You Mean You Have One of THOSE Kids Too?

"I thought I was the only one in the world who was raising a difficult child."

That was one reader's response to my post last week. The one that I agonized over before finally clicking "Publish." After all, as a parenting writer and educator, aren't I supposed to be entirely on top of my kids? Aren't I supposed to be able to gently guide them, parent them, help them get along with each other without fail?

The truth is that some kids are just easier than others. And if you don't have a child like mine, you won't understand. But if you do have a child like mine...you're nodding your head and grimacing as you read about the reality you live through every day.

"He refuses to shower, he's gone to sleep in his clothes the past few nights, refuses to go with his carpool so I have to take him to school every day....Oh, its a lot of fun."

Please don't judge this reader, unless you have a child like this. A child who sends his siblings off to school covered in scratches and bruises -- all caused by a tantrum because Mommy tried to lay down the law. And before you get out the phone to call the cops on this out of control abusive kid...

He's five years old.

Yes, if you have a child "like that," rest assured that you're not the only one. I sometimes think that the most important part of the parenting groups that I lead isn't even the techniques that we discuss -- although parents find them extremely helpful -- but the feeling of relief when all the moms realize that they're not the only ones who are struggling. One mom talks about her toddler who climbs on the dining room table and spins the chandelier like a top, and another mom gasps, "Yours too??" One mom complains that her five year old daughter has started intentionally ignoring everything she says, to the point that they visited the ENT just in case she was having hearing problems, and three more say, "Wow, you're kidding! I thought only my daughter did that!"

But these problems are relatively normal, mostly age appropriate. Kids who have issues with social skills...with impulsivity...with obeying authority...These kids are the ones whose moms are constantly stared at by the other moms at the playground. They watch that mom fail to set a limit and think, "If that were my child, I would never let him behave like that." The ones who seem to act so normally for a little while and then suddenly -- BAM! -- explode.

I guess, to some degree, it's a gift that I struggle so much with Bub, a gift that I struggle to teach him about communicating with others, about keeping his hands to himself, about obeying even when you think you know better. After a parenting group session recently, one mom came over to me and bared her soul to me. She told me about her daughter, age 4, who she's pretty sure has ADHD but is too young to get an official diagnosis. Her daughter, unsurprisingly, sounded almost exactly like my eldest. She was shocked to hear that I "have one of those too," and that it was he, primarily, who pushed me to become an addict to parenting research and advice.

So yes, we exist out there in the world. We are the moms whose little ones don't seem to conform to the norms. We are the moms who have kids that look normal, who don't have an official diagnosis (yet?) for us to apologetically fall back on, but who force us to dig down inside ourselves and wrench out every last ounce of patience that we have. We are the moms who often feel so alone, so downtrodden, so sure that everyone else in the world would parent our kids better than we do.

But we're not alone. There are so many of us out there who are struggling -- some less, and some much much more. And yes, others might not understand, others might judge, but there is a firm core of us who are working harder than anyone out there to give our difficult-to-raise kids the best childhood that we can, to help them focus their fiery personalities onto the fuse that will rocket them to success.

Don't let anyone -- including your own insecurities -- tell you otherwise.