Forums
New posts
Search forums
What's new
New posts
New profile posts
Latest activity
Internet Search
Members
Current visitors
New profile posts
Search profile posts
Log in
Register
What's new
Search
Search
Search titles only
By:
New posts
Search forums
Menu
Log in
Register
Install the app
Install
Forums
Parent Support Forums
Parent Emeritus
Advice for feeling like a failure as a parent?
JavaScript is disabled. For a better experience, please enable JavaScript in your browser before proceeding.
You are using an out of date browser. It may not display this or other websites correctly.
You should upgrade or use an
alternative browser
.
Reply to thread
Message
<blockquote data-quote="WiseChoices" data-source="post: 754565" data-attributes="member: 24254"><p>I used to feel shame and embarrassment about my mothering until I worked the 12 steps in Al-Anon, and realized that I did the best I could do with the tools I had at the time. And if I had known better, I would have done better because I love my kids more than life itself , and I would have done anything to raise them with the love, patience, discipline, and tolerance they each needed .</p><p></p><p>I think we forget sometimes that everyone is on their own journey. Everyone learns their lessons when they are ready for them. Comparing my kids to other kids and their rates of growth , their journeys etc does not serve me and only introduces more guilt.</p><p></p><p>The frontal cortex of our brains (which controls reasoning and logic) is not fully developed until around age 25. People who use drugs delay this process. The lessons we see at age 52 (me) and 66 (you) are not the lessons our young adult kids see, necessarily. Just because your son does not change his behavior on your time table does not mean he did not get the lesson, or won't get the lesson, or won't see this entirely differently as he grows and matures.</p><p></p><p>Seeing ourselves as failures extends seeing our children as failures to them by default. I don't think this is serving anyone. Seeing everyone , ourselves included, as being in our journey, growing , changing , and evolving exactly how we are each meant to gives us a sense of empowerment which is hugely helpful. </p><p></p><p>Your two older children have an interplay of genetics, outer circumstances, and their own ways of thinking and using their brains, effects from drugs perhaps etc etc etc - to take all that on is playing with what you are powerless over. It's too big of a mountain for you to even contemplate to tackle. Let it go. There is nothing you can do about the past anyway. You can affect how you feel about yourself today and how effective you are in your own life today. That is where your power lies: in the now. Don't waste it by focusing on the past and that which you are powerless over. </p><p></p><p>Every time you think it your estranged children, send them love. If you meditate, expand your heart with the inhalation and send a beam of love and light into their hearts on the exhalation for 10 breaths. Then bring that love back to you for the next 10 exhalations healing whatever needs healing in you.</p></blockquote><p></p>
[QUOTE="WiseChoices, post: 754565, member: 24254"] I used to feel shame and embarrassment about my mothering until I worked the 12 steps in Al-Anon, and realized that I did the best I could do with the tools I had at the time. And if I had known better, I would have done better because I love my kids more than life itself , and I would have done anything to raise them with the love, patience, discipline, and tolerance they each needed . I think we forget sometimes that everyone is on their own journey. Everyone learns their lessons when they are ready for them. Comparing my kids to other kids and their rates of growth , their journeys etc does not serve me and only introduces more guilt. The frontal cortex of our brains (which controls reasoning and logic) is not fully developed until around age 25. People who use drugs delay this process. The lessons we see at age 52 (me) and 66 (you) are not the lessons our young adult kids see, necessarily. Just because your son does not change his behavior on your time table does not mean he did not get the lesson, or won't get the lesson, or won't see this entirely differently as he grows and matures. Seeing ourselves as failures extends seeing our children as failures to them by default. I don't think this is serving anyone. Seeing everyone , ourselves included, as being in our journey, growing , changing , and evolving exactly how we are each meant to gives us a sense of empowerment which is hugely helpful. Your two older children have an interplay of genetics, outer circumstances, and their own ways of thinking and using their brains, effects from drugs perhaps etc etc etc - to take all that on is playing with what you are powerless over. It's too big of a mountain for you to even contemplate to tackle. Let it go. There is nothing you can do about the past anyway. You can affect how you feel about yourself today and how effective you are in your own life today. That is where your power lies: in the now. Don't waste it by focusing on the past and that which you are powerless over. Every time you think it your estranged children, send them love. If you meditate, expand your heart with the inhalation and send a beam of love and light into their hearts on the exhalation for 10 breaths. Then bring that love back to you for the next 10 exhalations healing whatever needs healing in you. [/QUOTE]
Insert quotes…
Verification
Post reply
Forums
Parent Support Forums
Parent Emeritus
Advice for feeling like a failure as a parent?
Top