Is It Our Fault?

We like to think that we can mold our children into successful, non-drug-taking, college-bound adults, but can we?  Is it really what WE teach, show and speak, that makes our kids into drug dealers or doctors?  Is it the stay-at-home mom that is more likely to rear responisible, loving kids? Or, is it the working family who will show their children what a good work ethic is?

Are we to blame when our child is a serial killer?  How many truly loving parents have "turned out" a child that is addicted to drugs, a womanizer or a murderer?  How is it so?  Is it inherient in the child?  Was there ANYTHING that family could have done differently to "make" their kid "better?"

Can you love a child too much?  Are we too easy on our kids and thus make them into winey, spoiled, self-indulgent brats?  Where is the balance between loving and spoiling?

I have many times shook my fingers at families who have "made" their children into train wrecks.  I have thought "what kind of parents were they?!"  And then I met the parents of a murderer.  And then I met the parents of a drug addict.  And then I met the parents of a theif.  And then I met the parents of a womanizer....and so on...

What is it that makes a child successful?  Is it EXPECTATION?  Is it hard work?  Is it good schools?  Is it love?  Perhaps none of it.  Perhaps all of it.



I know that from the time my son, Cody was born I have poured every ounce of my being into raising him and training him up and loving him and expecting the most of him.  And honeslty, I know deep down, it is up to him to be who he will be.  It is up to each one of my children to make the most, or the least, out of their lives.

The other day at the pool I saw a mom working her butt off to get her kid to behaive.  She was trying so hard to make her son into what society deems "acceptable. " She is trying so hard to raise him up to be a "good" adult.  But in the end, it is up to him.  He must find it in himself.

The scientific question is always "nature" or "nuture?"  But I think the answer is unequiviqually-- BOTH! Because as good as we can be, as hard as we can try, we can't be held accoutable for our children's every decision.

I had a parent once get very upset with me because of something Skylar did.  She charged up to my front door, knocked and then proceeded to read me the riot act about Skylar and what kind of kid I raised and blah blah blah. (for the record Skylar didn't do anything, the woman didn't understand what Skylar and her friend were talking about and THOUGHT Skylar was talking about her...) So I just sat that and listlened and said I would deal with it.

So when it was my turn to "deal" with a mom who's child did something I thought back to my experience.  I picked up the phone and explained what her son had said to Skylar and just asked her to handle it.  I didn't blame her.  I didn't chastise her.  I didn't even feel that all that was wrong with the world was her fault (although at the time I wanted to!)  I just spoke from one mom trying, to another.

And that is all that we can do is keep trying.  We can just wake up every morning and show and talk and do and help our children, but in the end, their life is theirs.  We are just here to help steer them in the right direction.

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