- Why Parenting is Difficult: Introduction to the Series
- Why Parenting is Difficult: Loving and Letting Go
- Why Parenting is Difficult: Loving the Hard to Like
Parenting is a deeply vulnerable endeavor. Here is this young person who is simultaneously deeply intertwined with the persons of the parents and yet is also separate and who needs to go through a process of separation with the parents. Separation of any kind is painful. The deeper the love and connection between two people, the more painful the separation is. There is probably no deeper connection than that of a parent and their child. No wonder parenting is difficult!
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There are a couple of common ways that people tend to try to make the pain of separating with their child easier: some parents minimize the separation and others minimize the connection. In order to minimize the separation between them and their child, some parents pretend that they can plan their children’s lives and actions for them. Often, this route is filled with: 1. frustration as the parents struggle to bend the child’s will to their own and/or 2. shame as they experience the child’s mistakes as reflecting on them. Another well worn path that some parents are tempted to take is avoiding the pain of separation by never really allowing themselves to become attached to their child. In order to become secure adults who can be confident in intimate relationships, children need to experience that their parents care deeply about them. They won’t have this experience if a parent is trying to protect themselves by minimizing the connection with the child.
The best way to raise a healthy child is to face the pain of loving deeply and letting go, but this is easier said than done. It also takes us back to the bottom line: aside from Jesus, no one loves perfectly nor does any have the perfect wisdom to know when and how to let go.
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