Okay, I’ve written about how I have become a more relaxed parent and how I’m less judgmental of other parenting styles than I used to be. This is all true. This also might give you a false idea about what kind of parent I am. In spite of some relaxing and an ability to not throw up in my mouth anymore when somebody uses the phrase “attachment parenting”(For real, people- because I fed my baby on some kind of a schedule you think I’m not “attached” to him? I find the phrase itself offensive even though there are parts of the philosophy I believe in), I am still a pretty rigid parent. And I want to tell you why.
We raised kids in reverse order. We started with the big kind and have slowly over the last ten years worked our way down to a newborn. For five years Brian and I worked at a children’s home and the first group of kids we had included an 18 year-old, a 17 year-old, 3 13 year-olds, an 11 year-old, and a 6 year-old. It makes me exhausted just writing that out. But we loved it and we loved those boys. It was an incredibly helpful experience and has kind of made me wish everybody had to spend some time parenting a teenager before they could bring a baby home from the hospital.
The boys we worked with had moms who loved them, but were not in a great position to be parenting at that time. This meant that for some kids negative coping behaviors had been developed to help them deal with stress at home or an unpredictable parent situation. We sure didn’t blame the boys for learning these behaviors because for some of them it was the only way they survived a difficult situation, but it did mean we had to work on some basic training issues or teach skills about how to live as part of a functional family.
This has had a huge impact on our parenting today. When you’ve seen a 17 year-old pitch a fit, you do not find it so adorable or excusable when you see a two year-old pitch one. When you have a 13 year-old treat you disrespectfully and you realize what a long process it is to earn their respect and trust, you develop a sensitive radar for disrespect out of your four year-old. If you’ve parented a child who was given too much freedom before they were ready to handle it and permanently scarred their life with wrong decisions, you determine to be very conscious of the way you hand out freedoms to your children.
I’m not saying we’re big fans of being overly sheltered with our kids. We haven’t chosen to toss out our TV or to homeschool our kids (I have a lot of respect for homeschooling moms, it’s just not the right thing for our kids at this point). We aren’t rigid or graceless because we want to control our kids behavior, but I know exactly what an undisciplined heart turns into if left unchecked over the years. So there are things we respond to with jackrabbit swiftness- disrespect, rebelliousness, anytime we’ve said “no” and our directions aren’t followed. While I have much less negativity about people who parent differently than I do, I still struggle with seeing someone’s angry, out-of-control four year-old because my mind is seeing him all grown up. At age 16 he’s still throwing things and kicking the wall, but now you can’t just distract him with a lollipop.
You know what, Moms? It’s easier to deal with it now. I know you’re sleep deprived. I know it’s kind of cute when they stick that lower lip out in a pout. I know it’s simpler to just give in than to stand behind your “no”. Other people may be telling you it’s just a stage and they will probably grow out of it. But what if they don’t? What if you take away the behavior and just think about what is in the heart of this child? What does that look like unchecked ten years from now?
We’ve got to be tough. We’ve got to love our kids enough that we’re willing to be consistent even when it makes us the bad guy. We have to earn their trust by being the enforcer of what is safe and what is kind. We’ve got to help them learn how to succeed in the world by teaching them to follow the rules and respect authority. We’ve got to teach them about the character of God by reflecting it ourselves- in our grace and forgiveness as they respond in repentance to the awareness of their sin. It’s not always the easy road, but it’s a lot easier to deal with these issues when they can’t walk out the door and drive away.
Be consistent, Mamas! It pays off in the end.
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