Last night my husband shuffled out at 2 am to deliver his best threats to get them to surrender to sleep, only to be followed by my award-winning stomping performance at 3 am. Then we heard nothing until 6 am, probably because my brain simply ran out of juice.
You heard me say 6 am right? It’s 10 am now. Thirty minutes till pickup. Thank all that is holy because I’m kinda miserable except that my 21 year old, Morgan, came to hang out with us last night to be part of the chaos that was our son’s birthday happiness.
She just announced she’s going back to her apartment to study in a town an hour away. She has reminded us with piercing clarity that these miserable parenting moments go away too quickly. And then we weirdly long for them. The older kids long for them too, it turns out. Last night Morgan sat with me around the fire pit reminiscing about her fourth grade slumber parties in vivid, grinning detail. It was a precious moment for sure.
Have you ever heard the saying “parenting is full of joy and no fun”? At this moment that dynamic applies in spades. It is during these “no fun” moments when we make our worst parenting mistakes.
This week I’m going to share mine from Tuesday. Of course I risk falling off the expert pedestal that some may put me on, but that’s exactly why I’m doing it. I may have expert parenting advice to share, however the truth is PARENTING IS HARD FOR ALL OF US. We all make stupid mistakes that we flinch to remember. We all get tired and confused and stuck. We all need fresh ideas and rejuvenating experiences to be the “good enough” parent psychologists encourage us to be.
This week is a story about how I failed to practice what I preach with parenting and Internet safety.
My 13-year-old daughter, Sidney, is bright, unflappable, and feisty. When I created www.GetKidsInternetSafe, she announced that she too was going to start a business, on YouTube giving MineCraft advice. I told her she should and that it sounded great, thinking it would be a fun creative venture for her.
Flash forward several months later. I’m checking her computer and find that she has created her own YouTube profile and there are several favorite videos already featured…and one is not appropriate for public profiling. Not terribly bad, but not terribly good either. Very middle school funny, if you know what I mean.
In my 30 Days to Internet Safety video parenting course, I stress how important it is to not rant, shame, or abruptly yank away privileges when you find that your child has not used good screen media judgment. Instead, use it as a learning opportunity. If you must consequate, be sensible. Don’t overdo or take away screen media by habit or your kids will learn that it’s a bad idea to come to mom or dad when Internet issues arise. And arise they will, for all of our kids, regardless of how careful and brilliant we may be in our strategies.
You hear where this is going?
Well, in this situation it didn’t take me long to rant and shame as I deleted everything; scolding her for proceeding without my permission and using poor judgment. Lecturing her about her online reputation and the risks of the digital footprints. All of it. It was kind of ugly and my bold, brilliant child started to cry.
I realized I’d kind of blown it, but didn’t want to crumble fully in that my message was important and some impact resulting from the situation was important as a reality check.
The next day I apologized for my overreaction. It became evident to me that I was partly worried about my credibility being ruined as an online expert if the YouTube channel were to be discovered. And I felt ashamed. I let my emotions override my empathy. It was the next day when she told me that she thought she had my permission. That the borderline inappropriate video she’d watched was super funny to middle schoolers. And that she thought those videos were only viewable to the user, not to the public. And the truth was, I wasn’t sure. I was too busy having a shame spiral spasm of my own to effectively hold Sidney’s emotional well being securely in the forefront of my mind. I was in a selfish panic really.
I’m not telling this story to administer a masochistic flogging, but to acknowledge that parenting is impossible to get right at every opportunity.
We all screw up, we all rant, and we all get selfish. But when we fill our hearts with compassion for our kids AND OURSELVES, we are more likely to stay on course. We are more likely to consider their developmental perspective, allow them the freedom to explore, and to validate their experience as we provide them with wise and gentle guidance (and if you live in our chaotic but loving home, to laugh at ourselves later among those we love, kids included). Because there’s really no better gift you can give your kids than a loving acknowledgement that failure is a part of life. If you are living a full one, those failures never go away, whether you’re 13 or 47 years old.
I’m the mom psychologist who will help you GetYourKidsInternetSafe.
Onward to More Awesome Parenting,
Tracy S. Bennett, Ph.D.
Mom, Clinical Psychologist, CSUCI Adjunct Faculty
GetKidsInternetSafe.com
Photo credit:
Birthday cake by Omer Wazir CC by-SA 2.0
Don't worry, we will never spam you.
