Parenting is a humbling experience.  Whatever vague notions you may have about how your children will be, God doesn’t really take that into account.  You get what you get.  Leaving egos and expectations behind to find the unique and complex creations with which our lives have been blessed is the journey of parenthood. 

When I was single and childless, I was very critical of other people’s children.  If they were unruly, or rude, or loud, or impertinent, or whatever, I told myself that my children would never get away with that.  They’d tow the line or know the wrath of Mommy.  It was just that simple. 

It isn’t.  It’s not about misbehaving, either.  At least, not always.  Beneath the round cheeks and toothless grins lie complicated little people with all sorts of talents, emotions, and issues.   When I first held each of my children, I promised them I would love them and take care of them, no matter what.  I do, and I have.  But there was no understanding with that first kiss how that promise would change me. 

I didn’t know then how watching my child run after a group of children on the school playground who didn’t want him to play with them would tear my heart in two.  Or how heavy I would feel seeing him happy when they finally agreed to let him be the bad guy in their game, since nobody else wanted to be.  I didn’t realize that a child of two well-educated, reasonably intelligent, avid readers, would suffer severe anxiety about school, and would struggle with basic reading and writing.  And I didn’t know that same child, who couldn’t pass the test, would impress his teachers with his vocabulary and ability to understand and recall details of science and history.  I wouldn’t have guessed that this child would be the most insightful and empathetic of my three, the one who would love and feel the most intensely. 

And if I had known those things, I would still have never anticipated the convoluted mix of emotions when other parents roll their eyes at my child, or lose patience with him.  How many times I have wanted to take those parents aside, and ask them to switch children with me for a month, because perhaps then they would be less judgmental, and would feel compassion instead of impatience.  What a loss to these parents, and to their own children, that they cannot see beyond the surface, that they cannot see the amazing spirit in each and every child.  Who are we, any of us, to judge the worthiness of God’s gifts? 

I don’t believe there is such a thing as a bad little kid.  Yes, they test their boundaries, and that is part of their natural growth.  Those that exhibit extreme amounts of testing are rarely being “bad”, they are coping with something in their lives in any way they can.  Children don’t have the cerebral development to stand back and analyze their feelings, put a name and a source to it, and figure out what to do about it.  Whatever “it” is comes bursting out in ways that seem strange to us adults.  I’m no expert in child development; these are simply my observations and personal experience. 

And in the same strange way that I have ultimately been grateful for the worst times in my life because of the personal growth and eventual rewards that pain brought, I consider myself lucky to have complex children, and one in particular who works very hard at tying my angel wings in knots.  Because if all my children were as happy and adaptable as my youngest, I would continue today with the one dimensional view of children with which I began this journey, and with which I see some other parents still afflicted.  I would have missed so much

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