Theresa's Famous Potholes

In my family, the word “pothole” takes on a whole new meaning.  When it is uttered, it is used as much affectionately as it is seriously.  This all stems from a theory I have:  When you are born, the life ahead of you is like a new road.  And like a new road, the way is strong and solid.  But as you live your life, the weight of metaphorical cars and trucks, combined with the, likewise, metaphorical changes in weather, cause potholes to develop.  This makes the road of life more difficult to traverse.  So, we fill those potholes in order to continue on our way.  Some of the things we may fill them with include: work, food, exercise, religion, anger, prescription pills, alcohol, drugs, shopping/spending, etc. 

Just like materials that are used to fill-in real potholes, some things work better than others.  Some may even cause the pothole to get worse when we try to fill it.  But the most important point to remember is that once that pothole is there, the road will never be as solid as it was before the pothole was created. 

Furthermore, as you continue through life, you may find yourself on the same road, stopped by the same pothole that has once again come uncovered.  The key is to know that you need to do the work again and again to fill and refill that pothole so that you can continue to get on with your life.  A simple example of this is if you lose someone close to you and after years have passed, you hear a song or smell something cooking in the kitchen and it . . . BAM! . . . brings you right back.  All the work you did to get past that event comes undone and you have to do it again.  Perhaps not as difficult as the first time, depending on what you filled it with, but, nevertheless, there is that pothole again and once again you need to do the work.  The problem is that these potholes from your past are what probably make raising children the most challenging.  Because you are not only dealing with their issues, you are dealing with their issues through the memory of your own.

One amusing story I’d like to share with you is about a personal pothole that I have that came uncovered when my son was about four years old.  I had given him and his sister several toy catalogs to search through in order to come up with a list of toys that they wanted for Christmas.  I did not have many toys when I was a child, and it was difficult for me to say “no” when there was a toy that they wanted.  But when my son came to me with a hopeful smile on his face and a Christmas list with eighty some odd items on it, I felt the walls of my pothole crashing in upon itself.  How could I possibly make him happy on Christmas morning with so much on his list, knowing that he would be looking for everything since, “It doesn’t cost Santa anything to buy the toys he leaves under the tree.”

Luckily for me, there was a Christmas cartoon on that year about a boy named Jeremy Creek.  The boy had written a Christmas list so long that when Santa got it, he thought “this surely can’t be all for just one little boy, it must be for a town.”  When Santa looked on his map he found the town, Jeremy Creek, and realized that the poor children in that town had been forgotten for years.  So on Christmas Eve, he delivered all of Jeremy’s toys to Jeremy Creek, the town.  On Christmas morning, Jeremy woke up to see that there was nothing under his tree.  Feeling angry and disappointed, he turned on the television and a news story appeared about a town named Jeremy Creek who had finally been remembered by Santa.  Jeremy was a pretty smart little boy and he figured out quickly that those were supposed to be his toys.  At first he shouted at the T.V., angry about the mix-up, but as he watched the children play with the toys, he realized that he had made them all happy.  It seemed that “giving” was even better than “receiving” and Jeremy ended up having the best Christmas ever that year. 

So, after watching that cartoon, I told the kids that they could only put the amount of items on their lists that matched their age up until the age of ten, with a maximum amount of items set at ten.  This way I could be reasonably sure that I would get them something that they really wanted.  Unfortunately for my son, after watching the cartoon, my daughter and I nicknamed him Jeremy Creek.  And over the years, as he never seemed to be satisfied with the toys he had and always seemed to want more, we sometimes would remind him of that cartoon and his face would turn red and his lip would quiver and he’d say, “I am not Jeremy Creek!”   I believe this probably became his first pothole! 

Respect + Ownership + Communication = Influence

 The difference between toddlers and teens is that, whereas you can control a toddler, you can only hope to influence a teen.  The ability to buckle my daughter into a stroller when she misbehaved was lost long before she became a teenager.  This is why, for those of  you who still have young children, it is important to know that you start raising your teenager the day you become a parent, not when they turn 13. 

There are three requirements that must be in place in order for a parent to have “influence” over their teen.  First, you need to have their respect.  Respect is earned through consistent and fair actions and reactions over a long period of time.  The second is ownership.  You need to take ownership of your part when a problem surfaces. (There are problems that surface that you have no ownership over.  When they occur, you have very little, if any, influence over changing the situation.) This does not mean that the problem is your fault, it means taking responsibility for the part of the problem that you CAN change, because the only person that YOU can control is yourself.  Finally, communication is also an essential ingredient in gaining influence over your teenager’s decisions.  There are no perfect parents, we all make mistakes, and when we do make mistakes with our children, we need to sit down and talk to them and let them know we are sorry and that we will take the steps necessary to make things right.  This teaches them to take responsibility for their own mistakes and to, likewise, do the work that is necessary to make things right. 

As a parent, we need to be willing and able to put our own egos aside so that we can recognize our role in the problem; because only then, can we have an impact on changing the situation.  Respect cannot be demanded, it must be earned.  Furthermore, love should not be confused with respect.  Your child can love you and know that they are loved by you, without respecting you or feeling that you respect them. 

Why I have turned to blogging

Before I had my first child, I read everything I could find about pregnancy.  Once she was born, my thirst for knowledge continued and I subscribed to magazines, read more books, joined “mommy” organizations to share information and develop a network of people to support me in this uncharted terrain. 

This served me well.  And by the time my second child was born, I had become a pro at developing these connections.  When my daughter entered elementary school, I dove in with all the excitement of discovering further the mysteries of this journey called parenthood.

Soon I became a Girl Scout leader (although I had never been a Girl Scout), I became “the” book fair person and thoroughly enjoyed bringing the joy of reading to these young children, I became a substitute teacher in the elementary schools, and it wasn’t long before I found myself as first a Vice-President and then President of the PTA. 

But once my daughter entered middle school, it almost seemed like someone put up a sign in front of me that said, “The train stops here!”  I still went to PTA meetings and now ran book fairs in the middle school.  I increased the sales of books and the profit for the MS/HS PTA so much that they allowed me to use some of the profit to bring education programs that I thought would enhance the history program at the school.  I brought in a pilot from WWII whose exciting story brought history to life for the students, as well as a Civil War re-enactor who helped the children understand the hardships that the soldiers’ faced when traveling and fighting over long distances for years at a time in the 1800s. 

Although I still got some satisfaction from these ventures, I felt like I was losing my support system.  The moms who had stayed home to raise their children, were now going back to work.  My daughter was making new friends and, although I always introduced myself to the new parents, the introductions were often as far as our connection went.  Soon the kids were communicating through cell phones and the Internet and my contact with her world diminished link by link. 

When I had questions about how to support her through the turbulent middle years, I had a much smaller network of friends to rely on.  There were a few books and movies on teen drama that helped to open conversations with my daughter.  But at the same time, technology was changing at a rapid rate and with it the “blueprint” of how to get through these difficult years became continually outdated.   I still had lunch dates, now and then, with parents whom I had met while she was in pre-school.  Because each of our girls had moved on into different social groups, these lunches became my lifeline to understanding the “big picture” or anything beyond my daughter’s personal experiences.  It helped me put things together so that I could be in a better position to advise her through the emotional changes and demands of those early teen years.

One day, one of these lunch-date friends told me that the school was starting a parenting of teens class in the evenings and asked if I would go with her.  I signed up and was thrilled to feel back in my element.  Here was the information I had been craving!  The class was informative and helpful but limited in time.  As it neared the end of the course, other parents who had recognized my passion for the subject, asked me to continue the discussion beyond the end of the term.  So I met with the teachers of the class and gathered information and went on to developing material that worked for our group.  We met in the library (the same one where my daughter had taken possession of all of those stuffed animals) and through posters I had created, and scenarios I had devised, we tried to navigate the turbulent waters of uncertainty together.  I didn’t have the confidence though to lead without an expert in the field at my side.  So I tried over and over to find someone to join us.  But unfortunately, I failed in this effort. 

As the following years passed, I continued my efforts to establish a parenting of tweens and teens help group.  Again and again I found myself stopped by either a lack of interest on the part of the authorities and/or a lack of funding.  When my daughter was 15 and my son was 10 (and now I had two in those terrible tween/teen years), I decided to write a book.  I had always wanted to write a book my entire life, but now I knew what I needed to write about.  I remember telling my daughter about my plans and explaining to her that I could spend years writing this book, it would take time away from my family and the daily chores that I needed to perform in order to keep our household going, and that it could all be for nothing because I knew the chances of getting it published where almost nil.  My sweet, wonderful teenage daughter turned to me and said, “Then write it for me mom.”  How could I argue with that!  So I wrote it.  A young adult novel filled with history, mystery, love and heartache, and a guide for surviving those years in spite of dysfunctional families and social obstacles. 

Now the book is done and I am writing its sequel.  But in order to get it “out there” in front of literary agents and publishers, I need to establish an interested audience.  So that is where you come in . . . if you are interested in the information I have garnered over the past years, then please become a member of this blog.  I promise I will entertain you, and console you, and learn from you.  Please join me on this next adventure in my life.

The Terrible Two's

There are a lot of similarities between toddlers and teenagers, they both love drama!  I remember one time I brought my daughter to the local library and her eyes opened wide at the sight of a huge stuffed animal on the floor, large enough for children to climb on.  In addition, there was a selection of stuffed animals, some in a large box, others scattered around the floor.  She was so excited as I unbuckled her from her stroller and placed her tiny feet on the carpet.  She ran around, gathering all the stuffed animals she could hold and climbed onto the large one, locking her legs around its neck and hugging the toys close to her.  Then a child tried to approach her . . .

My little princess changed before my eyes as she glared at the intruder and announced with great vibrato, M I N E ! ! ! !

What she didn’t realize was that if she intended to sit there on the toy for an hour, holding onto the stuffed animals locked in her arms, she was not going to have much fun on this day in the library.  If she had simply shared the toys with the other child, this day would have been so much more enjoyable for her.  But this freedom at the library was new to her and you can’t talk to a two year old when they are in the middle of a tantrum.  So I picked her up and put her back in her stroller and buckled her in.  It may have taken a few trips to the library before she realized that as long as she conducted herself appropriately, she would be given a limited amount of freedom.  But if she decided to push those boundaries and see how far she could get before I would place her back in the stroller, she ultimately ended up losing her freedom.    

Teenagers are a lot like that.  They are growing up and if they have shown that they can handle themselves appropriately in a situation, they deserve to be rewarded with a little more freedom.  But if they abuse the privilege, then those boundaries need to be reigned in again.  Age appropriate freedom is a wonderful thing; too much freedom is dangerous and too little is stifling.  It is important to always leave something, a carrot if you will, dangling ahead of them that they can earn.  Don’t give them all the freedom by the time they are twelve and then they want more when they are thirteen but there’s no more to give.  Think ahead.  There really is something to be said for “an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.”

New to Blogging

Hello everyone!  I am new to blogging but hope you will all help me as I explore this new adventure!  The reason for my blog is simple.  I am raising two children, a girl who is mostly raised, she is 20 now, and a boy who is semi-raised, he is 15 now.  In the course of raising these children, I have encountered many people who have touched their lives, some for the better and some . . . well, not so much.  My home has been and, I hope, will continue to be, a refuge for their friends who need to see that a home can be a loving, supportive, and healthy environment.  Unfortunately, I cannot take them all in and raise them, so when I send them back to their own environments, sometimes . . . many times, I worry about them.  This is because you can only help a child so far if you can't change their environment.  I hope that through this blog, I will be able to share some tools that I have learned through the years, and in turn, help parents parent more effectively.  And just as important, to be here for those parents and to let them know that they are not alone.  It truly does take a community to raise a healthy child.  I hope to start such a virtual community here.  Welcome friends and neighbors!