I’ve heard it said that our children are like a book. We might have certain expectations at the start of chapter one based on the title, author, and genre. But by the end of the book, we often realize the story was far different from what we anticipated.
Think back to when your first child was born. What did you think you’d be like as a parent? What did you think your child would be like?
As our parenting journey continued, we all discovered that there are a lot of things we couldn’t envision, such as that child’s
- temperament
- learning styles
- interests
- strengths and weaknesses
- dreams
- love languages
- quirky habits
Then factor in multiple children with variances of all these things, pluschanges in our own interests, dreams, or habits, plusunforeseen events like a long-term illness, job change, move, assuming a caregiver role, etc…. WHEW! We don’t regret becoming a parent (most of the time!), but no wonder we sometimes find ourselves wondering, How is this so far from what I thought it would be?
Ayelet Waldman once said, “There are times as a parent when you realize your job is not to be the parent you always imagined you’d be, [or] the parent you always wished you’d had. Your job is to be the parent your child needs, given the particulars of his or her own life and nature.” This is a good reminder to shed our expectations and become “readers” of EACH of our children. It takes patience, energy, and – quite honestly – a lifetime of observation. Yes, we have core values and habits that we want to maintain no matter what. But at the same time, each of our kids needs us to parent them in different ways. And those ways change as they evolve through different seasons of life.
No one says this is easy! (And it’s also difficult to explain to our kids how and why we handle things differently with different siblings.) We will mess up. We’ll look back and wish we’d have done certain things differently. But may we challenge ourselves to intentionally “read” our kids and to give ourselves grace as we observe, learn, and strive to be the kind of parent that each of our children needs… in each season.