I have a growing awareness that i now have a teenager at home.. not only that, the teenager is staying in my room!
Amanda is 17 but this year she is Sec 1.. and Sec 1 is really the blossoming of those teenage years.. an awareness of your individuality, the growing desire to explore and discover for yourself the world around you and being able to make choices and judgments for yourself.
I'm not her parent, though sometimes i feel like it with the 11 year gap between us, so sometimes i need to take a step back and re-assess my role and relationship with her. This more so with her starting on this new adolescent years.. I only pray i can leave a positive impact on her life in these important years instead of marring hers by giving guidance to her while not stifling her.
Was reading Dr Gary Chapman's Five Love Languages of Teenagers.. couldn't have started on it a better time.. a friend gave it to me in 2004 and i've only opened it now. I love this statement which so perfectly embraces the idea of unconditionnal love of a parent to his/her child and i hope i will remember it for life esp when it does come to my turn to parent. This is what unconditional love reads in a parents life:
" I love you very much. I will love you even if you don't follow my advice but because I love you, i must give you my advice"
i remember this comic strip i read in the Straits Times'.. about 2 sisters talking about one of the sister's teenage daughter.
Sister A "why do you get so upset with your daughter? relax, let her make her own mistakes and learn from them!"
Sister B "But i don't want her to learn from her mistakes, i want her to learn from mine!"
Haha! When i read THAT, it rang within me such a cognizant agreement!! I really really do feel that way. I wished my whole heart that those I care about esp the younger ones would learn from mine and didn't have to make their own mistakes... but i guess everyone's got to make their own mistakes some time.
My mom always tells me that we should set certain clear boundaries. Within those boundaries, we should let the child be free to roam and fall and make mistakes and not try and correct them every single time. That way they'll have room to grow at their own pace and develop their own life skills. But if they ever stray across the boundaries we have set, we have to come in and pull them back.
ReplyDeleteThe trick is, of course, how to set those boundaries. They have to be meaningful such that it is clear why the boundaries are significant (and the child should know too). But they should be expansive enough such that the child does not feel stifled even as she is guided by them.
Also, my mom says that you have to expect that all children will keep things from you as they try to develop their individuality. Always stay available to them and let them know you love them, and gradually in their journeys they may become more comfortable with sharing more with you.
i have two pre-teens. thanks for this
ReplyDeletenice blog, ivy!
ReplyDelete