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The Parenting Tip that kids don’t want you to know

  • Pics from our very indulgent vacation we just got back from…
“G-L-A-M-O-R-O-U-S!… Oh, the flossy flossy” – Fergie

My children and us were having a conversation last night. We were saying that when they have kids, we will be that child’s grandparent and we will be able to say “you did that when you were a kid” when they complain to us about things. Oscar stated he would be a better parent than us. I said “are we not good parents” to which he replied “yes, but I’ll be better”. I asked what he would do differently and finally, after some coaxing since he knew I was slightly offended, he came up with “I would let them do more things they wanted to”. That’s when I decided to let them in on a little life secret.

These things.

I turned to him and said “I’m going to let you know about a super secret parenting fact that, for some reason, parents don’t usually tell their kids. I love you guys more than ANYTHING in the world and nothing, I mean NOTHING makes be happier than seeing you guys happy. But, as a parent, it’s my job to make sure you guys turn out to be good people and respectable adults. If I were to give you everything you want, which I WANT to, you would expect everyone and the world to treat you the same way. You would be one of those awful people who only think about themselves and are spoiled and get super mad when things don’t go their way. I want you all to be loving, giving, compassionate people and sometimes that means dealing with not getting everything you want. In the real world, you’ll go into a job and be expected to get things done in a timely manner – including getting your shoes on – and if you don’t, you’ll get fired. The other reason is that you are children and I’m an adult with almost 40 years of experience and I know outcomes of some of the things you think you want. I have to keep you protected from hurting yourselves or being unhealthy”

Perhaps a too indulgent breakfast everyday, but on vacation, it was amazing!

Parenting is SO hard and not just because you’re exhausted from being a servant to three little piglets (to a certain age) or trying to wrap your brain around the decisions their little primordial brains make, but mostly trying to decide what you should take care of and what you should not. If parenting were just being a servant to a demanding little idiot, it would be tiring, frustrating, hair pulling, but I think what makes parenting harder on the next level is allowing them to make that decision you would have stopped and letting them learn why it was stupid. A good parent knows that the best way to learn is to experience it yourself, but it’s SO hard to sit there and comfort the tears that you could easily fix, but stop yourself for the lesson learned.

Some lessons are better learned by telling though, not experiencing.

Once, Oscar wanted a watch SOOOOO bad – he picked it out – it was a Pokemon watch (like $10 ) and he loved it! One day he came home crying because he had lost it at school. He had taken it off to wash his hands in the bathroom and left it and when he came back, it was gone. Oscar is my most sensitive child and I love that about him, so watching him cry over this was heart wrenching. All I wanted to do was grab my keys and run out right then and replace it for him. But instead I had to hold him and explain about responsibility and loss while he cried even harder that I wouldn’t get him a new one, ripping my heart in two.

Pandora – Disney

Losing something as small (not in his mind) as a $10 watch that he’d had for a whopping 2 weeks is a much preferred lesson on loss than other things he could and will lose in his life and dealing with loss is a very important lesson in life – processing the emotions and the grief and acceptance, learning lessons from what could have been done differently – slowly builds an emotional maturity ready to better handle the world. Hopefully, now when he’s 30 and his favorite coffee mug breaks, he’ll be sad, but he won’t fall on the floor and think the world has come to an end or worse, scream at his child for knocking off the counter.

Hippo at Disney

So, kids, just know that we are bound by our duty to make you into decent adults and even though we’d love nothing more than to stop your tears with new things and watch your faces light up, we have to make hard decisions about what we can indulge you with and what just needs to be a life lesson. And thanks to this lesson, my kids are very familiar with the Rolling Stones “You Can’t Always Get What you Want”

Introducing these adults – starting in 2030
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Raising Future “Leaders” of the World – ain’t nobody got time for that.

Like, seriously, what’s the likeliness my kids will be a president? Like even less than if they were a professional athlete, right?

When I was growing up and even after I was an adult and had kids, I would hear the thing about “raising the future leaders of the world” and just chucked that idea to the side because 1. I certainly was not going to be a leader – I’m average at best at everything I do. And 2. It’s just statistically unlikely that I or my children will every actually be a leader high up in the rankings. So, I never thought much of that saying and even thought it was a little hokey to say. Then, the other night, I was lying in bed, unable to sleep, letting my mind wander when this idea came upon me.

What if that saying does not literally mean that we could be raising the next US president or diplomat or religious leader? What if it just meant that we are raising people who will influence other people throughout their life? I think that sounds much more important. Like every child has the opportunity to influence those around them and, therefore be a leader.

The idea that I, as a single person in a world of billions, can influence the world to be a better place is, at least, slightly less of a daunting and crushing idea if you imagine that every person you come in contact with can be influenced to be a better person, even if they don’t show it right away. But, then imagine your creating little clones of yourself, little helpers (children, not robots) that can then go out and spread the same message as they were raised (after they come back from the dark side of the moon, anyways). If you can influence, let’s say 10 people, now with 3 kids, you and them can get 40. And if they each have 3 kids now, we’ve influenced 100 people to be better.

Obviously, this is all speculative. My kids could resent me for some reason or get into drugs or “the wrong crowd” and not follow this path. Or I could be crazy and just be perpetuating the crazy by spreading it with my kids, but for now, for the idea that we are raising leaders of the world, even if they’re small leaders who spread the love, lets just imagine that everyone does this, and so a multitude of very small leaders leads to a large change and better society.

Oops, they all got pregnant…

So, let’s raise our children to be those (small group) leaders who can influence others to do the right thing and to make a better world for themselves. I think that is a much more attainable and worthy goal for our kids. When I think about parenting in those terms, I feel like I’m doing a little more for the world by trying to hold in my temper or fly off the handle about something without the proper pause and introspection. (I still lose my temper with them sometimes, no worries). I try to make sure I treat strangers with respect and give them the benefit of the doubt. I try to quell my children’s anger when they are mad at each other or another kid at school and try to make them think about the situation from the other side or even consider that they may be mistaken in what they perceived happened. I’ve been pretty impressed with their perception of right and wrong in situations, understanding that they are all still very young and sweet.

Things they do that makes me proud of who they are right now: Calvin was having his birthday party to turn 5 recently and when asked who he wanted to invite, his very first people on his list were India and Oscar’s best friends because he “wanted India and Oscar to have a fun time”. Oscar consistently makes sure that others around him are taken care of (when he’s not fighting with his siblings). If there’s candy offered and Calvin or India aren’t there, he will make sure to give some of his candy to them when he finally sees them. He traded one of his toys for another toy he knew Calvin had wanted and surprised him with it.

India, our precious baby girl, is not our sweetest kid, she has been known to be on the spicy side (pummeled a boy with a hippity-hop in kindergarten who was picking on her and the other day threatened any imaginary person who is picking on Oscar in the future) but she’s very fair and responsible, volunteering to help the boys or us to make our lives easier. India has also been more curious in civil rights lately, asking if I think black people are equal to white and then wants to know why other people don’t think they are. I get to take that opportunity to educate her about how awful white people were to black people and see her astonishment that that was ever a thing. Then she asks about last names and I get to discuss how women were also once thought of as “less than”. It hurts to have to educate her on these things but hopefully, it will open her eyes to modern day injustices and continue to spread love and acceptance and that’s all I can ask for.

And, yes, we HAVE talked to India about our vast preference for non-violence. We have talked with her about calling for help, getting an adult, calling 911, all before getting physical.

So, the next time you are worried about your child maybe not being presidential material, and are wondering how on earth you are supposed to influence the world with little ol’, regular you, just imagine creating a loving, caring being in your child who will one day grow up to be someone special to every person they encounter. That your child could be an extension of your own love and and desire for peace and unity. Our children are, literally, the future. We won’t be around in the next 100 years, so let’s make sure our values are continued on and grow even as we wither and pass.