Parenting: Where we went wrong

 I ran across this article recently via a blog I often read. The religious context of it doesn't interest me in the least. I prefer to take responsibility for my own life and find my strength in my own self. But the parenting perspective touched on some nerves in relation to things we have been struggling with as far as the kids go recently. I guess I am writing this post to clarify the issues for myself and I am posting it because it may help me if anyone has some useful insight and it may help others if you have some of those 'me too' sort of moments.

1. Denial – denying issues or naively thinking that there aren’t any issues to deal with.

Not something I do a whole lot of in relation to the kids.Yay! one point for me. Though I will say I read recently, in relation to body image, there are three camps parents can be in: 1. Parents who acknowledge the issues and go all hard arse to try and ensure their child doesn't end up with problems- by being overly restrictive, using guilt and shame etc  to try and prevent or solve problems with weight etc. Group 2. Parents who address the fact the body image issues happen and the reasons why they do and healthy ways to prevent them. 3. Parents who say nothing. We are pretty much in group 3- we do talk about people having person appropriate sized meals, about letting your brain get the message from your stomach, and we don't let the kids eat a heap of crap. but other than that- nothing. Apparently doing nothing is almost as bad as being in with the manic group one parents.... bugger.

2. Embarrassment – hoping others don’t find out about an issue—which causes me to not seek help or counsel.

I don't really have this issue either.... I do feel some pretty serious guilt/embarrassment about some of my parenting behaviour/thinking- but it's not in the same way as parents who for example deny their child has an addiction issue because they'd be embarrassed if others knew about it and think less of them as parents.

For me embarrassment is more about struggling so hard with some issues and feeling like I am in an impossible/useless/helpless situation that I just don't actually want to deal with that child any more at all some days- that feels pretty shameful.

3. Defensiveness – taking offense at someone’s attempt to deal with an issue, or allowing my child to avoid personal responsibility by blaming others.

There have definitely been occasions where I have been defensive- generally they have involved my mother-in-law and have been where Les and I don't don't actually think there is an issue.... just cause a baby is a bit grizzly doesn't mean it needs the 'wind' whacked out it.

We're pretty big on personal responsibility with our kids.... and it's probably one of the things that annoys me most in parents who don't get their kids to take responsibility for their actions/inaction's.


4. Unresponsiveness – knowing there’s an issue but hoping it will just go away on its own (you know—a phase).

Me, me, me!!! Or should that be We, we we! At the moment what springs to mind is Kieran: 1) The amount of time he spends holed up in his room. The amount of time he doesn't spend hanging with his family. The problem here is that he's really no trouble when he's hanging out in his room and he doesn't aggravate his sister.. And more often than not we're all doing our own thing so if I got him to come hang out more- I'm not sure what it'd be for.... "Hey son, come do nothing in particular with us."

This also happens when we've got so much going on that one more thing to deal with just isn't an option. Then it comes down to that idea of picking your battles- like dealing with toilet training, midnight visitors to the bed and failing to help out with cleaning up ones own messes is enough- so we leave the cat to deal with the fact that she keeps getting dragged around the house herself- when on a better day we'd get up and physically deal with it.

5. Weariness – knowing there’s an issue, but being too tired to respond, or becoming discouraged that nothing I’ve tried appears to be working.

This has to be our absolute 100% worst issue.

I mean lets face it- neither of us are the worlds fittest or healthiest people physically so especially when the kids were little and their actions required actually getting up and walking over to them to deal with the issue we were very very far from consistent- which of course produces inconsistent behaviour. Squealing would be a good example of this; I deplore squealing in any circumstance other than pain- but if Will is outside and I've already been out there to tell him not to harass the dogs, and again not to play in the dirt, and again to say not to throw our recycling into the neighbours yard.... then by the time we get to the squealing I'm done and I'm not heading out there again. (And then there's the fact that there's a very good chance I should have been out there playing with him- rather than leaving him to it in the first place.)

Irlens, hearing testing, enrolment in a course of brain gym, need to set up a parent-teacher interview and maybe initiate and IEP, attend some parent information workshops/courses, do some reading and research, and appointments with individual and family counsellors and probably a paediatrician wouldn't be a silly idea...seriously.... I'm tired just writing the list down, and that's before I've even considered how we would afford it which is also a exhausting prospect.

At the moment we also have an issue with some basic communication which is contributed to by weariness.Essentially what is happening is some questions are quite simply going unanswered or at times even being stopped in their tracks because they are so inane that we just can't be bothered. As an example one of our children was watching quake coverage a while back and broke into huge giggles over the sign language interpreter and asked "What the heck is he doing?" I couldn't answer. I just couldn't. I should have I think it's important for her to understand about deafness and what challenges the deaf face and for her to be sensitive and tolerant to difference. But we get so many questions that she should know the answers to.... that Will knows the answers to... that sometimes we just throw our hands up in (minor) despair.

Weariness also means we don't do enough with our children. We don't go for walks, go out places, or camping, we don't often go to the beach, play many games or even do many activities at home with them- Kudos for Les though because he does heaps more activity type stuff than me. I just do all the running around- taxi mum type stuff.

Weariness also means we haven't persisted in sharing some of our values and beliefs with the kids where that takes some effort or we need to put up with complaints- like watching the Simpsons repeats over watching a really cool wildlife doco- I know what I'd rather watch, what I think the kids would get more out of and what I'd like them to be interested in. But I also know that weariness makes my tolerance for complaints and whining and a general lack of appreciation about zero percent... if the path of least resistance lies with the Simpsons I know which path I'm taking.

6. Duplicity – not wanting to deal with my own issue, and thus, creating an allowance for my child’s.

Not too sure about this- but I do sometimes wonder if the poor connection I have with my own daughter is some how related to the zero connection I have with my own mother.
7. Over-reaction – blowing up over the issue rather than contextualising and responding appropriately.

Not me 99% of the time but definitely Les sometimes. He would probably also say that I under react sometimes and that would be fair enough.

Les is harder on Kieran and softer on Merenia.

I am harder on Merenia and softer on Kieran.

Neither of us take a firm enough stance with the red head!

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One of the things I see in the kids most often and really struggle with is a real self-centredness and a very limited ability to take responsibility for their actions:

Kieran was literally pissed off that the Japan Earthquake and Tsunamis happened. for two reasons- one they interrupted Glee for a 'breaking news' report. And two because he knew the disaster would receive extended news coverage which had the potential to go over the usual news hour and horror of horrors cut into the sports news usual allowed time. I found his complete and utter lack of perspective on the situation unfathomable. And honestly wondered how I had managed to raise a kid that thinks like that.  

 Merenia recently couldn't understand why a friend wasn't willing to continue with a game after Merenia had insisted that she herself would be playing all the best parts and doing all the best stuff. She simply fails to see how her actions had contributed to the end of the game. Her friend walked off so therefore the friend was responsible for ending the game. And once again I wonder how I raised a kid who finds it nigh on impossible to see how their actions affect other people.

And they both do it.... so I guess that means it's something we did through our parenting.

One of the things we have generally done well together is to do regular 'status reports' to discus the state of the family nation. We look at problems and figure out solutions and strategies- but it seems to me as the kids have got bigger the problems have got bigger and sometimes we only manage to define and get a handle on the problem before midnight comes knocking and we both need to sleep- actually getting to solving and strategies is harder and takes longer and in some cases we actually just don't have the answers.

It's important to note that this is a great big post of stuff we've done wrong.... there's a bunch of stuff we've done right as well- but that's for another post on another day.

♥