I recently told a friend that this summer, with my children, has been an opportunity for lessons. I’m grateful and sometimes really tired. Last summer, I signed the lease for my new private practice and was excited and ready to work really hard. My oldest son was entering into kindergarten in the fall, which caused me a lot of discomfort and anxiety. Two weeks before he was going to get on his first school bus to leave for an entire full day of school, I realized that I didn’t spend the quality time with my boys that I wanted to and that I was distracted a lot. I struggled to balance time with my new professional adventure and adventures with my boys.
So, this summer I set a boundary with work. I had a set schedule and the rest of the time would be time with my boys. And I did that, but again without balance. If I wasn’t running them around to parks, museums, movies, trampoline centers then I was picking up after the messes they were making as they were playing on an iPod, iPad or watching television. I was so worn out from running them around and catering to them that I allowed them to be stimulated a lot through screen time because it gave me some time to disengage.
After engaging in this routine for two months, I began to feel very anxious and agitated. I felt worn out and taken advantage of despite knowing that my 4 and 7 year old boys weren’t being ungrateful but were reacting to their environment quite appropriately. So what did I do? I announced that this would no longer be happening and spent 24 hours in reactive dictator mode. Self awareness is a beautiful thing because I knew that I was in it but sometimes with challenging feelings, you just have to go with it.
I woke up the next morning feeling refreshed and certain that the strategies that I put into place still made sense but I shifted how I would move forward so as to respond and not react. It remains that my boys need to clean up after themselves and that if they need a drink that they can do it themselves but not because I’m angry and resentful but because it empowers them and it shows respect for their father and me. I will limit their screen time because I see what it does to them to spend too much time on a screen. They are kinder to each other, they create and use their imaginations and they connect so beautifully when the distraction of a screen is not an option.
With this new awareness, I took them for a very brief trip to the mall so that I could buy some of my favorite tea. I calmly reminded them as they were walking that it is important for them to walk next to me and not to run (large spaces always seems to entice my boys to run). We made it through our trip and we walked out to the parking lot to get back into our car. I reminded them to walk next to me or to hold my hand if that was too hard to stay close. My older son started to slow down behind me and my younger son moved ahead (this is so typical for us!) and I put my hands on both of their backs and said “I’m going to hold onto you both because I would not want you to get hurt because you aren’t listening to what I say.” As we walked, a woman closed her car door and she looked at me and said “I love how you talk to your children.” I just looked at her because I didn’t realize that she was there and because I was so grateful to her.
It’s about balance. Balance between work and my family, balance between doing for my children and empowering them, balance between connecting with them, having fun with them and being consistent in my expectations.
When my therapist hat is on in my office, I get this very easily but I’m their mom otherwise. I’m grateful for the kind woman in the parking lot because it reminded me that despite the times that I feel like I don’t know what I’m doing, there are times when I parent consciously and I really do get it right.
Lauren =)