Why Kids Can’t Come with an Instruction Manual

Of course kids can’t come with instructions. When you go to Ikea and buy a bookcase, you take home a box that looks absolutely nothing like a bookcase but it has all the required pieces, a list of needed tools and one insane sheet of “instructions”.  It might take many frustrating hours but you aren’t done until it looks just like the photo on the box.

When they hand us our babies, we have no idea what the end product is supposed to be. We don’t even get a vote. We all have our ideals- successful, healthy, happy, kind. But we also have our fears- entitled, spoiled, slacker, living in our basement, cruel, selfish. And we don’t get a vote. Our job is to be the fertile ground they grow in for some very crucial years. If they get love and respect and nurturance, we believe they get to be their best selves…whatever that means to them.

When I had my first, I often wondered if the pendulum would swing back and I would raise a child whose politics were in rebellion to my own. Rather than ultra conservative, suit wearing Alex P. Keaton I got a tattooed artist who has passionate opinions about everything- many I agree with, some make me crazy.

My father raised 5 kids who believe strongly in the electoral process and vote every year- against him. He is proud and confused. My parents gave us enough rein to become who we were going to become, not to be either like them or defined in rebellion against them.

With the media’s recent discovery of transgendered people, many liberal parents pat themselves on the back, knowing that we would support our kids no matter their gender or sexual orientation. But what about our deeper fears? What if they don’t care about the things we think they should care about? What if they aren’t the people we want them to be?

At the core of our human attachment need is a fierce need to be fully loved and accepted in our whole humanity. Loved not for our strengths, not for our best self but for our struggles, for our shadow self. It is easy to love my generosity and compassion. It is easy to reinforce my responsible, caretaking nature. It was harder to love my flaky, distracted, messy parts. So I hide them and try to pretend they weren’t mine. We all have a self that we closet. We all give up parts to fit in, to find acceptance, to feel safe.

As I focus on how to parent my younger two through the teenage years of trying on identities, working to self define, I hope I keep my eye on the prize. My job is to have them always believe I am there, no matter who they become. My job is to love the process of becoming and let go of the outcome. No instructions needed. I bring a tool belt full of patience and compassion.