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My morals were not taught, they were learned. Where, you ask? That,my friend, is a question I have never been able to answer myself. What I can say, is that they were not learned from my parents. Unless, ofcourse, you count me deciding at an early age that everything "right" should be the exact opposite of what my mother and father do as them teaching me. I always trembled at the passage "obey thy mother and father", it made me obsess over the question as to whether or not I would burn in Hell for not doing as they said, since it was my mother that was passing me a joint or my father forcing me to drink alcohol (cures a fever, he said)

From high school, I have learned through those around me that it seems to be the easiest to blame our parents for the short-comings of our lives. I smoke, must be because I saw my parents doing it. I drink to drown the sorrows that are a result of my mother's disappointment. I am not poking fun at depression or addictive behaviors, but at what point in our lives are we to step up and take responsibility for our own actions?

I am the child of alcoholic and drug addicted parents. My grandmother, the closest to a maternal figure I have, has yet to give me a sincere compliment that is not clouded by sarcasm. I lived my childhood with my father and step-mother, whom he decided was more important to please than keeping me safe.

I am not a high school drop-out (ok, well I did quit community college) I do not work at McDonald's or live off my parents (although my father still does) and I did not fork over my responsibility of motherhood to my child's father, my parents, or anyone else. (like my mom) I am not an alcoholic, I drink maybe twice a year. I do smoke, but had enough sense to stop the three years that surrounded my pregnancy and son's breastfeeding. I do not "party" with friends when I know I have a four year old at home that needs me, and I do not turn my back on my father or grandmother despite them doing so to me.

I am also not perfect. I struggle with bills. I am overweight. I get sad and cry for no reason. My son's father is a deadbeat and I wasn't in love when I conceived. Is that my parents fault? Not directly, if at all. I work hard to keep my child from becoming the statistic that the world expects him to be. He has never seen me drink and will never see me on any kind of drug, much less do it with me. He will never go through life with questions I refuse to answer about his father, as I did not knowing my mother until I was fifteen. He will never have to keep a job in high school so that he can eat and clothe himself, that afterall- is my job. He will never feel guilty that I love him more than someone I have married, or that I refuse to leave them even though I know they are abusing him. In some ways, I blame my parents for the things i am proud of- that I did not become them.

Ofcourse, I will try to instill morals in my son, it is what true parents naturally do. But there is a line that we must not cross between trying to teach children to make the right decision for themselves, and teaching them to make the right decision for us, or making decisions for them all together. We have to give our children the tools they need to become their own person, not our mirror image, or our idea of what a perfect child should be. Morals come from parents, I do not deny that. But, there is also a voice inside that each one of us own we must learn to listen to and teach our children to listen to so that they become the best version of themselves, not who we think they should be.

Learn more about this author, Nokomis Tatiana.
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