The Price of a Short Age Difference

Sibling rivalry is in FULL effect here at home. We're going on a few weeks of near constant fighting between the two boys and I am still without a clue as to how to get it to stop. Of course, they will stop fighting when grandma and grandpa are around, but that's not really a surprise. :^)

I have tried timeouts, spankings (even though we reserve spankings for more serious offenses, like running away in a parking lot), taking toys away, even just ignoring them when they start screaming and yelling. I do believe that John and I shouldn't step in immediately for every single fight, as the boys need to learn to figure things out/problem solve on their own, but that can only be used for a certain period of time. I have to step in once the punching and biting
starts. I also believe that they need to learn to respect people with their words and tone of voice, so when they start screaming at me, I tell them that I refuse to speak to them until they can speak to me nicely. But sometimes the screaming goes on for 30 minutes and I feel like I need to lock myself in my room to keep from losing it.

I am so tired of all the yelling, screaming, throwing things, biting, hitting, punching, kicking that has filled my days for way too long. I get it - they're both boys. Boys fight. But this is unbelievable and bordering on absurd.

On Monday, the boys both threw such huge screaming tantrums while I was driving, the entire car was shaking. I had to stop at a stoplight and what do you know, a motorcycle cop pulls up next to me. I was so convinced he was going to pull me over to see what on earth was happening with the two children in the backseat (had I kidnapped them??), but as I sheepishly looked over at him with my head in my hands, he gave me a look that said, "I am NOT getting anywhere near your car, lady!".

I have a few theories on what might be causing all the fighting and behavior issues, but unfortunately, there's not much I can do about it.
Nathan started having night terrors about two weeks ago and is up multiple times a night. Which means I'm up multiple times a night and Aiden is getting woken up multiple times a night. It's a normal phase for this age and there's nothing that I can do about it. So we're all sleep deprived and crabby. I've looked like I have two black eyes for a week now due to the dark circles. We have no extra room to move either boy into until the night terrors stop, so we're stuck.

I know that the boys feel cramped in the apartment. Obviously, we're attempting to fix the space issue by buying a house, but I can't make it happen any faster than it is. I can only take them outside so often and I know they don't feel like it's enough. I try to provide them with as much varying entertainment as possible: Playdoh, paint, chalk, crayons, blocks, train tracks, musical instruments, legos, board games...you get the idea. We've been baking. I take them shopping. On Aiden's school days, I stick around for a little while and let Nathan play. I'm trying and trying and nothing is helping.

It's possible that John being at work so much if causing some of the behavioral issues (they do seem to act much better when John is home). It's not fun for me to feel like a single mom for a huge chunk of the week, but the constant fighting between the two boys is making me feel like an absolute failure because I have no idea what else to do. I'm beginning to think that the "experts" who say that this age difference is "perfect" didn't actually have any children of their own.

This is a huge reason as to why we all need to get the heck out of Oregon for a little while. Every single one of us needs a big change of scenery and Disneyland sounded perfect. We just have to make it until March 24th.