Children's reflections of parents
By Staff
Melissa Cason
This week I have been asking myself the same question: At what point does the things we do stop having a direct impact on the way our parents are viewed by the community?
Unfortunately, there is not right or wrong answer to this question, and there's no set answer either. This question has to be evaluated on a case-by-case basis.
Take my brother, Robert, and me for example. We never really got into any real trouble as teens. The reason for that was we feared going home after the police calling our parents. We were raised in a very strict household. Some would say it was almost military without the physical training. We had a set bedtime, a set curfew, and the rules were made very clear to us, and the consequences for breaking them were even clearer.
We were always told if we were arrested not to call home because our parents would just make us sit there. So, we stayed out of trouble.
Today, we have carried that discipline over into our lives, and we both have good jobs, and families.
How much of that was a result of the way we were raised? A lot. We would not be the same people if we were handed everything on a silver platter.
But, just because we turned out good and made decent decisions, doesn't mean we couldn't have taken a different route. Yes our raising helped but we had to decide for ourselves what we wanted out of life and go out there and get it.
Here's another fictional but realistic scenario.
Two brothers, a few years a part, are raised in the same household.
One brother gets married, holds a job, and builds a life for him and his family. The other brother gets married but doesn't work, and thinks that the world just owes him something.
People think what did the parents do right with one and wrong with the other? The answer to that question is nothing.
Parents only have control over our lives while we are growing up. I believe that God only loans us our children to love and help during their early years. It's up to us as parents to teach them about God, to provide them with an education, and instill some values so that they will be ready to go out into the world.
When that job is over, our responsibility of who that child becomes is over.
All we can really do is try to raise our children right, and hope that they make good, honest, solid decisions.
And if they don't? We'll still love them because God gave us unconditional love for our child-the way he loves us.
But, we don't have to agree with their decisions once they are grown. We just have to respect them.
And, if the decisions have severe consequences, we can only hope that those consequences teach them a lesson.
I know many of you out there are asking yourself what I know about raising children. I really don't know anything. I am a parent who is learning on the job.
I just know that once children are raised and have families of their own, they stop being the responsibility of their parents, and their decisions should not reflect poorly on them as people or parents.
And the parents should not beat themselves up for the decisions their children make.
