THE WONDERFUL ART OF PARENTING

During my stay here I have been given the task of parenting two children. The boy has lived eight years, and the girl five, so far. Having no previous experience of parenting, it was necessary for me to access any available data on the subject. Realizing that my time on this planet allowed me to experience a childhood myself I first explored the point of being a parent from my child perspective. However, this turned out to be, a mistake, and a blessing, (being from what I would call a rather disturbed childhood experience). The mistake in this was remembering the terror, and pain of being the child of a person who's only way of expressing himself was through violence and a mother who was to scared to do anything about it. The feelings of loneliness from being heard and not listened to (and mostly of not even being heard). Feelings like nobody ever gave me credit for learning what they had taught, or acting like what they taught me was'nt of any use. I remembered a very confusing time when everyone was trying to get me to function in one way, but never teaching me the way to do it. Stuff like make a decision, but don't trust your judgment. Think for yourself, but you will be in trouble if you don't do it this way. Then their was be self-confident, but don't act like it. It seemed like the whole world round me was insane, saying one thing and acting completely opposite. You see, I new, I couldn't be blamed for this insanity, for it was the first time I had been a human ( at least as far as I could remember) and what the hell did I know . Apparently, the other kids around me didn't know much more either. The blessing to this is it gave me the motivation to be the best parent that I could be. The last thing I wanted was for a child under my care to have a childhood similar to mine. The first thing I learnt is that the references I had of parenting was going to have to change. If I was going to be a better parent than the ones that had parented me, I was going to need different information. My first thought was " what is a parent .... dictionary........ PARENT...... any organism that generates another???? What the hell does that mean mmmm.... encyclopedia...... Parents must provide for their children such necessities of life as food, clothing, shelter, education, and medical care; if they cannot or will not, state laws authorize intervention by designated authorities to ensure that children's needs are met. Children who are physically or emotionally abused by their parents may be the subject of legal action in order to protect the children. Parents' rights to custody of their children may be limited or, in extreme cases, terminated because of failure to provide adequate care.

Okay, so I guess, I needed to find a definition that made some sense. I don't think that the standard definition of parenting, is quite what I had in mind. To develop a definition of my own it must include, not only the duties of the adult, but the needs of the child as well. So what are these needs...... back to childhood........
(These will be written by me or the child whithin which ever feels most strongly towards answering.)

to be treated with respect and dignity
to be allowed to know nothing
to be allowed to learn and the chance to try what I have learned
to be allowed to explore this new world, with out being made to fear it
to be shown I am loved for who I am

So this is my defenition of parenting, learning, loving, sharing. I guess one of the things that has helped me develop into a good parent is that I can show my children that even as an adult, we all make mistakes and that it is okay to make those mistakes as long as we learn from them.

What is the goal of parenting?It is my belief the goal of parenting is it to teach the children to become their own loving parents, so they can learn love and share as well.

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