Parenting is a Challenge
It is our goal to raise strong, godly children who will be contributing members of society. We want our children to be capable! They will know how to cook, clean, build, raise and butcher animals, garden, work on vehicles, and teach themselves. We want our children to be honest, observant, and inquisitive. They should be paying attention to people, animals, and their surroundings while thinking for themselves and not taking things they are told as facts without doing their own research.
Even with all of these values we aspire to instill in our children, we want our children to have fun and be kids! Play, create, & imagine! We have found that parenting is a delicate balancing act that feels like the tightrope is different sizes and different heights for different children and we are often trying to jump from rope to rope.
Boy oh boy do we have our work cut out for us. Somedays we think we probably bit off more than we can chew, but it is our sincere hope that in the end all of our hard work pays off for the betterment of our children and their futures.
There are all sorts of thoughts, opinions, methods, and ideas that swirl around parenting and raising children. Each generation seems to try to reinvent the wheel because they "Must be better than their parents". Some people have very real trauma and very legitimate reasons for having to do/be better. Depending on what you read or who you trust as an "Expert", there are RIGHT ways and WRONG ways to parent.
I am a firm believer that I do not have it figured out. We have frequent conversations where we just talk through what we've tried and what we could possibly try to do differently. Most of the time we end up just scratching our heads in frustration. I've even started asking our oldest what she thinks we should do to reinforce certain behaviors.
I have asked my mother and siblings how they handle different challenges, but the reality that I've come to accept is all children are different. All situations are different, and there is no one size fits all for most parenting questions/struggles.
Some of the things our children struggle with the most are being obnoxious attention seekers (where they say or do things just for the sake of getting attention), lying (Seems like a constant struggle), whining (I swear... whining is one of the worst sounds on the planet), and not listening (Kids will straight up pretend they never heard you).
Is there a group out there that is the "We don't have parenting figured out" group? I need to join that community support group! We have tried all manners of different parenting techniques and methods to try to get through to our kids, but sometimes... it does not seem to matter what we do.
Have you found anything in particular that works better for you and your kids?
Much Love,
The Spauldings
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