Is parenting your oldest always tougher?

I seem to be getting more stressed out with the boys lately. There have been hardly any days (if any!!) over the last week where I didn't over-react or lose my temper with the boys (mostly Robert, it has to be said) over something. Mostly "just" shouting. But a couple of incidents I am not proud of (well, I'm not proud of the shouting - so I'd go as far as to say downright ashamed of myself). It's so hard, this parenting thing. They get older, they push harder. I bend, and bend, and then I break. I am learning - gradually - to become less brittle. But I feel like I am not learning fast enough. I am not keeping ahead of Robert, in the slightest, sometimes. And that makes me feel so horrid - for my poor eldest son, who is bearing the brunt of the worst side of my nature. It feels easier with Christopher. I've been there, done that, I know what to expect. But with Robert, every new thing is something new. I have to devise strategies, and ways to deal with things. I do my best on the fly, but these things are still relatively new. And on a generally stressful day, those new things are less easy to deal with, and then we're back in Bad Mummy Land.

Yesterday, I wanted to go to Tesco, as we were running out (or had run out) of a lot of staples. Robert, being the independant lad he is, was getting his coat on by himself, and doing the zip up, when the zip got caught halfway up. His coat's inside seam behind the zipper is very flexible and thin, and gets caught in the zip very easily, and when this happens, tantrums tend to ensue. So, quick thinking Mummy decides to dash over, and help out straight away to avoid the tantrum. OH DEAR. Wrong move. "I WANT TO DO IT MYSELF!!!!" and even sillier Mummy, decides to persue the "No, I'll do it for you". The mother of all tantrums ensues, and I end up grabbing his head between my hands in order to get him to look at me. I shout. In his face. With builders in the next room. I am overcome with shame and just leg it out of the house with the two boys in tow with barely a backward glance towards the house.

Then, in the car, the questions start. Oh boy, I know it's supposed to be great, they're being inquisitive, they're using their brains and thinking things through, all that stuff. But oh my goodness - NOW??!! And it's always the same sort. "Mummy, what are clams for?" "Mummy, what are cars for?" "Mummy, why is that man riding his bike on the road?" "Mummy, why did you stop the car?" "Mummy, why did you make the car go?" And on. And on. And on. For the entire 15 minute journey, non stop. Sometimes repeating a question if he didn't like the answer. While I was trying to AVOID hitting said man on his bike on the road. (Have I mentioned how much I hate overtaking?? Anything?? Anywhere? Except on dual carriageways of course when it's easy) It's a wonder I didn't have any accidents, no doubt my blood pressure was sky high. I somehow managed to get parked in Tesco unscathed, and just sat there for a few minutes after I'd turned off the engine. Then, finally ready to face walking around tesco for an hour, I opened the door. "Mummy, why did you open the door?"

The next hour was spent with me learning how to use a new system Tesco had in place where you scan your own shopping as you go round, while stopping Robert from pulling the trolley into people/shelves, and actually finding what we needed. Christopher was a little star, and was NO effort whatsoever, sat in his seat. When we finally got home, I made them the quickest dinner possible (aka our infamous "bits and pieces" where I pull out random food items and shove them on a plate, including sandwiches, cheese chunks, tomato, cucumber, cocktail sausages, fruit, crackers, boiled egg, meat slices, maybe a small amount of leftover pasta or the like, that sort of thing), put the shopping away, and then collapsed into a heap.

The boys did a good job at stressing me out again today, with my mum here. Nothing new, particularly. Robert throwing sand all over the cement mixer in the garden. Robert tipping his chair back and forward (loosening the screws gradually) while eating his dinner, Christopher putting some food in his mouth, chewing it to tiny pieces and then spitting it out onto his plate. I had such stern words with them both that Mum and Dave made a hasty exit so as to rule out their presence as a factor of the misbehaving.

I don't know if most or all mums have the same huge difficulty with their eldest than subsequent younger children, but if they do, I now have some sympathy for my brother (and gladness that I am not the oldest), after all the years that I hated the fact that he was older, and got all the privileges, and the later bedtimes and all that stuff. And maybe, my brother, as a father of two, is also realising why, as he put it, I "got it easier". Certainly food for thought.