My daughter and I had a difficult conversation a few days ago. She was in a bit of a mood and decided it was time to tell her father and me what she thinks of our parenting.
Not how we raised HER, specifically, more about how we're raising our youngest son compared to our older two kids. It was the standard complaint of, "He gets away with so much more than we did, he should be doing more chores around the house."
You see, our Cavegirl and her older brother are six and eight years older than our youngest, respectively. It's not that large a gap really, but the changes to our world that happened in that time affected a lot. When she and her big brother were small, the internet was still young. We barely touched our computer for entertainment purposes. We had mobile phones, but they weren't "smart". We had some movies in DVD format, but nothing available to watch online and we even kept pay tv to a minimum. It wasn't just the electronic side of things either; our life circumstances were different. We were both home full-time and spent any spare time and energy we had renovating the house we lived in. We allowed the kids to help us where they could and we occasionally gave them jobs to do around the house.
Fast-forward a few years and their younger brother came into a slightly different world. When he was small, we sold our house and went back to renting. We both got jobs outside of the home. The whole family used the computer a lot more and the internet played a much bigger part in our family entertainment, with online games, YouTube and smartphones becoming the norm. He has naturally been exposed to more screen time than the older two were at the same age. We still encouraged outdoor activity, but our youngest never enjoyed sport as much as the others had.
As time has gone on and our life has become so busy, we probably have let him get away with more than his older siblings did. It hasn't helped that the Caveman and I have been more involved with work and have had less energy for chasing up on making sure chores were done and that sort of thing. I'm guilty of falling into the same bad habits as any other busy mum ... you'd think, when you're time-poor, that you'd be better at delegating jobs to other family members. However, the truth is it's often easier and faster to just do the jobs yourself when you realise they haven't been done by anyone else.
The fact is, we've never pushed our children that hard - and even the older two weren't given as much to do as our Cavegirl is remembering. But it's natural for us all to recall things slightly differently to how they really were, so I allowed her to say her piece. As a new mum herself, it's important for her to think about this stuff, and I can handle some constructive criticism. I know at the age of 15 my boy is capable of, and should be, doing more to help around the house.
When she finished what she had to say and looked at me a little nervously, I gave her a hug and thanked her. That might seem a strange response, but I was so proud of her for being brave enough to tell me what she thought ... and I know how hard it is to tell someone (especially your parent!) that you think they could be doing something better. I remember feeling the same way about my mum and how she parented my younger brother many years ago and I'm not sure I could have approached the subject with her as maturely as my daughter did with me.
I guess the moral of the story is that we can all learn from each other. I've always taught my children that respect is a two-way street and that I will listen to their opinions with the same consideration I would give any other person. They may see things differently to me and I can learn from that.
The beautiful result is that my kids have now grown into young adults who respect other peoples' opinions too.
