Did you become the parent you thought you would be? If yes, what was one of your

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   threekeysposted 8 years ago

   Did you become the parent you thought you would be? If yes, what was one of your most proudest
   
   moments with your child? If not, can you describe the moment you veered off in another direction as a parent? ie: when you became the parent different to what you thought you would become as a parent
   
   

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   WordCrafter09posted 8 years ago

   My three kids are well grown now, but there's always been any number of things about who each one of them is as a person that have made me proud of them.  Then, too, there have been so many individual moments that have made me proud, but there have been far, far, too many of such individual moments (three grown kids times a few "kid-decades" (as in "man-hours") adds up to way too many of the same kind of moment.
   
   As for the rest of the question, I can't answer it here without either a) writing a whole book about my idea about the complexities and responsibilities and required skills needed to be the best kind of parent (and growing individually as each child and/or the family grows, while also preserving/safeguarding the relationship between parent and son/daughter; and/or c) insulting a whole lot of people (whether or not some deserve to be smartened-up).
   
   Some people think that the only thing to being a parent of young kids is to knowing how to make sure they're clean and fed.  Some take it a step farther to make sure they teach them their "ABC's".  Some think that as long as kids are clean and fed and told a set of rules of "right-from-wrong" in a one-size-fits-all (regardless of developmental stage or a child's individual circumstances) that's all there is to being a parent. 
   
   Some think the "job" is done once kids are eighteen (or twenty-five or on their own, or whenever).  Some think that loving them is enough, even if so many people are a little flawed in the knowing how to love one's child/children in the healthiest way, rather than seeing them as "less"  than individuals in their own right (whether those individuals are babies or well grown adults).
   
   Since I had no illusions about what even good, "smart", kind, kids may do as they grow up, there wasn't any "veering away" that I had to do from where I "was".  Again, complicated situation; but today I'm still on the same road I've been on; and my only hope is to know, for sure, that my three kids (grown or not) have re-joined me on that same road, even if we've all gone quite a bit of our respective distances at this stage in their lives.
   
   There's a difference between growing (individually), relationships growing/changing, and "veering"  My role as a parent is not to "veer" from the solid, stable, "road"I started to build back when all four us shared the parent/child(ren) "road"
   
   Being a parent is a relationship, not a job.  I'm the same person now that I've always been.

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      threekeysposted 8 years agoin reply to this

      Beautifully said.  "Parenting is a relationship, not a job". It makes you think so differently about parenting when expressed that way.
      I feel you have at least four books within you. The child; the teenager; the young adult and the mature child.

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