鈥泪听wish people would just relax. Parents need to lighten up,鈥� my friend said to me on the phone the other day. I looked around my living room, suddenly overcome by an Orwellian sense of being watched.聽
I asked him what he meant and he launched into an excited tirade 鈥� which isn鈥檛 uncommon, he鈥檚 opinionated and gets easily worked up about such things. Fortunately, it makes for great conversation.聽
鈥淲e all need to chill out,鈥� he said emphatically (there may have also been a few expletives sprinkled in there which I鈥檝e edited for popular consumption). 鈥淓very little interaction and mistake a child makes is not a big deal. It鈥檚 more important to teach them to enjoy themselves in life, and love themselves, than it is to perfect themselves.鈥�
I mean, what does he know anyway? He鈥檚 only got three kids 鈥� two of which he acknowledges have been identified as having 鈥渟pecial needs.鈥� Simple gross total, that鈥檚 one more kid than me, and on my crude parenting scale that means about five times the work over having just two.聽
Math has never been my strong suit, but you get the gist. He wins this round based on numbers alone.
His words really hit home for me. And once I accepted that he hadn鈥檛 secretly installed a nanny-cam in my house I took time to reflect on what he was saying.聽
It鈥檚 hard for any of us to look closely at the areas in which we are struggling or to examine hard truths.聽
Many parents, myself included, are often able to identify things we say or do as potentially damaging to our children 鈥� even in real time. It鈥檚 not because we don鈥檛 love them, it鈥檚 because we are without the resources or skills to make better choices when we are triggered by our child鈥檚 behaviour or emotions.聽
Possibly one of the key reasons we (over)react the way we do 鈥� by yelling, or berating or merely giving a deft look that indicates our disappointment 鈥撀爄s because we are overcome with the notion that this moment in time will forever DEFINE the person our child will become.聽
That their thoughtlessness, carelessness, selfishness, unkindness, forgetfulness, laziness (insert any judgemental word you can muster here) will be the way they are perceived until the end of time rather than it just being a momentary error in judgment.聽
Sure, it may be a moment that they can learn something from if you approach it wisely and in a tempered manner, and then again, maybe not.聽
I recently had the very humbling experience recognizing this in myself (hence the brief suspicions of being monitored).聽
Brushing out my daughter鈥檚 hair I realized she hadn鈥檛 washed it as we had previously agreed she would.聽
It might have been the way I sighed, what I said or even my body language, but regardless of how, I quite clearly communicated that I wasn鈥檛 pleased and she had done something 鈥渨rong.鈥� Watching her face crumple in the mirror, and then flush as she held back tears was enough to do me in right then and there.聽
Certainly not every moment our child says or does something we find displeasing needs to be a 鈥渢eachable moment.鈥� Sometimes the best thing is to just move on.聽
Maybe we all just need to 鈥渃hill the @#$% out,鈥� as my pal 鈥撀爉ore accurately 鈥� said. 鈥淟et鈥檚 all make mistakes and enjoy life anyway.鈥漃retty good advice all around, I鈥檇 say.
