Raising kids

Me & my partner in (raising kids) crime

There are few fields I am an expert in. One thing I do have experience in, possibly not an expert in, is raising kids. The Lord blessed me with 5 kids. Three are my step kids. At this point in my life & theirs, we don’t even really like to acknowledge they are not my own. Reason being is that I see no difference in them & my own two. Strange how years of being right there for everything makes me feel like we are more blood than not. My last baby did tie all the kids together with having a sister. I pity the person that refers to her as their half sister. They will tell you, real quick she is their real sister. Nothing half about none of that. People rave at the resemblance of me & my two step daughters. We just laugh quietly to ourselves, hardly ever admitting we were bound by anything else other than genetics. My husband & I have been married for 15 years this year. So, we have all put our time in, together, to make this blended family what it is today. The youngest, which will be 20 her birthday, had just turned 5 when I became her step mama. She doesn’t remember when me & her daddy were not together. Along with my son, for years, we had 4 kids like stair steps. It does not seem like that long ago, that they were in kindergarten, 1^st grade, 2^nd grade, & 3^rd grade. Now, I have grandbabies. Time stops for no one. Have times always been candy canes & fluffy clouds? No. Have I learned something about kids during this time? You bet your bottom dollar. That is why I feel so strongly about young people & the direction some of them are taking today.

I watched parts of an episode on Dr. Phil last week. It was a teenage girl, that is from a nearby town. Evidently, she was reeking havoc on her mom. She smoked dope, drank, was actively having sex with a boy over 18, kicked her mama’s windshield out of her car, shoplifted, & various other things, that I may have not caught. Dr. Phil was trying to counsel her. He asked her why she shoplifted. She said it was the people she was with & that if her mama had of given her money, she would not have had to. Come to find out her mama had given her $800 for clothes & she spent it all. Now, let’s stop right there. My 19 year old, knows this girl.

She said, “Who gives their kid $800 to spend on clothes?”

She was amazed & perplexed at this. She said this because, brace yourself , we did not give our kids wardrobe money. It’s not that we hated our kids, or that we did not want them to be able to go out & buy whatever their hearts desired. I felt it my duty, as a mother, to be a part of the clothes buying process. Have you seen some of the stuff these girls wear these days, in the name of trends & fashion? Between me & their grandmother, we made it our job to keep them in modest clothing. Today, as young ladies, my two oldest daughters dress appropriately. Why? Perhaps because as teenagers, they had to pass by their Daddy’s recliner, as they made their way out the door. He would stop them in an instant & send them back to their room to cover up whatever it was that needed it. Now, did they stay covered up after they left the house? I don’t know because I wasn’t always with them. However, they knew what the right thing was.

I will give you my best shot at telling you what I believe is going on with some of these young kids, these days. Why the rebellion & the acting out some kids do in the name of trying to get attention? First off, many parents do not want to parent. They want to be their kid’s friend. Why you may ask? Because parenting done right, is hard. It’s exhausting & tiring & a headache. Sometimes you feel like you are fighting a battle. Who wants to fight a battle, if you don’t have to? You have to have a lot of self confidence & conviction in you to stand up to a 16 year old boy, who is already a head taller than you. And to tell him, in no uncertain terms he is NOT taking your car out, because he made the bad choice to not study & make a less than stellar grades on his report card. No matter how much he wants to huff & puff, he ain’t blowin’ my house down. (Whew! I think this just got personal.) All that strong will, I have always had, would be mush if I did not use it for the good of my kids. Many parents today are afraid of making their teenage kids mad. You know what? I was never inclined to “pacify” my kids. They knew how I felt & what I believed to be right, good, bad or indifferent. Sometimes, you could cut the tension with a knife. But I was never miserable in my own house.

Thus the passive parenting begins. The path of least resistance. A parent has to have their stuff together, to pass that along to a child. So many parents are off chasing a rabbit. They, themselves are not growing up. They are still partaking in things of the world that is not good. Parents of children are on drugs, taking alcohol to the extreme, involved in unhealthy relationships & barely able to take care of their own basic needs. A person has to be serious about this parenting thing or you are setting yourself up for disaster with your kids. Kids are very monkey see, monkey do. It they don’t see the mama & daddy monkey with it together, chances are, they are going to follow suit. If the mama & daddy aren’t going to church & don’t care about the Lord, don’t be surprised that the kids aren’t going to be that interested either. And who’s to blame there? Not the kids.

Now, saying all of that, can you do your very best to do everything within your power for the good of you kids & your kids still turn from the way? Well yeah. Kids are free moral agents. They have a mind of their own. You & your household is not their only influence. Does that release you of your responsibility of doing your part to raise a child to not be a menace to society? I think not. It’s our whole duty to give it our best shot. You can’t make me believe that even the ones that go astray don’t have the solid seed of the Lord planted deep down in their soul. We have to pray that they will come back. We must stay on the straight & narrow path ourselves. Some good advice my aunt gave me-

“Your kids ain’t ever gonna do exactly like you think they should.”

(so quit with the wringing of the hands & worrying.)

& another wise woman said,

“You can’t let your kids run your house.”

Oh how true. I am not going to live in a house where everything revolves around the kids. I love my kids more than life itself. Too much to let them go out in the world with the false sense of believing they are so special they are not responsible for their actions. Letting them live in a kingdom, in which they rule, is a recipe for disaster. Especially the reality check they will get when they step out on their own in the world & realize they are not the center of the universe.

My Daddy told me one time when I went to him for advice about kids,

“Do you think you are better than God? Look at Adam & Eve. Even God had problems with His kids.”

So, don’t beat yourself up too bad, when kids get on the wrong path. Pray & let God handle it.

Here is what Solomon said about raising kids- (remember when God was handing out wisdom, He gave Solomon an extra helping of wisdom – just because he asked for it.)

Proverbs 22:6 – Train up a child in the way he should go, And when he is old he will not depart from it. (NKJV)

Proverbs 22:15 – Foolishness is bound up in the heart of a child; The rod of correction will drive it far from him. (NKJV)

Proverbs 23:13 – Do not withhold correction from a child, For if you beat him with a rod, he will not die.

Proverbs 29:15 – The rod and rebuke give wisdom, But a child left to himself brings shame to his mother.

Just to clarify- these last verses have things about beating with a rod. I don’t believe in child abuse. I don’t think that’s what King Solomon was saying. I do believe in getting a child’s attention when they do wrong. Whether it takes a belt or time out. Each child is different. One of my sons would not straighten up until my husband got his belt out. My youngest daughter, I believe we could have beat her to death & she would have still been doing what we told her not to. She got lots of time outs. That’s what worked on her. The main thing is correction & consistency.

Granted my kids are not perfect. I was not a perfect parent. I did faithfully take them to church & involve them in lots of church activities. They are all Christians, they work, & provide for themselves & their families. They are God-fearing. I just don’t know if I could ask for anything more. I am proud of each & every one of them. And we still have Miss Neenee at home with us. There is still time for improvement!

I am so glad you stopped by to visit with me today. Sorry if I got on a bit of a tangent. I do hope you took something positive away from all this. Don’t take raising kids lightly! When they are grown, you will be glad you put the time in! I hope you have a great rest of the week. This weekend I will be doing a 5k at Woodall Mountain. Pray for me that I don’t pass out. 🙂 Until then, I have to be going because I should be washing clothes.

My kids & kids in law (minus my son)

I heard someone say, not too long ago: “The hardest part of raising kids is over. Mine are almost teenagers.” I chuckled, a little, to myself when I heard this. My children are 21, 20, 19, 18 & 8 years in age. While they were younger, I was so relieved when they started walking & talking. And too, when the last one came out of diapers, I thought what will I do with all this money I will save from not buying formula & wet wipes?? Well, don’t get excited, this is not the secret to becoming a millionaire. ( I never saved any money.) Then, they started school. What ever happened to this free education they are supposed to be getting? I’m pretty sure I have bought enough Kleenex, Germ-X, colors, back packs, lunch boxes, etc,.. to take care of a small family.

Back to my point- I have had babies, I have had elementary school kids, I have had middle schoolers, jr. highers, high schoolers, & college kids. The hardest part of raising kids is not while they are babies, it’s these high school graduate- college kids. Let me explain. With a baby, if they get in to something they aren’t supposed to, you just pick them up from where they are. You give them something else to occupy them. All the while you go back & wipe up the spilled Cheerios, pick up the magazines flung from the coffee table, clean off the wall where they were showing their creativeness with their new colors, whatever it is, it’s exhausting, but obtainable. When they are the college age kids, they get in to something they aren’t supposed to, well, you can pick them up at the county jail, go visit them in the hospital, or basically try to rescue them from themselves. All the while, telling them over & over until you are blue in the face, this is NOT the way. This behavior only leads to nothingness. But they won’t listen. What do you do? Seeing that since I have an expertise in these things, I will share with you my solution.

As soon as they are home from the hospital & you are able to get out of the house, take them to church as much as possible. Keep them involved in a lot of church activities. Make sure they all know right from wrong, at an early age. Proverbs 22:6 Train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old he will not depart from it
Make sure they know you love them. However, let them know obedience is key to anything in life. Ephesians 6:1 Children, obey your parents in all things, for this is well pleasing to the Lord.
Make sure you are going to church yourself & leading a good example. Ephesians 6:4 And you fathers, do not provoke your children to wrath, but bring them up in the training & admonition of the Lord.
Once you have provided the fertile soil for positive growth, have given guidance, instruction, in love, when they finish high school & reach the dreaded age of about 18, sell everything you own, buy a R.V. & set out to see the world, without them. Otherwise, you will spend the next few years of your life in a bundle of nerves.
If you decide not to purchase the R.V., then, you might want to have your doctor prescribe you a nice anti-depressant. Because everything you have ever done wrong in your life, will come full circle & you will reap, heartily, of the bounty of crow that is set before you. Every time you said, “My child would never ……(and finish this sentence with something seriously earth shattering), will come true before your eyes. This is what your life will result in for the next few years. This is the time in one of my friend’s lives that she gave me some really wonderful advice. I won’t ever forget it. Her son was marrying, divorcing, having kids, doing drugs, getting jobs, losing jobs, going to jail, etc.,. He was raised using the first 3 tactics above. When I asked her how she handling things & making it through, she said, “A lot of prayer & a lot of Paxil.” I love my friend. A lot of prayer is so vital to every aspect of life!
When these kids get to acting like adults, don’t be afraid to treat them as such. If they are old enough to make adult decisions, they are old enough to take adult responsibility. Don’t enable. Don’t let their actions take control of your life. Even God lets go of people that won’t heed His will-Romans 1:28 And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a debased mind, to do those things which are not fitting. Don’t make yourself crazy with worry over their behavior. Pray- let go & let God handle it. Raising kids is not for the faint of heart. You have to be strong & have a load of self confidence, or it will really wear.you.out.

Now, don’t get me wrong, there are kids that are raised right, that stay on the right path. And my kids aren’t the only ones that do crazy stuff. I said that to my Daddy one day. I asked, “What did I do wrong? What could I have done different?” He simply said, “Do you remember Adam & Eve? Well, God was their parent. If He could not make His kids act right, what makes you think you can?” Thank you Daddy, for nailing it every time. I like to refer back to Proverbs 22:6 in hopes that one day, it will click for them.

So, the next time that toddler throws up on you, or that school age kid gets a red dot for acting bad, or that high schooler smashes their car in to something– Just remember you have a few more years until they are 18. Then I can stand up, clear my throat & say, “Welcome to raising college age kids, we’ve been waiting for you.” And then give a “Muuwahhaaa!!” witch like laugh.

Thank you for stopping by today. I have loved visiting with you. I have to be going now because I should be washing clothes.