I pride myself on being what many call a "deliberate" mother, that is to say I think a lot about how I'm raising my kids. I want my kids to be able to take care of themselves, to be able to cook and clean and get to where they want to go in life. I want them to be kind and compassionate and concerned with justice. I want them to have a strong personal moral code.
So not much of what happens in my home happens by accident; I spend a lot of time plotting out the kind of childhood I want my children to have, based on the kind of adults I hope they'll become and then I spend a bunch more time trying to make my aspirations a reality.
I'm what you call an "intentional" mother; a mom with a purpose. The kind of food we eat and how we make it, the extent to which the kids help out with chores, the extra curricular activities in which they are involved, our free time and how we spend it - these are all things I like to think about and control if I can. I want my kids to enjoy what I consider to be precious years of freedom and unrivaled imagination. I want my kids to have ethics, values - to feel virtue within themselves, virtues they can call upon in any situation. And so I'm pretty intentional about teaching them and getting into discussions and getting them outside, and getting them together with friends, and getting them playing, getting them into books. I'm intentional about limits: no TV during the week, period. Movies on the weekends, but only in the evening when we're not wasting daylight hours. No computer games on weekends until chores and homework is done. We don't miss church. We avoid using our car. We try to help families in our neighbourhood. We follow routines.
I had it all thought out...but now I'm rethinking.
Here's what got me started: A few weeks ago we went skiing. I was on the bunny hill with my youngest who is all of three. The first couple of times I went down the hill with him I tried to hold him between my legs, which didn't work at all. I could barely keep him upright and our skiis kept getting tangled together: clearly this method was holding him back. The next few times we went down the hill I tried to ski beside him and hold his hand as he went down. This didn't work either. One of us was always too fast, the other too slow and again we ended up hindering each other. Finally I landed on a method that worked: I simply pushed my son down the hill ahead of me. He was forced to figure out skiing for himself - and he did! He'd accidentally find himself in a snowplow and take note of the effect, or he'd find himself turning and the next time he'd be able to do it on his own. When he fell (which was at least once every time we went down the hill) I'd be right there ready to pick him up.
My oldest son is asking for an email account, which I don't think he should have. Email accounts aren't a part of the childhood I've deliberately mapped out for him! He's also asking for a cell phone and to take transit by himself. I'd give anything to be free of daily emails I need to check, and I told him so. I also told him I don't know who he thinks he needs to call on his phone or where exactly he needs to go on public transit that doesn't involve bringing his mom along, but it's clear that he is moving beyond the childhood constraints I've got in place. This week he decided to dye his bangs pink.
I think we are obligated to control our kids' environments when they're young - to give them choice within limits. But as kids grow older I'm learning that our new obligation is to help them set limits for themselves. With my oldest I feel myself moving into new territory where the kind of control I had when he was younger may now be more harmful than helpful. Ironically it was my three year old who introduced me to this possibility, and the insight that it is time to be a little less intentional so that my oldest, especially, can be more so.
As my oldest moves into pre-teen territory I am realizing I will need to rethink a lot of my deliberate decisions. He may want to watch TV a little more than I'd like him to, but it's getting time that he start owning his screen time...because he's equally ready to deal with the consequences should it start to affect homework or his physical fitness. He might play a computer game I find totally disgusting. He will probably get an email account soon. And, in a likelihood, a cell phone is not far off. What I need to do now is be intentional and deliberate about protecting his independence, so that he can learn to to be intentional and deliberate for himself. It's just not coming that easily to me!
