I woke up to the smell of slightly overcooked Eggo Muffin Top Breakfast treats on Tuesday. While I enjoy the aroma of one of Eggo's breakfast masterpieces, I become bathed in fear when I'm not the one doing the toasting and I have yet to get out of bed. I immediately run down the steps missing eight of the twelve total. I get to the kitchen and there is my six year old daughter. Kneeling confidently on one of the 'island' stools we use in the kitchen, Hannah is directly in front of the toaster oven. I hear the familiar metallic pop letting all know what ever it is you have toasted, is finished. She has yet to turn her head to me, either out of ignorance of my approach or complete apathy towards me and I can't tell which. All I know she has focused into getting out the Muffin Top in the toaster that has been folded in half by the 'popping' and can not be retrieved without help. It is then I step in, say good morning, explain to her what happened and show her what to do next.
Thus I have punched in on my parent time card and started my day. So much of my children's experiences right now have to deal with learning about all the cool things in front of their faces. The toaster oven. Figuring out how to get their favorite cup for their milk, the cup that happens to be so high up, I need a step stool to get to it. Their experiences are so visceral. Full of contact and experimentation. My job is to maintain their safety and health. To show them how things work. Why we avoid sticking objects, especially fingers or shiny metal things, into electrical sockets. They are learning about their world but I know it will not be long before my little girls, who merely want to make their dad a Muffin Top before he wakes up, will need a new sort of parent.
Kids hit their teenage years doing 150mph and don't slow down nor look back. Their teachings need to keep up with their buried speedometer needle of life. They no longer need to know how to tie their shoes or how kissing a boo boo will help with the pain. They know better than to pick something up off the floor and put it in their mouths, though they might do it simply because their 15 year old minds told them someone would laugh at it.
As our kids unfortunately continue to age and grow up even more, again what they need to be taught or coached or shown has changed. As parents we again take another turn and change the course. New stresses of graduation, facing the "real world" we have been telling them about since they through that fit when they were 10 and got punished for not cleaning their room and were not allowed out to play with their friends, the stress of college. The frightening possibility of your children being worried if their high school sweetheart and they will be able to keep up with a long term relationship.
As parents, whether the issues arising from our children have to do with sharing, acne remedies, or why just because your daughter and her boyfriend broke up doesn't mean she'll never meet anyone ever again, we need to always do our jobs. We must always be vigilant in our parenting. Just because our kids grew up does not mean they ever stopped being our kids. We change with our children. We need to be adaptable to the ever changing lives our kids live in. We may never understand what 'LMAO' means in a text message, but we have one thing our children won't have until they are parents...kids.
Something changes in all of us. For better or worse we change. Kids do that before the APGAR test is over. I felt it before all the gunk could be wiped off my first daughter's eyes in the delivery room. From that first breath in her new world until the day of my death, I am going to be responsible for this little person. She's mine to worry about. She's mine to love unconditionally. She is mine to hold. At age three. At age thirty three.
We never relinquish our grip of parenthood. I have yet to meet a parent who has let go of their child. I don't know any parent who could stand to let go of their children? I still rely on my mom. I don't need her to help with my homework anymore but I do need her and so she is there, ready when called upon. Never contemptuous or indignant about her role in my life. She understands that in the evolution of her parenting, this is the next step for her. She can not possibly be the type of mother she was when I was a teenager or child and nor does she ever try to be that parent. I am learning that now with my six year old who is becoming more and more independent by the minute. (By the time I will have finished this article I'm sure she'll be asking for the keys to my car.) But I am learning and adapting to the type of father I need to be to her as opposed to my three year old. I am explaining the merits of fire safety and the hazards of electrocution from toaster to my six year old while the three year old and I are just happy she made it through another night without wetting her big girl panties. I am a better father because of this approach and my kids respond better. This is whey we never let go. Letting go of their children is an impossibility for any parent who realizes that their children will always want their mom or dad when they feel the need arises for them. We can't let go of being parents because most of us didn't let our own parents let go, even if they had wanted to(which they didn't), we would not have let them!
We allow our children to grow. We allow the space they need to be adults. We allow them to make mistakes. We hope they learn from those mistakes. We allow them to learn just like we learned at their ages. No matter how many times my daughter will tell me how much she does not need me, I'll be there as soon as she calls for her 'Daddy'. That's what I chose to do when she came into my life because no matter what age either of us ever get to, she always be mine to be responsible for, to worry about, to love unconditionally, to hold, and to kiss her boo boo's when she falls to take away the pain.