Life, I admit, the past few months has been utterly exhausting. It’s a really busy time of year, the time of year when I look forward to early June, which is the end of school and all the “school year” commitments that run from September to May. I wouldn’t give up a minute of the time I have volunteered to lead 4-H and Cub Scouts or to teach Sunday School to my children’s class because it keeps me involved in their lives, but being a parent is the hardest job in the world, hands down. Somedays, I just sit down and cry from the pressure of wondering if I am making the best decisions in terms of discipline and expectations, and if I am just loving them enough. Our world is so critical of parents, and I can be just as bad because I see all kinds of parents with my career in education, and I always think I have the easy answer for them (well, if they’d just do this or that…their problems would be solved), and although I know the world’s “right” answers due to my education and experience in child development and child care, I also know how hard it can be to apply that knowledge to each unique child in this world. The most challenging part about it is that I can relate to both sides as an educator and a parent, and I hate it when others are critical of me as a parent or an educator because I really believe each day that I am doing the best I can with what I’ve been given, so I know I should not be so critical of others as they are doing what they can with their given lot in life.
I am not a perfect woman, and I make mistakes, both as a parent and an educator, but who is perfect and doesn’t make mistakes? Ultimately, isn’t what’s most important that we spend time with our babies before it’s too late, that we hug and kiss them as much as we can before they can’t stand it anymore, that we teach them how to be strong, to believe in themselves, to take care of themselves, and to make good, moral choices in school, work, and life…isn’t that the most important thing? Why is all of this on my mind today….
Well, lately my days seem to be filled with too much nagging of my children, too much of trying to get them to eat better, to act better, to be better than they are, but am I criticizing too much…I know that I thought my dad criticized me too much. But, maybe he was just trying to teach me how to think critically, to make wise choices, to be a better person. The other side of the coin for me is that I tend to do a lot for my children instead of making them do it, which isn’t fully teaching them how to be independent and do it for themselves, but that probably comes a lot from my own upbringing. My mom is a homemaker, and she loves being a homemaker, so we didn’t help with dinner much or load dishwashers, or wash clothes or really a whole lot of chores around the house until we moved out and were on our own because my mom loved us and enjoyed doing those things for our family. I find myself, for the most part, enjoying doing those same things for my kids, but I worry that maybe I shouldn’t be doing so many things for them because I’m surprised at how much my kids cannot do on their own. These are the things I struggle with as a parent each day. How much do I put on them and how much is just part of my job as a parent?
It doesn’t help that they are being raised by two single parents in two entirely different households as children were made to be raised by two parents in the same household. I completely understand why God set it up that way now. Some days I am too overwhelmed or feel too soft to play the tough disciplinarian, and some days I am too hard altogether on my children for no good reason, but I have no one to share those difficult days with, no one to take up the slack or give me a break when I need one. My fiancé is very good about helping me when he is here, but the nature of our situation precludes him from being a full time parent with me for now. And so, I get tired and sometimes just want to be the mom and not the disciplinarian. I know their father probably feels the same way some days.
It’s hard to raise them on your own, but so many have done it before me, including my own mom from the time I was twelve on up. And here’s the rub…I turned out just fine. Even though my mom and I didn’t spend hours in the kitchen together with her teaching me how to cook, I still gained the skills to figure it out on my own, to know how to pick out a cookbook and follow a recipe like she does. I didn’t expect someone else to do it for me, just because she cooked for us for so many years. I knew enough from growing up around my mom and watching what she did, and I’ve called her a few times along the way to get a recipe or ask about a favorite dish she used to make us, but I still took on the responsibility like the adult I had become. That’s because my mom did teach me independence; she taught me by her example rather than by directly walking me through it. Instead of cooking together, we spent hours talking instead, hours spending time together, just the two of us, and as I grew older, I saw how hard my mom worked to take care of me, and I recognized that I could be helping her more. That’s how I learned to take responsibility for the house and how I became so good a vacuuming and homemaking, because I started to take on some of the housework for us and followed her excellent example on how to perform what some might call, these mundane tasks. And obviously, her actions spoke very loud and clear to me because as I grow older, I see so much of her in me. How just today I asked my son to put the picture he was looking at back in the right place, and how I later had to move it to the side a bit because it was half of an inch off from where I wanted it. And how I naturally go around the house cleaning up after others (sometimes before they are even finished with what they are doing) and get told by my fiancé, “I can take care of that.” It’s just part of my mom’s nature, of my nature, to be a caretaker of the home and the family. And that’s okay, isn’t it? It’s okay to have a heart of service and not feel that you are letting others walk all over you. It’s okay to sometimes do more for your family than maybe they do for you. It doesn’t mean they are not learning how to be what they need to be when they grow up just because they are not tasked with being an adult so early on. I long to be a kid again some days, with no real responsibilities, and part of me just wants them to enjoy that while they can.
I think my biggest challenge is just helping them to recognize when others do for them and to be respectful of that and when they are asked to do something, to do it willingly and without complaint, but part of me thinks that a lot of that comes with time and age, and each day, I find myself “picking my battles,” so to speak, deciding if I want to fight the eating issue or the disrespect issue or if I just want to spend some quality time with them and not battle at all. They say with marriage that you have to choose each day to love your spouse. Of course, you love them, but you have to choose to make those loving choices each day. It’s the same with kids. You naturally love them from the day they are born, just as you never really stop loving the one you’ve chosen to spend your life with, but you have to choose how you will love them each day. Do they need “tough love” that day to get them through a difficult time or do they need the kind of love only a mom can provide? No matter how frustrated I become with my kids, no matter how long or difficult the day at work or at home has been, in the end, I just want them to know how much they are loved and how I am there for them because no matter what I do or don’t do for them, they will grow up to make their own choices. I DO hope to have some influence on the kind of people they choose to be, but will it really make a noticeable difference that I didn’t ALWAYS require they eat what I served at every meal or that they didn’t ALWAYS turn off the light or wipe the seat in the bathroom when they forgot to lift it? Isn’t what matters most that we laughed, cried, and told fabulous stories of our lives with them over the dinner table, that we took the time to explain the reasons why we were asking them to help around the house or use manners and the fact that we showed them the same kind of respect and manners we were teaching them about every day that they spent with us? Won’t they learn more from what they see us doing than what we “nag” them about? I don’t mean to say that I would ever stop teaching them these important life skills and lessons, but maybe I don’t need to stress myself out about it so much…I know how fast time goes by, and I don’t want to look back and wish I had spent more time loving them and less time nagging them.
And this is what happens when a month flies by without writing…All the thoughts, worries, and stressors I have not had time to “write out” flow out like hot lava in a jumble of Faulkner like run-on sentences that I can only hope some of my readers can make sense of and gain some insight from, even if it’s only to say, “good, I’m not the only parent who struggles with the difficult task of child rearing.” Thank you for “listening,” whoever is left out there after my severe lapses in writing…it’s good to write again. Feel free to share your insights on parenting and/or your frustrations if my humble musings have moved you to share something…and Happy Parenting! J
