My 4-year-old son has a very strong personality that, according to his former speech therapist, who is also a psychologist, will serve him well throughout his life.   But, parenting such a stubborn child isn’t easy.  Especially now that he thinks he’s in charge of my pregnancy.

Thankfully, he’s incredibly sweet and protective most of the time. 

When my cartilage-challenged knees are hurting me, which is often with my 30-pound weight gain, he’ll throw both arms around my ever-expanding waist and say, “Mama, I will help you walk.”

On Saturday morning, when we returned from the grocery store with overflowing bags of groceries and Halloween candy to find my husband wasn’t yet home to bring them inside, my son announced, “Mama, you’re not allowed to lift heavy things.  You can only carry your pizza.”

And, he struggled under the weight of the gallons of milk and juice and the too-heavily-packed candy, which was slipping out of breaking grocery bags, as he stumbled from the trunk of the car, up our front porch steps and into the house.  He refused to let me carry anything but my one frozen pizza.

Chivalry is alive and well in our house.  But, some of his other militant behaviors are starting to get annoying.

I’ve written in previous posts about his daily declarations that I’m mentally incapacitated because I have “the pregnancy brain.”  

“Mama, did you forget my goldfish snack?”

“Yes.  Yes, I did.”

“It’s because you have ‘the pregnancy brain.’”

At first I thought this was cute, but now I hear it day after day after day, an unwelcome reminder that I have become a pregnancy-hormone-afflicted idiot.

Perhaps because of my “pregnancy brain,” he feels compelled to remind me of my pregnancy-related restrictions on an hourly basis.

If I say, “Sweetie, it’s raining, so we need to run into the house,” he’ll respond, “Remember?  You can’t run because you have the baby in your belly.”

I’ll explain that I don’t run, pregnant or not, that I was using the word “run” not literally, but as an expression.

But, every time I slip and use the term again, he makes absolutely sure I’m not being literal this time around, stating, “You can’t run, Mama.  The baby could fall out of your belly.”

But, tonight, he really crossed the line:  He came between me and my candy.

His favorite of our Halloween-candy leftovers are the Kraft® caramels.  And, after he finished his dinner tonight, he asked me if he could have some.  I said yes.

Unwrapping his first, he declared, “You can only have one.  You can only have one caramel because you know the baby needs healthy things.”

But Kraft caramels are my favorite too.  And, they’re ridiculously small.  Having just one is almost like eating nothing at all.

But, my son was so serious about the “just-one” rule, and he was being sweet, trying to protect his brother from sugar overload. 

So, what could I do? I agreed with him and ate just one, just one teeny-tiny, miniscule one.

Then, after he went to bed, I snuck three more. 

Yes, I’m 41 years old and hiding my candy intake from my 4-year-old.   As  I said, he’s not easy to parent.