Last night, I think (hope) we hit the peak of Sam's illness. (Have I mentioned that he's sick again? Not here, I suppose, but in the weblog. Actually, I'm not certain that this is an "again" so much as a "still." There's no more puking, but there's a nasty cough, a rattling sound when he breathes, and a nose that's running like a faucet, all accompanied by an intermittently nasty demeanor.) He woke up from a late nap, just after Eric got home from work, and began to cry. He wanted me to hold him, but that didn't comfort him. He didn't want to nurse, and he didn't want to eat dinner. He began to scream louder and louder.

My nerves were frayed, since I'm sick, too, but when I asked Eric to give me a break and hold Sam for a few minutes so I could recoup, Sam went nuts, kicking and arching his back to try to get to me. He worked himself into a frantic, sweating frenzy that didn't abate, even when I took him back.

This went on for an hour and a half, people. Eric wanted to take his temperature, but I felt that that would be an exercise in futility; after all, he was positively red and blotchy from his yelling. How accurate a reading could we have gotten? Instead, I suggested a bath. (Actually, I first suggested a family walk around the block, until Eric pointed out that it was freezing outside.) I ran the water, Eric undressed the baby, and I encouraged a sobbing Sam to pick a Tub Tint tablet to plop into the water. The yellow tablet fizzed and bubbled, an act that usually brings a grin to his face - but not this time.

He continued to shriek in the tub, clinging to the edge and howling. "I'm getting in with him," I finally said to Eric. He, immersed in children's health books, nodded. ("What time did you give him his medicine?" "A teaspoon of Zithromax at around one o'clock.") I hurriedly disrobed and climbed into the tub behind him, scooping him onto my lap. After a few moments of rubbing his back and swishing his toes in the water, his cries began to lessen. Abruptly, they became a questioning babble.

"I guess that's it," I sighed. "He's feeling better."

And, by this morning, he was.

Sam and I were in a store recently. We had finished shopping, and I was letting him play at the train tables before we left. He was cheerfully burbling as he pushed the engines along the tracks, and I was perusing the brochures for prices on tables, since Rita and Ronnie want to get one for Sam for Christmas. Suddenly, a train car in each hand, Sam looked up at me, giggled, and started to tiptoe down a neighboring aisle.

"Sam," I warned. "Get back here." He turned and ran, laughing. I dropped the brochure and chased him down; picking him up, I sternly informed him that running away was not acceptable. "You could get lost, or hurt, and Mommy would be very sad," I said. "If you do that again, you'll have to go back in the shopping cart, and we'll leave."

Sure enough, not five minutes later, I heard the same mischievous giggle. "Don't you think about it," I told him. Too late; he was off and running.

Thirty seconds later, shoppers on the other side of the store were wondering who was murdering a small child.

I spoke soothing words, acknowledging his anger and frustration, but at the same time, I wasn't backing down. Sam struggled in the shopping cart, trying to climb out; tears poured out of his eyes as he howled his indignation. I pushed the cart for the checkout counter as quickly as possible.

By the time we were done paying, his tantrum had petered out to a few shuddering sighs. He reached for me, and I carried him out to the car in my arms, hoping to God that the lesson would stick.

Parenthood just gets harder and harder. Sometimes I think back to when he was a newborn, and the most challenging things I had to master were getting him to open his mouth wide when he nursed and how to deal with diaper rash. Sure, he fussed, but it was almost always for a reason that I could fix; he wasn't really a fussy baby, or not as much as some.

Temper tantrums? Wow, this is new. For the first time, I think he's finally beginning to comprehend that his crying can affect us and potentially alter his environment; whereas before he would cry out of pure misery or anger, now he can use crying as a tool. Just as he can manipulate his cars to drive them around the floor, or manipulate his fork to put food into his own mouth, he's realizing that he might just be able to manipulate us. It's not a devious or "bad" thing, but an important stage of his development.

I'm working very hard to keep tabs on my own reactions. While I'm trying to encourage his efforts to communicate and experiment, I don't want to put him into a position of having too much freedom. In the end, he'll be miserable without limits, and possibly put himself in danger.

But, boy, does he hate it when I have to curtail his "fun." When Cory was here visiting, he asked me what the "Terrible Twos" were going to be like, and I explained that it was basically a massive conflict between a kid's rapidly expanding abilities and his realization that he doesn't have total control over his own environment. Really, that's what we're doing now, isn't it? Will it get exponentially more difficult as he gets older?

Wow. When they said it was the most difficult job in the world, they weren't kidding.