PDA Parenting
Usually, when I sit down to write a blog post I’m often thinking of my older 3 children and all the wonderful chaos they bring into my day. There is always so much going on in their lives, we’re always learning new things together as they grow into beautiful young women. With our youngest, not much is new, she’s a baby, and we’ve done this 3 times before so she isn’t generally the center of my posts, however…she totally inspired this one with a new game we’ve not seen from our older children’s toddling years.
A few months ago Sofie learned how to pucker up and make kissy faces. She is quite stingy with her kisses, rewarding them only when she really wants to give you a kiss. But, when she does want to kiss you, she doesn’t want to stop! She’ll hold you by the neck or cheeks and kiss you over and over and over again. She’s also a huge fan of being held by Mommy and playing with daddy, and this melded with her kissy-face-game to create a whole new game that Sofie just adores. Now she likes to grab mommy by the back of my head, and daddy by his beard, and put our faces together to make Mommy and Daddy kiss.
It was pretty cute the first couple of times she banged our faces together, but after a couple days we started to wonder if our youngest child was trying to tell us something, simple and sweet. Are we not being affectionate enough to each other in front of our children?
We considered this possibility. We are a happy, loving couple (for the most part lol) most days, but we also live very busy lives. We’ve been through several business ventures in the last few years, added a new addition to the family, and bought a new house just 4 years back. At present, we are now both working from home and couldn’t be happier having the lifestyle and time to take our kids out and experience life, not like when we were exhausted after a long day in the office. We realized that although we weren’t unaffectionate, we might have been letting the chaos of life wear us down a bit. We’re talking relationship auto-pilot while we juggle our lives together. Any other parents ever get in this rut or is it just us?
At any rate, it was an eye opener and got me thinking, how much affection should I be showing Mike in front of our children? I had always scolded him for giving me a pat on the rump when the kids were in the room or next room over, but I recently learned Mike spent most of his life seeing his father do that to his mother. He has grown up seeing this as a healthy sign of love from his father to his mother, and so he tries to show me in the same ways he has been taught. We laughed while I explained to him that I no longer see this as a problem, and apologized for scolding him for previous love pats. You can’t apologize for something like that and sound serious about relationship time…it just sounds silly as hell anyway you slice it lol.
We talked to some other parents and asked around about their feelings on the subject. The responses were pretty unanimous, a resounding “YES! Because it’s important..” Now, looking back how important is it really? I mean, would it be the end of the world if Mike didn’t grow up thinking of a rump-pat as a sign of love? No, probably not…but consider this quote from my Uncle Ron on the subject “Above all else, children's home should be a sanctuary against the rest of the world. A place where they feel safe to be themselves and rest from outside influences. What says that better than love?”
Children need to see love between their parents just as much as they need to feel it for themselves. We are not only laying the groundwork for their future relationships and expectations (a BIG factor in our decision to get married, we have 4 daughters and we want them to have that example and strive for that commitment. We don’t want them to feel as though they must settle for the man they love, whether he gives them what they deserve or not.) but we are also teaching them about family.
The truth of the matter is your entire relationship will not be wedded bliss through out your kids lives. Y’all are going to get into an argument or two, and Junior IS going to notice. Even if you don’t argue in front of your children they can pick up on the tense emotions between you two, and the tension in the air of their home. It puts them on alert and makes them worried and uncomfortable. That sense of security for the home vanishes if it happens to often. But, regardless…it will happen.
So…what happens a few hours later, or even the next day, when your child sees you cooking Daddy’s favorite breakfast and leaving it with a little “sorry we argued” note or maybe planting a big fat kissy right on Daddy’s face? Are they confused and damaged forever by seeing an argument? No. They see that Mom and Dad are human and occasionally disagree, and they also see that Mom and Dad still love each other even if they’re upset. They see that love is stronger than anger. This is vital to not only their life and relationships, but your relationship with them as well. If they think that anger is stronger than love…well, just imagine where that puts you when said child is a teenager and anger is a common occurrence.
Raising children isn’t about surviving today (okay, some days it IS…but not in general lol…), it’s about preparing them for a glorious tomorrow. It’s important as parents to consider the lessons and examples we are setting for their future choices, because often times the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree. And I should know, I wanted nothing more than to be anything other than my Mom my whole life. And I have become her, A loving mother with a herd of beautiful children trying not to go totally insane while I weigh out the pros and cons of every life decision I make for and in front of my kids.
And I wouldn’t have it any other way, because my mom laid the groundwork for some beautiful life lessons. She showed me what a mother is, and what a mother isn’t. She showed me right and wrong, she taught me so many home making skills – cooking, sewing, ironing, washing, cleaning, shopping, organizing, teaching... and most of these lessons I learned as a child, just spending time with her and seeing what she did.
And you know what else? My mom loved my dad. A LOT. She refused to go to bed angry at him, I’ve only seen it happen once in their entire marriage and she actually didn’t sleep that night because she couldn’t go to bed angry at him. She was terrified she might not wake up and the last thing they said to each other would be on bad terms. Low and behold, shortly before my mothers 54th birthday she passed away in her sleep after a day spent with my Dad, going out to eat, kicking back some brewskies, and remembering all the good times. Sometimes I wonder if she knew she was going to die that day. It was scary the things she laid out for all of us. We could all feel something coming, but she just kept smiling. That’s how I want to remember her, strong and smiling and full of love.
And so, in the wake of this realization, we have vowed not to get stuck in parenting auto-pilot and show each other more affection in front of our kids. Including lifting the ban on the rump pat. J
