Parenting is freaking weird.
Was thinking about parenting this week as my child was
preparing to leave my “nest” for Portland for 7 long weeks…(they feel long now,
will no doubt fly by as life does). Most everything is a double edged sword.
You try doing something this way or that way and suddenly an entirely different
problem will present itself.
Life is weird like that.
For instance – I often find myself telling people how my kid
is sheltered, a bit naïve and I’ll always follow that up with something along
the lines of liking it that way. To an extent, that is true. I do appreciate
his naiveté in the face of so many, many kids his age running around and
knowing “too much” about things I feel are adult topics.
Flip that coin though….he’s also less mature. And maybe less
prepared to deal with issues should they arise. Things like sex, boobs, drugs….I
honestly don’t know which way he’d go. When I was trying to feel him out the other
night after his promotion ceremony about any girls he may have had crushes on,
he shut me down quick…”Do you know me at all, mom? Do you think I just go
around picking up girls all the time?” – no son. I don’t think that. At least I
didn’t add that I didn’t think he’d have the skills to be picking up girls all
the time; I just asked about if he had any crushes or girls with crushes on
him.
Apparently not. But it worries me that perhaps by sheltering
him, I’ve gone overboard. I didn’t want him to grow up knowing about things
like I always did. Everyone commented on how I was like a miniature adult and I
was. But that is likely why I’m always so goddamn worried now. I’ve spent my
life preparing to be worried about shit. Add that to my propensity to put
ridiculous things on my head for a laugh, and it’s almost like I’m Michael
Jackson. Trying to reclaim my youth and shit. But I don’t want him to know how
fucked up the world is. It’s a huge conundrum…how to prepare him for life
without saying shit like…well…sometimes people are really fucked up and will
hurt you for no apparent reason.
I wrote a few weeks ago about how his dad suddenly was
talking about how it’d be nice to have him live in Portland with them….and I
was livid. I’m past livid now, I know that nothing will happen unless I want it
to and that’s not likely, but it was a knee jerk reaction to the thought of
someone “taking” my kid.
As I’ve thought more about it though…I suddenly realize that
THIS is what I wanted all along.
No, not for my kid to leave, but for his dad to care enough
to want to have him around. Something I never had. Instead of his dad making
excuses as to why he can’t come spend time with him, he’d actually like to have
MORE time with him. So thinking about it that way, how can I be mad about it? I
really can’t. Instead I’m going to work on being fucking grateful about it. It’s
something I always wished for my kid and I was worried when he was younger
about the lack of time with his father, and now it’s not an issue.
It’s
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