Children take on things they observe

Charles was getting the shopping out of the car when his wife inquired from inside the house, whether he had remembered to pick up their daughter’s medication from the nearby pharmacy. Snapping in a fury, he burst into the kitchen and gave his wife a lashing. He reminded her that he was not her son, who needed to be told what to do.

Shocked, taken aback and deeply hurt, his wife stared at him. As tears rolled down her cheeks, she run to their bedroom and cried painfully. She felt she had only asked an innocent question and did not deserved that insensitivity and anger outburst in return.

Scenes like this play out a lot and until you have broken it down, you might not understand the root cause.  I was reading a book, Our Mothers, Ourselves. The authors go into the details of how the way a mother raises a child impacts their children as adults. We take on things we learn and observe our parents doing and they inform our view on many things.

For a husband who lashed out at his wife, it is likely that his mother was very strict and mistrusted him. In his subconscious mind, he developed a deep seated resentment towards her. When his wife asked a simple question, his mind quickly took him back to a scene when as a child and his mother questioned his sense of judgement. As a grown adult man, the resentment welled up in him and he released it on an unsuspecting wife with such fury.

That is the impact the mother had on her son’s emotional well-being. If left unresolved, this state of affairs can escalate into marital problems such as separation or divorce. Children would never understand what happened to their parents or why they separated.

Parenting has far reaching consequences and some can be dire. Everything you do or do not do, impacts your child in one way or another. If you are picky or a perfectionist, your children will pick on that behaviour. If you are happy-go-lucky, that impacts them. If you are withdrawn and complacent, that too will impact them.

That is why with every day, we need the guidance of God to walk the journey. I often ask myself, how can I make a positive impact on my children? How should I talk around them? Are there ways I can improve on my relationship with them? There is so much pressure to be a model parent. One of my mentors has told me repeatedly that no praying mother and one that is deliberate about parenting, fails in that role. It is a comforting and challenging thought. Are you a praying mother? Do you earnestly pray for your child?