I'll never be a parenting expert. Truth be told, I don't think anyone ever will be. I'd like to think that I learn and grow as a parent, though, the same as I'd like to think that I can learn and grow as a person, a Christian, and in any number of other ways. My kids teach me new things every day, and some things I just eventually realize on my own, and wonder why on earth I didn't think of it before. One of the things that I've worked really hard on, especially in the last few years, is looking at how I respond to situations with my kids.
Let's face it ... raising kids can be a wonderful experience. It can also be a frightening, maddening, stressful, where-did-I-put-that-straight-jacket experience. The news today has so many stories of children being mistreated and abused, and I find myself wondering how parents could possibly treat a child that way. I would never dream of intentionally harming my children. My guess is that many parents around the world feel exactly the same way. I've begun to think, though, that in many cases it has to do with a parent who hasn't learned the difference between responding to a situation and reacting to a situation.
Think about the last time you watched a group of kids play together. One child takes a toy, or does something else that another child doesn't like, and what happens? The second child will cry, or scream, or find a way to lash out in an attempt to say "I don't like this at all!" We look at children doing this and think, "There's a better way to deal with this.", but then we don't even notice when we do similar things.
Case in point ... as we were leaving an evening church service recently, we told the kids to go get in the truck (my husband still objects to calling a minivan a truck, but that's another story). My five-year old blasted off across the parking lot in the direction of our vehicle, not noticing that there was a car parked next to us whose driver was preparing to back out. Startled at the danger, we called out for him to stop, and managed to get him out of the way of the vehicle. (Thankfully, they had seen him and hadn't moved anywhere.) My son now safe, this is where I try to make it a point to respond, instead of react, to the situation. My inclination (the reaction part of me), would be to tan his hide and yell at him for putting himself in danger. The reason? Well, yes, it could have been dangerous, but a large part of it would have been because he scared the daylights out of me. On the other hand, the "respond" part of me part of me might give him ONE swat and a serious scolding about being more careful and explaining what almost happened. What's the reasoning? Well, to begin with, he's five. I don't want him putting himself in danger at all, but I have to understand that five is never going to be as observant as adult. It's my job to watch out for things for him, until he learns to watch out for them himself. Besides all that, he was attempting to be obedient, by going to the truck in the first place. If I start spanking him for no apparent (to him) reason, what does that teach him?
I think it's a lesson some parents have a hard time learning. They have a child that doesn't do exactly what they want them to, or an unexpected situation comes up, and they REACT to the situation instead of responding to it. It's an easy mistake for all of us to make, but for us and for our children it's so important that as adults we learn the difference. It's a part of being the kind of parents our children need us to be.
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