I've got to stop watching Dr Phil.............................

As I was hunched over the stove (Unable to staighten from all the hours in the yard earlier in the day.) getting dinner started, Dr. Phil was also starting. The story line was about out of control mothers. Boy! Was that an understatement! This woman was on tape smacking her ten year old son, and as she was smacking him she was sreaming at him to be quiet. (In much more colorful discriptive language.) While she was doing this, her other children where trying to dissappear least she come un-glued towards them. As much as I wanted to turn away from the screen, I was unable to. Not because I enjoy watching someone elses pain, but because simply listening to the parent/child exchanged instantly transported me back to my childhood.

In the above scenario, I was the one that most of the time was trying to be invisable. My younger brothers received most of the physical abuse, but that fact carries a certain amount of guilt with it as well. Listening to that little boys cries of pain, and then his mother telling him he was "Faking it" is far too reminiscent of words I heard on a daily basis.

Why do I feel the need to write about this? Mother's day is coming up, so reading this will make most of you jump for joy that this is not the mother/childhood you remember. The real reason I am talking about this, is because it is not an isolated event. All I could think of after finally being able to turn the channel, was if you aren't being the kind of mom that you want to be, please be strong enough to ask for help. Yes! There is shame involved; guilt and denial as well. Nine and a half times out of ten, you are only parenting as you were parented, and this is not your fault. Please! Do what you need to do, to let this cycle end with you; so your future grand-babies might not know this type of pain.

When I turned seventeen, I could not wait to have a baby of my own. (And yet somehow managed to hold off until I was twenty-one.) I knew how I didn't want to parent, but I had no idea how I did want to parent. My boyfriend at that time (who several years later became my first husband) played on a softball team, and instead of watching his games, I used to watch one of the wives on the team interact with her children. She really became my role-model for mothering. Ten years later when I ran into her, and told her the great influence she had been on my parenting style, her children where teens. She told me that there were days when she felt she had done nothing right, but I know she appreciated the compliment.

The other two things I was able to change with my children, was allowing them to express their feelings, (at least ninty-nine percent of the time.) and being big enough to apologize when I was wrong. Most of you are saying, "Well, of course that is what you do with your children." Not in the world I grew up in. Even if you were "proven innocent" the best you could expect to hear was "Go on! Get out of my face." (Which were the words we all lived to hear.)

Does this mean I have been the perfect parent? Heavens no! Under stress, I have been known to revert back to a screaming bitch, and I will admit to having hit my children in anger over the years. In spite of these behaviors, I have worked hard to do better than what was done to me, and know that I have been successful. And if I can learn to do better, then anyone can do it. Also, by correcting some of my mistakes, my children will do better when they have children. (You should see how my oldest spoils her dog!) I can remember on one vacation (my older two were early teens) sitting around the campfire listing to "Remember that time Mom beat me" stories. While their perceptions were very different from mine, I had no choice but to listen. That is the thing. When you are a child, you really are helpless to do anything to change your situation. Whatever you perceive, IS your reality. It is up to us adults to put their own fears aside, and step in and help the child. Most of the time, this means helping the parent.

When I was going through my first divorce, I couldn't get my children into therapy fast enough. It was important that I give them a place to work through their feelings. (They were three and five at the time.) Before the first session was over the therapist determined that I was the one that needed the therapy. (Smart woman!) She helped me tweak my parenting, and cope with the stress of a divorce. I can distinctly remember it took her three sessions to convince me that the world would not end if my oldest wore jeans and T-shirts to school day after day, instead of the pretty dresses I wanted her to wear. We ended up compromising with my oldest getting to pick her clothes out three days a week, and me picking twice a week. Within a month, I was cured, (of this control only, )and she has worn what she wanted since then......... Jeans and T-shirts. Until Middle school, when it would be "Mom, will you do my hair?" So, of course I would drop everything, do her hair, and then listen to "I don't like it like this," and she would re-do it. I learned (without the benefit of therapy) to either say no, or make her give me exact instructions on how she wanted it to turn out. I would call that progress wouldn't you?

Now that you have completed one of the strangest pre-Mother's day post in the history of blogging, let me direct you to a more traditional one. Beautifully written by
Mind Curry it will lift you out of any gloom I might have inflicted with my words. All we have is hope, and as a mother, we have the greatest ability to give our children hope, by giving them unconditional love. Our reward will be their unconditional love in return.