Children have long memories
Published in The Mom Experience
3 days ago (Medium.com)
If there’s one mantra I would like every parent in the world to repeat to themselves every day, I would choose “Our children don’t belong to us.”
They are not our trophies of adulthood. They are not mini-mes in which we can pour our failed dreams. They are not weapons of mass destruction against our ex. They are not our property.
We serve one of the most critical roles in their lives; that part is true.
Thanks to us, for better and sometimes for worse, they will build their early vision of the world. What is right, what is wrong, what is safe, who am I, where do I belong? All of this is filtered through their experiences with us.
And then, little by little, they start to find their own way. It begins with little steps that soon morph into a massive transformation that makes us wonder where our little child went.
Eventually, adulthood will come, and with it, the last freedom spurt. They have always had their own lives, but it won’t be until now that we’ll acknowledge we cannot keep pretending they are under our control.
Not that some people don’t try…
Their survival is in our hands
Some parents spend most of their children’s lives doing everything they can to ensure their kids will always depend on them. Whether they do this out of misguided love or narcissistic jealousy, the outcome can only be detrimental to their kids’ well-being.
When our children are little, their very survival is in our hands. However, as they grow up, we have to let go slowly — an art known as parenting. No one does it perfectly, of course. Still, the trick is to learn from every mistake we make instead of stubbornly trying to defy nature and gaslight our kids into staying as toddlers forever because it makes us uncomfortable to see how we lose control over them.
However, once our kids have jobs, homes, and even families of their own — once they are out in the world and they start telling the story of their lives — that’s when we will learn how they truly see us, and we might not like what we hear.
A matter of unconditional acceptance
We must keep in mind that what our children will remember the most is how we made them feel.
Was our presence a source of terror, or was the home we shared a temple of safety? Did they live with the knowledge that they could tell us anything and receive guidance, or did they build a double life just to escape our judgment?
Buying food and paying bills does not make us parents. Why do some people want credit for doing what it is their duty to do? Why do they want a parade for doing what is the bare minimum they have to achieve?
I know it is not easy to provide. After all, we spend many hours at work, trying to make ends meet, all in an effort to bring home the resources necessary for our family to survive.
However, the kids are right when they say they did not ask to come into the world. They are here because we made the decision to bring them. By the way, this is reason #57580 why reproductive rights are so important, so parenting will always be a choice.
When we decide to enter the world of parenthood, we must do so out of unconditional acceptance for the child we will receive. There are no ifs, no buts, no “they better be this and do that.”
Our children do not exist to fulfill us. They are not responsible for satisfying our emotional needs because it is not their job to provide what we refuse to work on.
If it feels like a one-sided relationship, that’s because it is. How else could it be when we are the ones in power, and they are at the most vulnerable stage of their lives?
This happened to me
Of course, all of this brings me back to my experiences with my parents and with my own child.
My parents demanded nothing but perfection from me. I was always informed when I was too fat, too stupid, or simply being bad. My grades had to be perfect, and my presence in the house had to be unnoticed. I was not to be a nuisance.
Predictably, this did a number on me. It’s so cliché that it’s embarrassing. From developing an eating disorder to making foolish decisions out of not knowing how to stand up for myself because no one ever taught me how to do that, I spent decades in misery. It was only recently that I started making the necessary changes to stop tormenting myself because, in the end, I’m the only person who can do that.
If you were to ask my parents about their role in this, they wouldn’t know what to say. In their view, since they put a roof over my head, fed me, and made sure I received an education, I should not be complaining. And yet, complain I did, and the erasure they tried to do of my feelings only made things worse.
It felt like they were trying to control my memories of my time with them. They asked why I didn’t visit them more or call them at least once a week, and I grew tired of explaining something they refused to understand.
It hasn’t been until recently, now that they have stopped pushing this narrative so hard, that I have felt more at ease. I am prepared to admit they have supported me through the rough patches I have experienced in the past few years and have even given me some good advice.
We still have some conversations pending, and they will not be easy, but I cannot stop noticing that only now that they are not constantly trying to convince me of how marvelous parents they were do I feel like I can trust them more.
Instead of telling me, they are trying to show me.
Will this happen to my son?
But the journey that worries me most now is with my son. And I’m not sure how I will look at the end of it.
After all, I am the one who left his father. Sure, I had my reasons, and they were powerful ones. I’m sure he somehow can understand that Mom couldn’t keep taking Dad’s emotional and financial abuse.
However, when it all happened, my son was heartbroken.
To my son, I was the one who broke the family apart. Since I was the breadwinner, when his father has financial issues, he feels it is because I’m not there anymore to take care of everything.
This tells me that, back in the day, I did a terrible job communicating what a healthy family should look like. I told him many things, but by normalizing his father’s behavior, I showed him something different.
I can’t help wondering what he will think of me in a couple of decades.
Will he remember me as someone who finally learned to set boundaries, or will he think Mom was selfish? Will he see my decision as an act of bravery, or will he think I abandoned my family?
I have no idea.
I tell myself that once he grows up, he will understand why I had to do what I did, and although it will still be painful, he will see how necessary this decision was.
Besides being there for him, I cannot control the outcome. I cannot control how he will remember me.
All I can do is show him who I really am and then respect his decision instead of trying to tell him what a fantastic mom I was. Easier said than done, I know, but one thing I’ve come to realize is that this is how parenting always goes.
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Our Children Don’t Belong To Us
Even though our souls reach out to them
This Is Why You Don’t Have the Right to Abuse Your Children
Violence does not equal discipline.
Written by GB Rogut
·Editor for The Mom Experience
Jack of all trades, mistress of poetry. Mom to a son. Teacher. Bi. Autistic.Mexicana. Need some feedback? Hire me! https://ko-fi.com/gabyrogut/commissions