On Finding Your Own Way

I've been reading a parenting book lately that I really like. I don't read a lot of parenting books because most of them are stupid, but I have a few that I really like which have for the most part come highly recommended by other moms. One of my favorites is Parenting the Way God Parents: Refusing to Recycle Your Parents' Mistakes, which I found through Angie. What I love about that book is that it helps you identify what your parenting weak spots are without pointing accusing fingers at your parents. It's not about coming up with a list of everything your parents got wrong, it's about being really straightforward and honest about how your own upbringing affects the way you parent, and identifying ways you can do that better. The book I'm reading right now comes highly recommended by damomma, and it's called The Blessing of A Skinned Knee . What I'm loving about it is that Dr. Mogel addresses a lot of my own personal fears for my children and illustrates what will happen if handled the wrong way. I totally agree with her that most American children are overscheduled, overprotected and under-skilled. I think I was one of those children. Like most well-intentioned parents, I think my parents overprotected me a bit. My dad is a cop, so I get it. While I understand the forces which motivated them, I am proof of the flaws of that parenting style. Carefully shepherded in the 'right' direction my whole life, I grew up lacking the skills to make my own decisions, to choose my own way, to learn from my own mistakes. My parents didn't want me to make mistakes. They wanted to protect me from mistakes. What I love about the two parenting books I mentioned is that they both confirm something I've long suspected: you can't entirely avoid mistakes, so stop trying. Plus, mistakes are one of the greatest learning opportunities you're ever going to come by. It's not whether or not our children make mistakes that will determine their success or failure, but how they are taught to respond to their mistakes. In Parenting the Way God Parents, Katherine Koonce uses the example of a toddler learning to walk and points out a very simple truth: learning to walk involves a lot of falling down. No parent in their right mind would dream of scolding a toddler for stumbling while trying to learn a new skill; it's all a very important part of the process. No one learns to walk without a few(or a lot of) bruises. Yet somehow that lesson is lost on parents once their children are older and are, in a very real sense, "learning to walk" in lessons of character. My kids are still very young, and already I'm frustrated with their lack of ability to make the right choice the first time. I try to be very, very careful in how I respond to their mistakes because I know it will shape their attitude toward mistakes in the future. Will they seem that as an opportunity to learn something about themselves, as a nudge to go in a different direction, or will they seem them as personal failures, take them on as part of their identity? I had a psychology teacher in college who said one of her least-favorite parenting lines was: "I'm very disappointed in you." I got that one a lot as a teenager. Aaron and I have agreed that we will never, ever say that to our children. First of all, it's a lie. Secondly, it is aimed at the person, not the behavior. Jack makes a lot of mistakes, and the only person more frustrated by his mistakes than me is him. He draws a lot, and quite frequently it doesn't come out the way he wants it to. His usual response is to throw a fit, crumple the drawing up and say something self-deprecating like "I'm a butt!" When that happens, I walk him through the process of identifying what's really going on. "Jack, you're not a butt. I hear you saying that you're really frustrated, and I'm sorry your picture isn't the way you want it. You have some choices: you can try again, you can quit and do something else, or you can decide that even though it's not quite what you wanted, that your drawing is still pretty good." It was slow and painful progress, but it worked. Some days he'd get upset over a misshapen transformer drawing and he'd start to pitch a fit, but then he'd catch himself. "Mom, my picture wasn't the way I wanted and I almost tore it up, but then I decided I'm okay with it!" Or, my personal favorite, the Day He Experienced A Revelation. He is drawing at the table, I don't even remember what. He groans in exasperation and starts to explain to me what's wrong with his drawing. I get as far as saying "Jack," in an encouraging tone of voice when he cuts me off: he holds up his finger as if he's just been struck with an idea, and his entire countenance shifts. A smile spreads across his face and he sings, "Artistic license..." Okay then, my work here is done. I realize that a messed up drawing is not a moral issue, but he is learning responses that will come into play when there is more at stake than a picture of a robot. He is learning to see his mistakes not as personal failures, but as opportunities for improvement or a lesson in letting go. What really concerns me, the reason I read any parenting book at all, is that my kids' mistakes may not be the same ones I made. They might have different things to learn. Growing up, I longed for empowerment and independence. That was why, at the age of 11, I started running. I wanted the feeling of getting out into the world on my own two feet, and the practical activity of running provided that for me. My mom got married when she was 18 and only ever wanted to have a family, so she didn't understand those drives in me. I was a girl, I wasn't supposed to want empowerment and independence. I was supposed to want babies and a man who was strong enough to do the heavy lifting so I wouldn't have to. The irony is that my mother is a stronger person than the majority of the men I know. I married a man who likes the fact that I want to do the heavy lifting. He encourages me in it. What sometimes frustrates me about my husband is that he refuses to let me settle for less than what I am truly capable of. I wanted more freedom as a teenager, and the lesson I learned very late is that with freedom comes responsibility. I want to protect my children from pain, from failure, from danger, but what I am struggling to accept is that if I protect them from all pain, failure and danger, I will be "protecting" them from responsibility also. Responsibility involves risk, exposure, the potential for injury. I can't really protect them from those things, and I don't really want to. The best I can do is teach them management tools, which are easy enough for now: always hold Mama's hand around cars, always carry a knife with the tip pointing down, never touch anything on the stove. It will be harder when they're older and the consequence of a mistake is more dire, but we are laying the groundwork of trust. I want our kids to come to me with their mistakes with the faith that they will not be ridiculed or punished, that they will not be a disappointment to me. If I do that, eventually they won't come to me with their mistakes and then every poor choice is compounded by becoming a guilty secret. My kids will make mistakes, I guarantee it. My hope and my resolution is that when they inevitably do fall down, I will help them up and encourage them to try again, not push them back down to wallow in failure and my "disappointment."