Generation gap

Mummy and me, photo by sanja gjenero, zagreb, Croatia,  parent  childTake back your authority as a parent, regardless of the age of your children. Even adult children need to feel that there is a healthy generation gap. You are the parent they are the children. You can be a friend but that role is governed by your role as the parent. They have friends who are there to share in their fun and foibles but do not confuse that role with the role of being a parent. In this way you keep good boundaries for yourself and also role model healthy boundaries for your children. Otherwise, children take on parenting roles towards their siblings or even towards their own parents – they become the parentified child. So, before long the roles are reversed, with children becoming critical towards their parents or feeling overly responsible for them and this is all due to the ambiguity. It is the parents’ responsibility to ensuring this does not happen by not relinquishing their role as the parent.

she wondered why she felt fear around her adult children
unable to express her needs to see them more often
she became depressed and confused
their claims that she was being needy felt accurate
until we discussed it and she became aware that
her expectations were quite normal for a mother who
had spent her life dedicated to the wellbeing of her children
now that they were adults it was not unreasonable
to expect her love to be reciprocated accordingly
expecting her busy offspring to reach out was unrealistic
yet trying to arrange visits was being met with
resistance and sometimes intolerance
until she realised that she had to take back
her role of mother and correct the imbalance
before more harm was caused to her and
to her adult children by being role modelled
ineffective parenting skills
in taking back her role of parent she became
confident, nurturing and specific about
what her needs as a mother were
resulting in renewed respect from her children

Fathers

father and kids, photo by mario gonzaga, Bage, Brazil, smiling eyes Nowadays it seems that fathers are not credited for how important they are. Quite often people minimise how caring fathers are and it’s maintained that males are only interested in their work, mates, sport and sex and that they leave the family things to the women. Yet so many men make wonderful fathers and this is so important for their children.

my father was so reliable
not demonstrative with his affection but
I sensed he loved me by his caring ways
he worked hard to provide for us and
when my mother left he took on
both parenting roles
when he didn’t approve of something I did
he firmly but gently expressed it
when he was pleased his smiling eyes
were my reward
he died forty years ago and still I miss him

father and kids, photo by mario gonzaga, Bage, Brazil, http://www.sxc.hu/photo/473343

Spending addiction

mother and children at doctor, photo by Jyn Meyer, Spokane, United States,  depressed, therapy  We delight in the thought of going shopping when we want to lift our spirits. Everyone supports this by laughing about it when it’s mentioned. It is healthy fun except when it is a spending addiction. How do we know the difference? It’s a matter of whether the spending is affordable, not excessive, and above all does not create clutter by accumulating too much. Mainly when we feel uncomfortable about the spending and still do it then it needs attention.

she looked depressed and opened up to
how low her finances were and how hard
it is to feed small children as a sole parent
with no support from the father
her job was not paying well and the
expenses were high
there was no time nor money for
socialising and having fun with friends
her only delight was shopping sprees at
St. Vincents de Paul where she spent little
and got things she couldn’t otherwise afford
however her spending addiction was getting out of hand
in therapy she found out that by admitting it
half the problem is solved and she made a plan
to get her spirits lifted a healthier way

Don’t give up on love

Love photo by Ann-Kathrin Rehse, Göttingen, Germany happinessLove is our own emotion to do with as we please. We feel it for someone or we stop feeling that way. It is good when we love someone and it is painful when they stop loving us but they don’t take away the ability for us to love. It just causes us to withdraw for a while to heal our love wounds. Don’t give up on love when that happens because in time love blooms again and a powerful lesson is learnt too.

he loved her more than life itself
and would do anything for her to be happy
nevertheless it was not enough and she
left him stranded with the kids, toddlers at that!
then she returned only to leave again
this time with another in the middle of the night
she took one child and left the other
he was a good father as a sole parent
but he used to say “one life, one love”
and I would say “don’t give up on love”
one day he fell in love again
and how great it was to see his happiness