She has the perfect pout. When she was young, she would use it as a weapon to get her way. Brother and sister were immune to its effects but it was so powerful a pout that I often would have to remind her easily-affected-father to ignore it.
Sometimes, mid-pout, she would mutter under breath, “You’re a mean mommy!”
I guess she added those words for effect for over time, the pout became easier for me to ignore.
Last week, she used the pout again over the phone. Yes, I can ‘hear’ the pout and in my head I can hear her words, in her baby-talk voice, say, “You’re a mean mommy!”
I must admit, I wore the ‘Mean Mommy’ label as a bit of a badge of honour. I know! I must need psychoanalysis but I knew I wasn’t mean; I was just in the process of training children and if what I was doing seemed mean to a child, so be it. I never withheld love or physical touch; I never withheld doing good for my children when it was within my power to do so:
“…which of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone?
Or if he asks for fish, will give him a serpent?
If you then, who are human, know how to give good gifts to your
children, how much more will your Father who is in Heaven
give good things to those who ask him!”
~Matthew 7:9-11
My children do not have a perfect mother. Instead, their Heavenly Father is perfect, giving good gifts to them when they ask. My 3 at-times-hooligans can never say that I was mean–a disciplinarian, yes but mean, no!
So it amazed me the other day when I heard a mother trying to be kind to her child in what I consider to be an unkind and unprofessional (yes, parenthood is a profession) way to her child.
The child was being naughty. Downright naughty in defiance of her mother’s words. Mother said, “Stop doing blank.” Child continued to do blank. Mother said, “I told you do not do blank.” Mother pleaded with the child saying, “Please stop doing blank.”
And then mother did something amazing. Instead of taking responsibility for her request, to stop doing blank, she said, “Honey, if you don’t stop doing blank, the store manager will be very upset. He may even call the police. They will make us leave the store and how will we get food?”
I couldn’t believe my ears! To set the store manager and police up as the villans? Unbelievable. Mother was trying to be her child’s best friend. Mother was trying to avoid responsibility.
What was truly amazing was the look of absolute fear on the child’s face. She was terrified. I found myself feeling sorry for this child with a mother for a best friend.
Parenthood isn’t about being your child’s best friend.
Parenthood isn’t about being popular.
Parenthood is a calling on your life.
A holy calling placed on your life by God.
Whether we are a biological, adoptive or a parent by marriage or osmosis (an aunty, uncle or friend), God calls us to (and I love this translation):
“point our kids in the right direction–
when they are old they won’t be lost.”
~Proberbs 22:6 from The Message
It means saying yes most of the time but saying no sometimes. It means being unpopular, when your child is the only one not allowed to go to the sleepover. It means making them clean their room even if they are late for the school bus and it means lots of hugs and kisses.
So hold tight. If you are in the mean mommy or mean daddy phase of your children’s lives, it too shall soon pass. But don’t choose the easy path now. It makes the road even rougher later.
And one day, possibly not until our children begin to make the tough decisions of parenting themselves, they MAY be our very good friends!
