Calling All Perfect Parents

Anyone? Anyone? I hope no one responded. Being a perfect parent is impossible. As Hillary once told me, if there was one perfect way to raise a child there would only be one book on parenting in the book stores. However there enough books to not just fill a rack at Barnes and Noble but a whole section.

The number of books bringing me to my next point. Something about raising a child suddenly makes some people feel like they know the best way to raise and discipline children. Not everyone is like this but there are alot of people who are. It's a natural thing you see a child do something and you see the parent react. If it's different than how you would have reacted and you don't think the outcome was good you want to offer advice to help that parent the next time around. It is quite possible the motive for this comes purely from trying to help a friend and not being overconfident in your parenting skills.

However any parent should know how senstive that aspect of life is. Every parent, or set of parents, has thier own plan for how they will raise thier children. They are afterall THEIR children. This plan generally evolves from how they themselves were raised as well as insight from things they have seen other people do or read in one of the 500 books. I learned how to put Reese in Time Out by watching Hillary with Owen. It doesn't always work perfectly but neither do Owen's so I know neither Hillary or I are perfect parents but we try hard and so far our kids are turning out well.

This plan I mentioned is kinda like the birthing plan when you were pregnant. You have a goal for how you would like things to occur, how you want to handle different situations but there has to be flexibility in that plan. Afterall your child is a living rational being who doesn't always do things they way you want to and may not respond they way you want to. Being to rigid in your birth plan 9 times out of 10 leads to complications and generally a c-section. (Way to many stories from my Mom and Anne) Being to rigid in your plan for rasing and disciplining your child can lead to worse behaviors or even affect the basic relationship of the parent and child.

Every family has thier own plan and while you may think you are just trying to help your situation, your lifestyle, and your goals are different and cannot be imposed on someone else. Even within a family each child is different and has to be handled differently.

I know I have been guilty of disciplining other peoples kids. It's hard when you see them do something they shouldn't not to stop them. But I am trying to stop more often and evaluate if I think in the situation the childs paretns can easy be gotten so they can handle it themselves b/c they need to use thier method not mine for consistency sake with the child.

In the end it will be me who sits back and reflects on the person Reese has grown to be and accept that how I raised her helped her become that way, for good or bad. (obviously I'm hoping for Good). But only me (unless I get married) not anyone else.

Reese Story time: On sunday we went to the Circus and Reese got to ride on an elephant. I'll post some pics on here as well as one Facebook later tonight. It was so much fun and she had such a great time. However I now constantly find myself hearing "mommy want to be like pretty ladies" which means I turn into some form of gymnastics equipment to help her tumble, flip, and spin like the acrobats. At least she only does it with me so I don;t have to worry about her hurting herself somewhere else.