by Dawna Dees

Created on: November 20, 2008

There are as many ways to parent as there are children. Each of these children has a separate personality and mind all there own. The methods that are chosen to guide and protect each child should be tailored for each particular child. Their needs and level of understanding varies independently. The bond between each parent and every child is a personal one that will be custom created and personally built between the two of them. I have four children and no two are the same, not even the twins.

There will be unexpected adventures and accidents that are unlike what other family's might experience. They will bring challenges and emotional circumstances that no one else might want to endure. The way you feel toward each child will be different than that of the next. There are hundreds of differences and similarities in growing children but the combination to one will not open the other. What works best for this one may not work at all for that one. Somethings that many of them respond to well, there will be many more that may not respond to it at all. That is why parenting is such a tough job. It's like creating art, you envision the final product but due to your resources and abilities, your final product may differ from what you've expected. Not any less proud or more disappointed because of that, you did what you needed to and felt what would work best.

We are given instinct and experience from our own life to pass on to our young. From where you live to how you talk to them, your decisions will have an impact on each day and how they feel about it. You must have a foundation, a set of rules and consequences for not following them. Structure and stability are two things that children thrive on but that is just for the basics. When you are considering the differences between each child, the areas of their strengths and their weaknesses as well as the way they respond in certain situations, you will understand why there is no 12-step program for parenting. Parenting is a serious business and no one can tell you how to run yours but you know that to become successful you have to invest a lot of time and hard work.

Parenting is one of the toughest jobs in life. It's expensive yet priceless. A task that will make you worry, can create fury, will make you proud and is often loud. You will make mistakes, everyone does, but if you really want to do it well, don't worry, you will.

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