Sometimes it’s easier just to let it go. Because I hate when I have an adversarial relationship with anyone, especially my children. But then the disrespect reaches an all new high, and a little part of me shrivels up inside while I yell and lash out on the outside. I may put on a brave front, but like most mother’s I want my children to like me or at least enjoy life with me. (Ok, maybe not enjoy themselves all the time, but at least some of the time).
At MOPS yesterday, I was talking with the ladies at my table and I said “I have lots and things I’d like for my children, but when it comes down to it, I really want them to be decent human beings and actually want to come home to see us.” Obviously that is simplistic, because I want so much more than that for them. But at the end of the day, while I want them to be independent, I also want them to come to me when they need me.
I never know how to balance dealing with their behavior issues and hoping they will sense that I love them. Because I know that I am human, and I will mess them up. I believe God’s grace is sufficient to cover those mistakes. Yet,I sometimes fear that perhaps it won’t be. That either I will let too much go, and they will become self-centered, entitled little creatures (as truthfully, we all are, but for the grace of God) or I will be too hard on the, making life seem like drudgery and drive them away from both me and God.
It is so hard to be a parent. It’s like trying to juggle while balanced on one one leg, on a tightrope. (Oh and the tightrope is pitching in the wind and it’s over a gorge.) That’s how it feels some days.
Maybe it’s not my children’s behavior I need to deal with (though I still do) as much as I need to face my own flaws and hurts and my deep desire not to pass those same issues on to my children. Though as I said to my friends yesterday, we will mess our kids up, it just may not be in the ways our parents messed us up. There are no perfect parents on this side of heaven. Accepting that while still striving to emulate Father God is the continuing challenge I must cope with.
