Category: Parenting

Homeschooling, Parenting

No one Is to Blame

October 11th, 2020
Mollie T. Cox

We are sinners and live in a fallen world. However, I found it easy to forget that and blame myself or my children or even my husband for learning problems or lack of progress in my children. 

The children were lazy. I bought the wrong curriculum. The homeschooling co-op was not a good match. My husband wasn’t helping. We needed to spend more time and money.

However, the only sin was assigning blame. Some, if not many, parenting or homeschooling struggles are because of living in a broken world.

I once listened to a powerful sermon on John 9.

Rabbi, who sinned, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?”

John 9:2 (ESV)

The premise of that culture was blindness was because of sin. We get what we deserve.

We parents also buy into that un-biblical notion. We may do our best and our children may do their best, and we don’t get the results that we think we deserve. Our abilities and theirs are limited.

“Neither this man nor his parents sinned,” said Jesus, “but this happened so that the works of God might be displayed in him.

John 9:3 (ESV)

What problems are you wrongly attributing?

Parenting

Children Change

October 7th, 2020
Mollie T. Cox

I worried and prayed and strove and sought advice and everything else with regard to traits in my children that concerned me. Nothing I did worked. But, one day, some problems disappeared. If I had known it would be so, I would have avoided the heartache for everyone by my striving.

I told this to a father of young children along with my other observation that some traits never change. See Children Don’t Change Here

How do you know which foibles children will outgrow if you leave them alone?” he asked.

“You don’t,” I said. “Just take comfort that sometimes—actually many times—it happens as they mature.”

Is there something that you need to let go and give some time?

When I approach a child, he inspires me in two sentiments—tenderness for what he is and respect for what he may become.

Louis Pasteur

Parenting

Children Don’t Change

October 4th, 2020
Mollie T. Cox

An acquaintance said, “The way a baby nurses is the way he eats the rest of his life.”

I remembered, and it proved to be true for my family. My preemie nursed for an hour, and returned in two hours. He is still my slowest and most frequent eater. We say he grazes.  Another son filled his baby tummy in minutes and was content for hours. As an adult, he is my quickest, best eater and snacks the least.

One son was only three when he studied—perhaps memorized—the dog pictures in the “D” encyclopedia. He read encyclopedias for fun when he was seven. He is our scholar.

When barely two, one son was inconsolable when we left a campground. The love of camping never left him and being outdoors is still a priority. Our silliest toddler is now known for his dry wit and entertains us much.

These observations can be both consoling and humbling. They were born that way—both the good and the frustrating—I sometimes remind myself.

Have you ever tried to change the unchangeable?

I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made. Wonderful are your works; my soul knows it very well.

Psalm 139:14 (ESV)
Decisions, Parenting

Family Voting

September 27th, 2020
Mollie T. Cox

Making the best decisions occasionally required knowing the preferences of my children. Besides a survey—see Take a Survey Here—an uneven vote was another way I infrequently collected information. A side benefit was making voting a familiar part of my sons’ lives.

I might say, “We are taking a vote to help us make a decision. Each of you gets one vote. Three votes total. Daddy and I get two votes each.  Four votes total. Which would do you prefer? Camping at Point Lookout or camping at Catoctin Mountain?”

This only works if you are undecided. If parents are unified and have strong preferences, an uneven vote would be cruel. Children’s votes are automatically overruled. 

You can also assign one parent more votes than the other or one child more votes than siblings depending on the type of decision and who has the most at stake.

At least two of our children received their preference because either my husband or I voted with the majority.

Have you experimented with creative voting?

Friendship, Parenting

Their Longings Not Yours (Reprise)

September 16th, 2020
Mollie T. Cox

Do not do unto others as you would that they do unto you. Their tastes may not be the same.

George Bernard Shaew

The quote above does not negate the Golden Rule found in Jesus’s Sermon on the Mount. It gives guidance. Love, acceptance, and respect look different to different people.

A friend showed me a wedding present that was different from her tastes and would never be used. We were amused by it. However, my friend’s perspective changed when the giver shared that the item was the one wedding gift she had longed for thirty years earlier but had not received.

Four summers later, I was pregnant with my first child. An acquaintance delivered her first child a month before me. During church announcements, we were urged to visit her that afternoon. My husband thought we should. I disagreed. Hours after delivery, I wouldn’t want a room full of close friends, certainly not acquaintances.

I was wrong. Lindy was disappointed we had not joined the crowd.

How do you discern?

Maybe raising children was just giving them the things you loved most in the world and hoping that they loved them too.

Kevin Wilson, Nothing to Look At