ENJOY THEM IN SPITE OF THEM ‘Femi Adekunle on Parenting
ENJOY THEM IN SPITE OF THEM
‘Femi Adekunle on Parenting
Have you become exasperated while screaming, yelling and agitated? You are not alone, many parents have. From keeping their toys in place, to washing the dishes, to doing their laundry, parents have a hard time endlessly dispensing instructions which sometimes, you have to repeat often enough to make them sink.
When my kids all went to the boarding house, we had a foretaste of the ‘empty nest syndrome’. We missed them sorely and that was when we suddenly realised that the time we have to spend with them is indeed short and must be so maximised that the positive reminiscences must outweigh the negative.
While giving discipline, correction and chastisement their due place, you must know when to loosen up and relax the rules for the sake of relationship. Can you enter your kids’ room and roll with them on the floor in the midst of dismembered toys sprawled and scattered everywhere? Can you de-emphasise schoolwork a little during holidays and allow them time to play and have a work-life balance, which they also, like you, deserve? Can you for a moment pause from that important meeting with your kinsmen and spare a minute to answer their nagging question rather than rebuke them harshly for rudely interrupting family discussions? Can the dishes be suspended while you play their favourite game with them?
A time is coming when you will long for their mischievous pranks and will never find it. Even before they leave the home, they will withdraw in their teenage years. The hands of time are stiff and cannot be manipulated. When time presents you with the benevolence of its fluidity, realise that the only direction it can go is forward. Hence, the time is coming when old age will catch up and it would seem as if time had flown faster than it did. At that time, there will only be either of two declarations you will make, but you won’t have the luxury of making both, i.e. ‘I wish I did’, or ‘I’m glad I did’. Grant an indulgence or two and stop complaining endlessly. Condone the chaos once in a while, and discover they’d become cherished souvenirs. Enjoy the pranks now. They will fill your memory bucket to last a lifetime. This is the discovery that grandparents have made – a benevolent opportunity granted by the Almighty; a second chance to loosen up, and they seize it hands and legs. This is why it appears they spoil their grandchildren. Yes, it’s their responsibility to spoil, and yours to train them!
…. _the time we have to spend with them is indeed short and must be so maximised that the positive_ _reminiscences must outweigh the negative…. Condone the chaos once in a while, and discover they’d become cherished souvenirs._