The Story About the Devil

There are some stories that need to be told and recorded for all time...and I figured, blogging about this one particular story is a sure-fire way to do both.

It's a story about Riley - my little hellion. 

Riley pushes everyone's patience to the limits.  She's the kind of child who could get you to gnaw your hand, grab handful of your hair and scream like a banshee.  She doesn't cry unless she wants something and she can't get it.  I nipped her neck a little just the other day while trying to cut her hair and she didn't even flinch or make a sound. She stares at needles going through her skin and doesn't even cry.  She's tough like that. But boy, is she a little scary. Unfortunately, she is so adorable in her antics that she often surprises people, leaving them laughing even when she's being horrible.

I must confess I, too, have my weak moments. However, I have been appointed the disciplinarian. This is why I am her least favorite person except when she's hungry or she needs Paige scolded, then she comes to me.  But because I am her disciplinarian, I am in company with spiders, ghosts, "aswangs" and every scary creature out there. Whoopee!

I don't mind though. As long as she doesn't grow up to be a sociopath, I am quite alright with that.

In the process of teaching her to behave, I sometimes scare her with the "fires of hell" and the "devil".  This doesn't work though. She doesn't scare easy, this child of mine. So, I had to resort to showing her pictures of the devil. I figured if she is scared of devil, she'd behave. (Yes, I know. I know. I am a horrible mother sometimes. I'd probably have Bantay Bata banging on my door with my methods.) So, yeah, I showed her pictures of the devil. I looked for the really scary ones and showed it to her. 

Here is one example:

Pretty damn scary, huh? You'd think it's scary enough to drive kids to behave. But did that scare Riley? No-uh.

It didn't work at all.

I was quite hopeful, but I was destined to be disappointed. This worked well with Paige, but this does not work for my pre-schooler.

Every now and then when she misbehaves and people scold her, you'd hear her screaming, "Sige! Maduman na ako sa devil!"

We found it amusing. She twisted the whole thing and she started scaring us off with her "going to the devil" because we were scolding her! Ingenious and devious, don't you think?  The first time it happened, I was flabbergasted and I ended up laughing my ass off. I really didn't know how to handle the whole thing.

This didn't end there.

The other night, she was playing restaurant. She was handing out imaginary food to us, her Papa and I, and to her imaginary friends. Erbe and I were both working, so we didn't pay much attention to what she was doing until I heard her say, "O, devil, udoy na. Ano pa gusto mo devil?"

Oh.My.God. I did a double take when the word registered, and said to her Erbe, "Did you hear that?! Ginibo nia pang imaginary friend ang devil!"

My antics completely backfired. I practically saw the devil reared its scary ugly head and bit my ass. This kid of mine doesn't scare easy. And disciplining her would be such a hoot, I imagine. Darn. If only her Papa could takeover, but she has him eating at the palm of her hand.

Oh, dear. Oh, dear. Oh, dear.