We
live in a culture where there are expectations of perfection that are being
imposed on us as parents. These
expectations come in a wide variety of forms. And what I want suggest to you is
that if we buy into these expectations uncritically, the result is that we end
up feeling liking perpetual parental failures.
This
is what happens when you host a play-date with some friends...
Everything
starts out great. Lunchtime rolls
around and you think, “No big deal.
I’ll make lunch for everyone.”
You go to your fridge, open it up, and all of a sudden you’re hit by a
wave of panic, a rush of anxiety, as you realize you don’t have any organic fruits or vegetables on hand,
and all of your friends…well, that’s all they feed their kids. So you feel a tinge of inferiority and
inadequacy, because here your friends are, only giving their kids the best of
the best and here you are, poisoning your kid one apple slice at a time!
We
live in a culture of parental perfection and I am convinced that it’s making
the task of parenting much heavier than it needs to be. It’s putting a weight on us that we
simply can’t carry. Over the past
year, I’ve been waking up to this reality more and more. It all started when I noticed a pattern
in my life. The pattern was two
fold: (1) I’d fail to meet an expectation; and then (2) I’d feel this thing
called shame. This pattern
happened over and over again until finally I woke up thinking that I wasn’t a
very good parent at all. I felt
like a failure, perpetually guilty and never measuring up. Then, one day, everything changed. I began to examine why I felt like such
a bad parent. What I discovered was
so freeing. As I explored my
feelings of shame and traced them back to their source, I realized they were
rooted in unrealistic expectations, expectations that were completely
unattainable.
Here
are a few examples…
Enjoy every moment
This
was by far the most common piece of advice I received before I became a
parent. And so I went into
parenting with the expectation that I should savor every second with my
kids. They are going to grow up in
the blink of an eye, I was told.
The problem was that almost immediately, I started to experience moments
that weren’t enjoyable at all. The
very first night home from the hospital with our oldest son, Josie finished a
feeding at 3 a.m. and asked me to change a diaper. So I got up, went over to the changing table and got
started. Everything was going
great until the moment that he shot mustard-colored diarrhea out of his butt with
tremendous velocity. It got all
over him, the bed, the carpet, and me.
So here I am. It’s 3 a.m. I really just want to be sleeping. But what am I doing? I’m doing laundry, vacuuming the floor,
and taking a shower. Not cool. Not cool at all. And I have dozens of other stories just
like it. My point is that it is an
unreasonable expectation to enjoy every moment. And the only people who give out this advice, it seems to
me, are middle-aged women well past the stage of raising toddlers with selective
memory disorders. No one with
young children has ever told me with any degree of seriousness to savor every
second. Some moments just
suck. Period.
Be Consistent
I’ve
read a lot of books on parenting, and this little piece of advice continually
surfaces. Be consistent in your
discipline. Be consistent in your
demeanor. Just create a consistent
environment for your kids because that will give them a sense of security and
safety, the kind that will allow them to truly thrive. So what did I do? I went into parenting with the
expectation that I should be perfectly consistent. If I could do that, I thought, my kids will turn out great. The problem was that very quickly I
realized I wasn’t consistent at all.
I’d have good days and bad days as a parent. And for the longest time, I just beat myself up for the
moments when I wasn’t at my best.
Then one day I realized it’s not just me. Like, if every single home had a hidden nanny camera in it,
I am convinced no one would want anyone else to see the footage! See, we have good moments and bad
moments as parents. That’s sort of
what it means to be human. When I have
a brilliant moment as a parent, it’s worth celebrating. But I can’t possibly expect to be
brilliant all the time. A better
expectation is that I am going to have to ask for forgiveness, a lot.
Good parents are in control of their
kids
Confession. I used to carry around this
belief. When I’d see a kid out in
public totally losing it, I’d mentally blame it on bad parenting. Then I had kids, and everything
changed. My kids, like all kids,
throw tantrums. And they often
save their best ones for when we are out in public. Nothing is more embarrassing. The game changer for me with this one was when I received
compassion rather than judgment.
One of my kids was throwing a tantrum and this individual, rather than
giving me the stink eye, looked at me with compassion and let me know that,
“This is normal and that you are still a good dad.” Kids have this thing called a free will. Sometimes I wished they didn’t. But they do. And sometimes they choose to express it in some really
unfortunate ways.
And
so here is what it comes down to…
You
and me, we are never going to be perfect parents. And the good news is that God doesn’t expect us to be. Look, if we could be perfect, what
would be the point of heaven? So
long as we are on this side of heaven, we are going to struggle. We are going to make mistakes. We are going to blow it. But we can still strive to move in the
right direction. And this is where
grace comes into play.
Mercy is not getting what we deserve.
We deserve punishment and separation from God. But God is merciful.
He doesn’t give us what we deserve. Grace includes mercy, but also goes beyond it. Grace
is getting what we don’t deserve, in addition to not getting what we do
deserve. A professor I had in
college summarized it this way: Grace = Mercy + Power. Grace is mercy for when we fall short,
and then power to live differently.
I
am learning to be a grace-filled parent.
Rather
than allowing my shortcomings to produce shame within me, I am starting to see
them as opportunities to experience God’s grace. The very moments when I blow it, the very moments when I am
at my worst, the very moments when I mess up, these are invitations and
opportunities to experience grace—to turn to God, receive forgiveness and mercy
for my faults and failures, and receive power to live differently and move in
the right direction.
My grace is sufficient for you, for my
power is made perfect in weakness.
-- 2 Cor. 12:9
Very well written!
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