They Didn't Know Either...

via

I have long drives to and from work and time to time I tend to just think about things.  Sometimes I think about them too much and sometimes I run into some sort of a personal epiphany.

I was an emotionally needy child and teenager.  I got mad at my parents A LOT!  I blamed them for a lot of things, I didn't get this, I didn't get that, you didn't do this for me, you didn't support me here, etc, etc.  As a kid, you can come up with a million things that someone didn't do for you and who can blame you?  Every child is selfish! Trying to carve out a niche for yourself in a world filled with billions of people isn't easy.

The other day I was thinking about all the tweets I read from my friends who I follow on how hard it is to be a parent. Since they are my friends, I know that they are trying the best they can to help their child have a healthy balance of fun and discipline.  I thought to myself "you can't blame them for the struggles because it's not like they know what they are doing in the first place, I mean there is no manual to parenting". 

That's when it dawned on me. MY PARENTS DIDN'T KNOW EITHER!  I realized that parenting is basically flying by the seat of your pants and trying to hang on.  All these things I blamed my parents for had no merit at all!  They obviously didn't know what they were doing as well.  I mean who can blame them?  I was the second child.  They had a couple of years to practice with my older sister but as we all know and have seen, raising a boy and girl can be very different.  Hell, I mean raising a boy after another boy can be very different.  Each child has their own character that the parents have to adjust to.  My parents had 4! So by the time it was time for them to do all those parental soccer mom things for me, they obviously couldn't cause they were raising my other 2 younger siblings!

I guess I can finally let go of being that bitter child and teenager and realize that sooner or later, I'll be going through the same thing my parents did.  At least this time I'll know what both sides are really thinking and can make me have better decisions as a person and a parent.