't know where it comes from, because neither William or I are. Everyone just loves her. They don't see the temper tantrums!)

So anyway, Liam. Taylor had met my mum at the mall as she was buying Taylor a new fall coat and the girls and I were at the hospital. Before I left I took some money out of William's wallet as I was planning on meeting Taylor at the mall and treating her to her first ever manicure. Liam had slept over at a friends and didn't want to come. He was still at his friend's when we left so I didn't lock the door.

While at the mall I called to see if William was home and while we were talking he looked into his wallet. "How much money did you take?" he asks. I tell him and he says what has happened to all the money in there, there's at least $500 missing and so on. He has only a $100 bill in there, and I say that I know that I left at least a $20 as well. We narrow our culprit down to Liam. Who else could it have been? Taylor was with me, if someone had just walked in they wouldn't have left the big bill. It could only have been Liam.

As I'm walking home Liam calls out to me from the park and walks over. I ask him if he had been home. "Yeah" he said. "Did Tyler come in with you?" He says no, and I say that William is missing money from his wallet. Suddenly he hasn't been intp the house, he thought I said "Did you NOT go into the house?"

And you know, I so badly wanted to believe him. I did not want to believe that my son was capable of stealing off of his parents. I wanted to believe that it was Tyler's idea. We've always thought he was a bit of a troublemaker and, at a year older than Liam, he is definitely the leader. So I say to him that he had better think really hard about what happened and he better be home soon.

I get home and tell William that Liam hadn't been home. Like I said, I so wanted to believe him. But, I went to go to the bathroom and there was pee on the toilet seat. Classic Liam. As William and I talked I discovered that he came home to the door wide open and I knew that I had closed it over. So we knew that it was definitely Liam.

Confronted with these facts, he still denied it. And kept on denying it. We were pretty calm, surprisingly, since I especially tend to be a yeller. I was just too disappointed to yell. William said to him at one point that he was going to talk to Tyler and so Liam said "Ok I took $20 but I lost it at the park." As William and Liam were going to look for the money I said to William that I was going to go talk to Tyler's mom. This really upset Liam.

His mom wasn't home, but Tyler answered the door. I asked if he and Liam had gone to the store. Yes, he says. I asked where they got the money and he said Liam had some money. I said that actually, that money was taken from William's wallet and so I would definitely need to talk to his mom.

When I got home I said to Liam that I knew he had taken the money, and asked what they had done. He tells me they had gone to the movies. I said "And you paid for Tyler?" Yes, he says. I ask how he managed to pay for two tickets with only $20 and he says "Okay, I took $40" and he starts crying.

I called Tyler, said I know you guys went to the movies, and because you benefited from this you can pay half. I was, at this point, pretty sure Tyler was involved in this even though Liam was denying it. He had lied about everything else, why start telling the truth now?

The following things were said to Liam:

"If you can steal from your parents, that means you would steal from anyone. And, I swear to God Liam, if you ever get caught shoplifting, I will have them press charges against you."

"It's not as though we never give you money. If you ever want money for the store, we give it to you. If you had asked to go to movies, we would have given it to you. Why did you need to steal it?"

This is the sentence that made me start crying, and had Liam sobbing: "I have never in my life been so disappointed in anyone. I am absolutely devastated that you could do this." And honestly? I really haven't. Except for in myself, for having raised a thief.

I later talked to Tyler's mother. I had told her that I thought Tyler should have to pay half and she didn't agree with me, because she said Tyler didn't know that Liam had stolen the money. I did say to her that Tyler is not a stupid boy, that he should know that Liam is not the type to have enough money to treat a friend to a movie. I know that this is Liam's fault, I really do. I just don't believe that Tyler is entirely innocent in this. And I know that had the situation been reversed I would have offered her half the money whether Liam had been involved in the actual theft or not because he still benefitted from it. William disagrees with me on this one, as I suspect most people will.

The timing of this was just terrible. William had had a really small paycheque and with back to school things going on that $40 was needed. Taylor and I had just talked about how much back to school preperations (clothes, school supplies, haircuts, school fees, bus passes, so on) will end up costing and it is well over a thousand dollars. So for a family that makes very little money $40 matters at this time of the year. And it is fine to say that Liam can pay us back by working it off, but I wanted the cash in hand!

I am still so frustrated with him. I honestly think he doesn't care. I think he thinks we will forget all about this in a few days. When I was a kid, if I got in trouble I did all I could to please my mum. Clean my room? You betcha, it would be spotless just so she had nothing else to pick on. Liam? Clean his room? No, couldn't be arsed. Unpack the suitcase he has been asked to unpack everyday for 3 weeks? Nah. Even when I asked him to help me in the basement he did such a half assed job I just ended up yelling. At the rate he's going it'll be months before he's paid us back.

Just to cheer myself up I shall leave you with something Saoirse said (because she makes my day...I really wish Liam was 2 again. He was so sweet...what happened to that little boy?)

Saoirse likes to climb up onto the counter to get into the snack cupboard. She and William have a game where he plays monster and she runs away laughing. So this one day he goes into the kitchen, playing monster, but she has just climbed onto the counter. Can't run away so she yells "Look, Daddy, I don't want any trouble!"

Seriously, I love that girl.

Oh, and today I asked Sophie where her dummy was and I swear she said "daddysgotit" All fast and run on like that. Also, I called home from work tonight and she answered the phone (because she is always playing with it) and babbled away to me-even pausing when I was talking- for a good two minutes and then hung up on me.

I love that girl too.

And I love Taylor because she relented and got her hair cut, not as short as I would have liked, but about 4 or 5 inches were chopped off.

But Liam? I'm not even in like* at the moment.

And me? I am still wondering where exactly I went wrong.


*Before someone gets all therapy-ish on me and tells me that we are supposed to love our children no matter what, I never said I didn't love him, I love him very much, but I just don't like him very much at the moment. Sometimes? Liking is way harder than loving.