Well it's Mother's Day again. I've been working on a post for a few weeks now about moms but then I started reading all kinds of blogs and articles on the same thing and it all just seems a little overwhelming and even a little ridiculous how much instruction we crave on how to do this correctly. At least once a day I see another mom post an instructional article on how we can do this better than we already do.
I am a person who panics over being a good parent. I've got all kinds of bad feelings about the path I could send poor Olivia down over forgetting some simple and obvious moral or practical lesson. And if you doubt that I could bungle this, you must be a new reader. The responsibility is huge for a person who trips regularly over her own two feet and can hardly be trusted to remember something as important as DEFROSTING when it comes to poultry. I'm sure there was more than one person who prayed for Olivia's general safety when they learned of my pregnancy.
So anyway, for a few years I read all the articles on how to raise a responsible, lovable, happy person and swam around in a pool of practically useless information. I'd stay awake thinking, "What if I do forget some vital lesson and Olivia's found in a crack den in a few years? What if I talk so much about something that she becomes exactly what I feared? What if what if what if?" Most of the what if scenarios end with her dancing in some seedy night club with glitter all over her. I'm not sure why they all end there in the strip club, as if that's the worst of things that can happen to a young woman, but it's certainly not a pleasant thing that can happen to a young woman.
All those What If's kept me up enough that I did my own cultural research and noticed how almost everyone I know was either JUST LIKE their own parents or very deliberately living IN SPITE OF their parents' example. I'm not sure I believe in past or future lives, but what if your next life was the part where you watch your kids play out all the things you didn't resolve? That led me to this theory: The best way to raise children is to be the sort of person you'd want them to become. Terrifying task, I know, and it's going to require the sort of self-inventory that most of us hide from.
Let's start with the basics. All women have a hope (or fear depending on your situation) that their daughters will pick a man like their husband or that their sons will pick someone like themselves. And usually we do. You may not realize it until after your nuptials, but I assure you that most of us discover our spouses have a lot in common with our parents. And so you will drag whatever unhealthy or unfinished business along with you from childhood to adulthood. The question is would you hand your marriage down to your child? Because that is what will most assuredly happen. If you are wound up in articles over how not to raise bratty kids while you prepare their organic food during their Mandarin or Cantonese lessons, but neglect the very important legacy of your marriage I can imagine which part you will regret. It's an easy thing to neglect really, what with the rest of the world telling you it's your job to make your kids' dreams come true. I mean, seriously, what kind of mother are you if you don't coupon so that your child can go to every $5,000 astronomy camp because when he was 7 he really meant that he wanted to be an astronaut? Mothers are supposed to be selfless and miserable, kind of frumpy and worn out because they are so busy giving and giving and dragging their kids towards their dreams, right?
But let's finish my favorite game, the What If game. What if a woman gives everything she has to drag her children towards the dreams they professed as adolescents because she believes in their capabilities and wants them to have what they want? What if she swoops in and clears the way over every obstacle so that they never have to bother with something like failing? What if she neglects her own relationships and her own interests because parenting is the most important and blessed responsibility? Don't be mad, but I think if a person does those things she makes a terrible error in thinking. First, (and I have been accused of this) she undermines her children's independence and and I can assure you doing that doesn't raise a person who can be happy and capable and independent. She gives them a legacy that they will repeat in a similarly neglected and unattended marriage. She encourages them to think that it's someone else's role to make their dreams come true and ultimately she finds herself used up and resentful because her job as martyr was supposed to be temporary but most certainly can't be.
See, this constant pressure to be selfless in parenting all comes from a place of sincere love (I'm not including the people who are absorbed with their children so they can avoid looking at their own problems), but isn't exactly effective. I dug up the data on this. And it turns out that the biggest, most weighted influence on your child's future happiness and health was never tied to your willingness to give or your instruction or even all those lessons and classes. In fact, and you may find this as horrifying as I do, the biggest influence on your children's future is your EXAMPLE. So in a sense, you are liberated. You don't have to read the articles on how to raise a person who is generous and capable and ambitious. You just have to BE generous and capable and ambitious. Perhaps even more terrifying is that children receive the most influence on the very topics we'd call important from their tired, neglected, used up MOM instead of dad. I didn't drag out the research on marriages because that's pretty commonly accepted that they will inherit whatever we've shown them in that regard. Wanna see the research on the other big topics?
Here's the NIH's study on how Mothers influence their children's understanding of God. So taking time for actively pursuing your spirituality will be their blessing from you. http://dspace.ubvu.vu.nl/bitstream/handle/1871/33816/170220.pdf?sequence=1
And here's the one on how Mothers are responsible for shaping their progeny's understanding of food, health and body image:http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18167323, so you are shaping their healthy future when you take the time to take care of your body.
Guess who most heavily influences their children's perception of alcohol? And this is unfortunate, but they believe you drink more than you do. Here's the 30 year study on that: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/9591703/Mothers-ruin-mums-determine-their-childrens-drinking-habits.html. So modeling careful consumption of alcohol rather than complaining about how you need a drink at the end of a day with them might be wise.
Moms have a heavy, heavy influence on career ambition. Here's that study: http://bps-research-digest.blogspot.com/2008/09/how-ambitious-mothers-breed-successful.html
And you can bet that sex is all about you too. A mom's relationship with her daughter is the strongest predictor of her sexual experience. Here's the research on that: http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/12310348
In case you are completely exhausted after all that data, let's just wrap this up. Mom, you are released not FROM the responsibilities of raising your children, but TO go about the business of making yourself into the sort of person you'd like to see your children become. Your example will be your legacy for them. You are free to take care of yourself physically through exercise and nutrition and mentally through the creation of friendships and exploration of your spirituality. Your children need your rested example of nurturing and they really need to see you kiss your husband sometimes. They need a picture of how to set about exploring the world with curiosity and confidence and even if you are afraid, the time has come for you to do your own exploring. You are free to enjoy an imperfectly manicured home full of safety and laughter (even if it is at the expense of a missed Mandarin lesson). It is no longer your job to drag their dreams home for them. You are free to pursue your own dreams so that when it is their turn, they will know just how to set about it. No more articles! No more martyrdom! No more What Ifs! Onward girls!
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