Personal History - Parenthood, Revisited

Did you spoil any of your children?

No, I would never...!

Yes, I'm afraid I did. Pretty much all the time.

I would have made a terrible single parent if that had been my path in life. I'm not good at that 'being the mother and the father' thing, and I know it. Although I never wanted to have a career - I wanted to be a stay-at-home mom, and financially we couldn't do it - I think in our case it turned out better, because it made my kids grow to be more responsible and independent than they would have otherwise.

My hubby has always been a very nice counterbalance for me in that respect.

Were you strict or lenient as a parent?

I was the good cop, and hubby the bad cop. Only very rarely did it go the other way, but once in awhile it did. I was too lenient, and hubby was too strict, and somehow we ended up safely in the middle of discipline because of it.

Did you find you had to treat each of your children differently? If so, why?

My mother told me once that she thought, when children were born, that they were blank slates you could write anything you wanted on.

I never subscribed to that, probably because of my five brothers and my sister. Not one of us was the same as the other. So I never expected my kids to be the same as each other, and I was absolutely not disappointed.

 My oldest boy is quiet and a reader and writer, like his mom. He also has very high-functioning autism tendencies, like his mom. So he was the easiest for me to relate to and work with.

Oldest daughter was a tornado in human form, so I struggled with her for awhile. Eventually I learned more about energy profiling, while helped me tremendously in understanding where she was coming from, and in learning to live with her personality and energy, which was way higher than mine.

Youngest girl, same thing...but in the opposite direction. She was more low-energy, and stubborn. Once she made up her mind about something, there was no changing it, and as long as she wasn't intent on self-destruction, I let her make her own decisions. Her creativity was amazing, as well, even though her sensibilities are different than mine.

Youngest boy is like a combination of them all - high-energy, creative, and a deep thinker who's very generous in sharing his ideas.

How am I supposed to parent all this out of the same book of rules and regulations?

To a certain extent, I did, but then I needed to make allowances for each temperament, and different circumstances that arose as time went on.

Don't ask me how I did it. I can't tell you, other than I prayed, and then I did the best I could. And it sort of, somehow worked.