Parenting is beautiful. It is middle of the day, just because hugs. It is art projects brought home that say, “I love you.” It is watching and helping them achieve milestones. It is playing together, laughing together and creating memories together.
Parenting is ugly. It is middle of Home Depot tantrums because the child is B-O-R-E-D bored and hungry and you have been there for 1.78 hours, in the same part of the store. It is discipling the child because they need to know that disrespecting their elders is not ok. It is getting them to admit the truth when they’ve been telling a lie. It is finding 4 week old milk under their bed. It is cleaning up diaper blowouts in the middle of a road trip. It is praying they get back on the straight and narrow when they’ve veered off and become “wild”
Parenting is mundane. It is helping them write their anchor (spelling) words 3 times each, figuring out the new math or helping with the dreaded science fair project. It is singing the same song 30 times to get them to sleep. It is reading the same book over and over knowing you are helping their literacy but really you can’t stand the story and “WHY CAN’T YOU PICK A DIFFERENT BOOK?” you scream (in your head, not at them).
Parenting is day in and day out. It is cooking a healthy dinner EVERY night (with the occasional splurge) even after working all day. It is packing lunches, doing laundry and picking up what others in the house can’t seem to see, even though NO ONE IN HERE IS BLIND! It is playing chauffer to all the back and forths of school, church, doctor, sports, clubs and friends.
Parenting is scary. It is 104* fevers that won’t come down. It is a hacking barking cough that sounds like a death cough. It is calls from the doctor saying, “We need to talk.” It is watching junior climb 40 feet up a tree, or ask to jump off the roof. It is checking on who they are spending time with, wondering why cars only have 1 seat belt per seat and not a Michelin Man suit. It is calls from the school principal in the middle of the day.
So often on Social Media, Mass Media and life in general we glamorize parenting. Parenting is the most wonderful, stressful job and amazing job. Yet, we need to be honest with each other. We are not perfect parents, and our children are not perfect children. Parenting day to day in the trenches raising up future adults into hopefully upstanding citizens. If you are having troubles, your child just embarrassed the heck out of you or you are calling military schools for an immediate enrollment, just know that you are far from alone. Our Social Media pictures may be all pretty but our lives with our children are just as messy.
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