Whine, whine, whine

The whining will be the death of me, I am sure. My 4 and a half year old Monkey Boy is driving me to the brink. I am feeling frustrated and angry with him a lot of the time. Have to keep reminding myself that this is an adjustment period for everyone, especially my little people. To be honest, today that wasn't helping that much.

The whining starts soon after waking. We usually get a nice half hour cuddle in bed before he gets going, thankfully. I get up with him and we go downstairs to get milk. It does not matter what kind of cup I get, it is the wrong one. This morning there were no clean sippy cups, so it was, "Why do I have to have this cup? I want my sippy cup!" complete with tears.
Yesterday I asked, "Sippy cup or not?" His answer was sippy cup, so I made it and then he pushed it away angrily, refused to drink it and cried that I gave him a sippy cup and he didn't want one.

Then it is time for food. "What do you want for breakfast, Monkey boy?"
Him, "Nuffing. humph."
Me, "Well it is time to eat and this is your one and only chance to have me make your breakfast. What will it be? Oatmeal? Cereal? Toast? Eggs?"
Him, "Hurumph. I don't like any of our food. I want waffles."
Me, "I am not making waffles."
Him, "Fine then, I will have butter toast."
Me, "How about some peanut butter on that, for some nutrition?"
Him, "No. I hate peanut butter now."
So I make him the buttered toast, unwilling to fight with him. I am careful to butter it completely and then place it on his plate just so, with no cutting. Usually he will whine if I cut it, that a) he doesn't want it cut or b) I cut it wrong. Any way I cut it is wrong. He will also whine if I don't cut the toast, but at least that is undoable. Today he whined because I put one piece on top of the other and he wanted them side by side. "I hate it like that. I don't want that, I hate toast!"
He will then usually bring on tears and push the plate away and stomp out of the room.

I tell him that this is breakfast. He may eat or not, but there will be no other food. I will not stand for any more whining and if he wants something he needs to ask, rather than whine. This brings on the 'hurt feelings' crying. His face looks like his heart is utterly, irreparably broken.

I am so not falling for it. I am done with this freaking whining all the bloody time. I proceed to be a good parent and ignore him. Eventually he will eat the toast, today it took until about 10:30 and I found him at the table, eating with a smile on his face.

Every interaction of our day is like this. Everything I, or anyone else does is met with whining. Whatever we do is wrong, even if it is done exactly the way he asked. Instead of asking for what he actually wants though, his first reaction is to whine at what is there.

The most oft repeated phrase out of his father and my mouths is, "What do kids that whine get?"
"Nothing!" Monkey and his sister chant in unison.
"How do we get what we want?"
"By asking! With words!"
"So?"

Today though? I had enough. When he started that crap at the dinner table, because I had put his ketchup on his bun instead of his salmon patty, I started ranting to his daddy.
"I have had enough of this whining crap! He has been doing this since he got up! Every single thing I do for him is wrong or not good enough! I am going insane, I can't stand one more second of this!"

Monkey boy paused in his whining and tears and shoving his plate at me, to stare at me with a slightly hurt, but more 'my mom is nutso' look on his face. But he still wouldn't eat that burger for another half an hour.

I bailed to take the teenager to youth and let Daddy deal. I could feel the steam rising from my ears already.

I do realize that my stellar parenting of late is not helping the situation. And that he is only 4, and we are about to add another child to our family, and he is probably in need of more reassurance and attention than usual. But some days I just want to stick my fingers in my ears and scream lalalalalalaala at the top of my lungs while running to hide in my bed.