I hear parents say, “Parenting is the most challenging job I’ve ever had.” Then they add, “But it’s also the most rewarding.”
I’m not here to say that.
Parenting has been a roller coaster ride. It has revealed my insecurities, vulnerabilities, and dysfunctional story lines. It has torn off the shrouds that protected me and laid out all my bits and pieces for everyone to see.
Rewarding? No. Parenting is much more than rewarding.
My mom used to tell me stories about walking uphill both ways to school, through the snow, sometimes without shoes. Not really; it’s a metaphor for her efforts to convey how much better I had it.
And it’s true! She and my dad worked tirelessly to give my brother and me what she lacked in childhood. She tried to instill in us the lessons she learned the hard way so we wouldn’t have to endure her pain. She maintained traditions and values from her upbringing so we could experience that grounding sense of security in times of uncertainty.
“I want to give you what I didn’t have.” she’d say.
And while this was a noble gesture, it ignored one salient fact: I wasn’t a younger version of herself. I was me, and I had my own needs, strengths, and desires that were different from hers.
Were my mom still alive today, she’d be chuckling.
Because just like she did with me, and her mom probably did with her, I have tried to protect my kids from the struggles and heartaches I endured as a child.
This is a perfectly normal thing to do! We love our children, and it hurts us to see them in pain. Our intentions are sound.
But if parenting has taught me anything, it’s that learning never stops.
We cannot right past wrongs through the lives of others any more than we can harness missed opportunities by turning our clocks backward.
My husband and I have had many discussions about my eldest son’s need for downtime. He (my son) and I are both introverts.
We crave alone time like a climber craves oxygen on Mt. Everest.
I get it on a gut level. I’m the first person to rush in and protect his downtime, partly due to our shared introversion but mostly because I wasn’t afforded this validation in my childhood.
But here’s the reality: no amount of rest time I protect for my child will re-write my past.
Our children are unique and separate from us. Their experience is their own. Raising them well has less to do with giving them what we lacked as children and more with seeing them for who they are and offering them what they need most.
So, returning to my opening statement. Yes, parenting is challenging and rewarding. Just not in the ways we thought.
As parents, we have a front-row seat to watch these little people grow into their own. But we’re not making them.
They are not our creations.
If anything, we act as witnesses to their transformation, with the added bonus of growing alongside them. And if we’re lucky, we’ll all come out of this experience more aware of ourselves, compassionate towards others, and better humans all around.
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