WHY?

If there’s one thing I’ve learned in raising my boys, it’s that I really don’t think this question will never be satisfied! And yet, I still catch myself asking . . . why? “Seriously, why did you need to dump the entire tube of toothpaste into the sink? Why did you decide to wipe your ‘self’ with the carpet, instead of just telling me you needed toilet paper? Why are you drinking the juice from the pickle jar instead of just asking me for a snack? WHY?!”

Ugh! This is something that even though I don’t ask it out loud anymore (because I’ve learned that my kids really are never going to have a good answer for me even if I do ask them ). . . I still wonder all the time. Sometimes, I’m good enough to remember that they are kids, not mini adults, and they therefore don’t have their common sense fully developed in their brains yet, so I need to just ease up. And, sometimes I’m better and remember that I do things that are illogical and impulsive at times still, too- and I DO have my common sense developed. Usually, however, I find myself grumbling and mumbling under my breath to myself about how irritating this or that “illogical” behavior is. What’s more frustrating, I think, is realizing over and over again that no amount of yelling or venting or up-scaled adult temper tantrum from me is going to change anything about what annoying thing they are doing. They are going to do what they do until they don’t. And, that’s just how it is.

Sure, I could probably “helicopter parent”, and hover over my boys constantly day in and day out to make SURE they don’t do anything wrong . . . for a few days, at least. Having tried this avenue a few times before, I’m confident it would lead to the same definition of insanity for me as I try to do the same thing again, expecting a different result this time. The only result my increased hovering ever leads to, is MORE frustration over not understanding and not being able to change any of their illogical behavior.

Of course, that’s not the END of this post. Might I submit that facing the very real, unsettling questions and feelings about parenting, and accepting the fact that we don’t have it all figured out, and neither are we perfect in our ways of dealing with frustrations – is actually the first step in a really good direction! I STILL have not figured out why my kids do the things that they do sometimes. Unfortunately, I can’t offer any solution that will take away frustrations and/or irritating behaviors for good. Nope. I actually believe that anybody who says they know exactly how to FIX a kid’s negative behaviors is either abusive or not experienced. This is what happens when you scare a kid into behaving the way that you want. They either rebel and become 10x worse, or they behave exactly the way that you want- until you aren’t looking, that is. Either way, the kid isn’t thinking for them self, isn’t making any real mistakes, and therefore isn’t making any decisions about who and what and how they really want to be (when nobody else is looking).

Now, here’s a solution that I’ve learned: BE the video game for your kids. Ok, so I don’t want you to literally become like a video game. I’m not suggesting that you start shooting pretend lasers at your kids and steal gold coins to get extra life! No. What I’m saying is, be for your kids what they seek when they play their video games.

Think about it. When your kid plays a video game, they are figuring out how to win at something. They know that they want to win, but they don’t know exactly how to win, just yet. So, they start trying all new things. New moves, new directions, new ideas; they know that with just one bad turn or wrong move, they could have to start over from the very beginning. So, why do they keep trying, time after time, and just re-start after each bad turn or wrong move? Why are they able to sit there and “melt their brains” on some “dumb game”, just so they can finally “win”? And, even if they don’t win, why do they keep playing? It’s because that game is giving them what they want from us- the people in charge of directing their lives.

I wonder how many kids wish their parents came with a “re-start” button every time they made a mistake trying to figure out how to grow up? How many times do WE wish everyone else came with a “re-start” button when we make a mistake? It’d be pretty awesome if we had that option with our boss or our best-friend, or our mom, wouldn’t it? Most of the time, right after we’ve made a bad turn or a wrong move, we can see very clearly EXACTLY why that wasn’t the right thing to do- even though right before our bad move, we didn’t really see why it was a wrong thing to do. There’s a reason why teenagers rebel and eventually move out on their own. Despite how much our parents love us, and will always be smarter than us, we get tired of hearing all about our mistakes. We just want to be able to figure out what went wrong and start over, try again, keep pounding away “mindlessly”, in hopes that eventually we’ll figure it out- and finally “win” in this game called life.

So, my idea- Spare the lecture. Spare yourself the agony of “why?” You know better than to do what they just did, thank goodness. You can see clearly why toothpaste in the sink is a bad idea. Perhaps the kid knows better now, too. Whatever the reason they’ve done what they’ve done, here’s their chance to learn from it and start over. Hand them the rag, show them how to clean it up, (fix it to your own liking after they’re out of the room), and just “Start-over”, and over, and over, and over.

The “Why’s” will figure themselves out in our kids minds over time. We may NEVER know why they did some of the things they did. We may always struggle to understand their reasoning behind things without being irritated at all the wrong turns and bad moves that we have to witness as they figure it all out. It’s probably not even going to someday suddenly all make sense. But, we CAN, become emotionally durable and resilient, and loving in our relationships with each other through the process. This is a powerful mindset, this whole learning to just “Re-start” when a mistake is made. It can heal all our relationships, even our relationship with ourselves. So, I’m reminding myself today, as I try to do this thing called parenting, that even though yesterday had its moments that left me wondering WHY I get so frustrated with my kids sometimes, I’m giving myself a “Re-start” today. I know I can do better. I know what I want to try next. I’m just going to do it. (Wish me luck) ;o)