bits and bants vol. 41
parenting reality and teenagers
Hello dearest readers, from a very snowy Friday, so a perfect writing situation!
I completely fell off the substack train and I apologize because I always intend to respond promptly to your comments, but it really got away from me. Long, painful, January story short: most of the household caught a new virus, which may have been strep throat, that left us fever and bed ridden for days. I can tell you how many times I’ve been so sick as a mom that I needed to stay in bed, and the fact that it’s happened to me multiple times this winter is just truly depressing. My fall illness can definitely be attributed to burnout, but I really thought I course corrected once I was sick in November for over six weeks. We’re all back to normal now, but if we get sick one more time I’m leaving the country. I am the first to admit that I am a terrible sick kid mom, I have patience for illness for about 24 hours, after which time you better feel better because the sympathy bus has left. You’d think I’d have improved over almost 18 years of motherhood, but I think I’m getting worse.
On top of sickness upon sickness, we’ve had some behavioural/school issues with a kid that has been really challenging to deal with. It’s become cliche at this point for the parent of a teenager disclaimer that you can’t mention things about your kids on the internet anymore because they’re so old, and blah blah blah, but it is true. What’s also true is that it is incredibly emotionally draining dealing with teenage issues. And as someone with a not too positive natural personality, as in I don’t post weekly about how great my kids are, and that I usually dwell on everything that needs to be corrected rather than everything that’s going well, it is really awful when serious stuff happens that’s out of your control because these are decisions your kid makes, and frustratingly, there is much less that you can do than you would prefer and thought possible previous to being the parent of an actual teenager.
To be clear, the child didn’t do anything criminal or anything that effects another person, but serious in the sense that it’s something you just would never want to have to deal with with your own kid. And maybe that’s from my own terribly high and unrealistic expectations of my kids. I get it, I have high standards. Honestly, it’s much more realistic to expect behaviour that has to be corrected from teenagers! I rationally know this to be true, but when the rubber meets the road and it’s your own kid you’re dealing with, all the trite teenage stories don’t really soften the blow, you know?
It’s been really hard for me to pull out of the self pity loop of, “How could this kid possibly think this type of behaviour is even something to consider having grown up in this house?!” “Obviously, I’ve failed in teaching him/her basic moral understanding of anything.” “Is it even possible to teach a child anything?” “Has my entire child rearing enterprise been an abject failure?” “Is there any point even trying with my other four kids?” “Is it really all for naught?”
It’s a real nihilistic cycle which spirals the more dramatic I feel at any given moment.
I honestly don’t have decent answers to those questions. I don’t even want answers to those questions yet. I’m still very angry over the whole thing, and it’s taking all of my energy to continue to show this child love and not act out of my petty anger because I’m the adult!
We don’t really hear much about how difficult it is to parent when you’re angry at the child. To be fair I follow zero all out parenting accounts because who needs that kind of boring content in your life, but I do feel like once people have kids who are older that they will only post positive positive stuff about motherhood. Or the opposite and sink into self pity. I’m trying to muddle myself to some middle ground of real life experience that doesn’t sugar coat or completely despair. Which may be the title of my parenting book: Stop Sugar Coating, But Don’t Completely Despair; A Guide to Knowing You Have Way Less Control Over Your Child Raising Than You Think.
Larger picture: I keep reminding myself that parenting is not for my own ego. It is not performative, I don’t get any reward if my kid does x,y, and z. Parenting and my motherhood is not who I am, my worth doesn’t come from doing this thing. Motherhood calls me to be faithful to parenting my unique children hopefully how God sees fit, but I’m not perfect. And my kids are human beings with souls capable of free will and the older they get the more they are responsible for the decisions they make.
I’ll stop there.
But hey, it’s complicated and not easy and that’s the reality of motherhood every step of the way.
bits:
this article on the recent Cormac McCarthy news of a lifelong muse raises very interesting ethical questions about artists and the creation of art.
I am once again asking for every single person in the world to get a theology degree. Or maybe for the Church to adequately catechize…you know…whatever I can force upon the world first…but here’s a smart, succinct response to everyone losing their minds about anything JD Vance says…actually just his ordo amoris comments…because we can’t keep up.
as a forever fan of Middlemarch, I would like to co-sign this very smart essay on the book by Katie. I would like to write so well!
reading, watching, what have you:
We started Severence and wow, is it the most gripping show I’ve watched in many years. We’re almost finished the first season and I’m so glad that the second has just come out because I’m going to need more immediately.
I also watched the Martha Stewart documentary on Netflix last weekend and really thought it was well done. I am a Martha Stewart lover. I love things done perfectly, I learned so much from watching Martha Stewart when I was home with infants, and her magazine was the pinnacle of magazine production if you ask me. I believe she was 100% unjustly persecuted because she was the world’s first woman billionaire. Do I think she is still dealing with serious issues in her personal life, yes of course. But great doc.
I have an hour left to listen to A Father’s Tale, and I am only sinking so much time into it in order to adequately and justifiably rant about how much I hate it when I am finished!
I’m re-reading An Enchanted April, in loving memory of Joan Plowright and because it is the perfect thing to read in this most awful month. It is just as good, and probably better than I remember! Pick it up.
My retail therapy this month was buying houseplants. I’m desperate for green and growing things and I found some great, unique plants the last couple weeks at my now local amazing garden centre. Truly something that keeps me going through the winter is just popping in once a week to see new plants! I am a diehard plant nerd!
Ok. I’m off but not for long as long as I don’t catch another plague.
dirty martini is calling my name,
Christy
I'm actually rereading a Father's Tale for WRM and a friend was griping about how it just goes on and on...did he have to visit 2 art museums? I'll pass my words on to you... just wait until he gets to Siberia and stays there...for hundreds of pages...
All my kids are still under 5, so I’m still a long way from teenagers, but I would certainly appreciate a balanced take on the realities of parenting teens that is neither “oh wait, it just gets harder!” nor “I’m my 16-yo’s best friend,” both of which seem rampant online. After seeing older siblings make bad choices, it was really clear to me, even an a teen myself, that parents can do literally everything right and their kids may still choose to live in destructive and stupid ways because…free will. It’s a hard truth of parenting that I constantly remind myself of while dealing with toddlers, but it can be difficult to not be fatalistic about that reality.
I still have about 200 pages of “A Father’s Tale” to go, but I think it’s already filled almost every box on the “cringey Catholic wannabe literature” bingo card. My husband keeps joking that O’Brien is just going to have thousands more anti-fans after this who will ensure none of his other books sell. The second half of the book is exactly what EWTN would order if it were in the business of making Hallmark movies. Not to mention the few chapters that were obviously just his attempt to get all his incomplete and supposedly profound thoughts about communism & Christianity onto the page. I could go on, but I’ll save a bit for Christy’s full critique 🙃