Who Am I as a Parent?

Sitting in front of the window while watching the traffic, tied me one afternoon with my mother. At that time, we were relaxing over a cup of tea in the gazebo next to the house. It feels like a wonderful afternoon indeed! Among lot of topics that we discussed, there is one thing I remembered which made me smile today. My mother said to me, "Sier, if you have children, please take care and love him/her sincerely without expecting anything in return ".

At that time, I said yes to her, but thought to myself, "It won't be a matter! Who can't take care and love their own children sincerely." That seems odd to me.

Back to reality.. I am a mother of a son now. Thus, I start to aware the intention of my mother's words. 

Often, as parents, we are not aware of our weakness. Being a parents make us feel that we have freedom and power to set the 'fate' of our children. Which of course resulted misconceptions about the roles, responsibilities and rights as parents. This is so true. Why? There is no school to be good parents. If anyone of you can recommend a school to be good parents, I will register shortly.

After married, newlywed couples wants a child. There will be many reason such as, age (like me), children lover, or have already rushed by his/her parents who wanted to have grandchildren (sounds familiar?). Heheheh.. 

Without any warning of the risk of becoming parents, they become a father or a mother for a child. Their job descriptions are to educate and raise children. How can they do that? Read books, ask other parents, ask friends, joined the seminar, and so forth? Sometimes it works. But is it sufficient? Since our children are individuals who are unique. 

Now I will focus to comment on my mother's word.

For those who already have children, was it ever occur to your mind the following things:
"Oh, how her son's weight bigger than mine?"
"Well, how come his son become so clever?"
"Great, your daughter can walking since 9 months while mine is not?"
And so on. If not, congratulations, you are a GREAT parents! 

To be honest, I experienced that feelings sometimes. As a mother, there is a mischievous desire (or perhaps obsession) to have a super son. In my mind, I EXPECT Deniz can quickly roll over-crawling-walking, could be easily teaches the toilet training, eat a lot, and can be proud of in front of another mother.

If reality did not match my expectation then I get panic. To get rid of my panic I will then "force" Deniz to learn to roll over-crawl-walk, "force" him to eat, and so on. Though maybe Deniz have his own stage to roll over-crawl-walk or he did not eat because my cooking taste so bad. O my God! What a shame.

In connection with my mother's word, I think this is what she meant by take care and love our children sincerely. Love them sincerely by limiting our expectation and let them grow with a proper stimulation and give them a joy in their live by letting them do what they can do rather than they have to do! 

I can not imagine that this is the first year of Deniz's life and I have a bunch expectations on him. How about later? I might give him a 10 lessons in a week, I could choose the best school that I think is best for him. Moreover, I may choose the subject that he was going to take in a college just because I thought he will get a good job from it. Sadly, this can caused several negative impacts for our child. They can be depressed and demotivated which lead them to drugs, drinks and possibly grown with unhealthy emotional development (e.g. bad temper). 

I have to sit back and relax. Thinking of who am I as a parent. Then I can start to analysis of whether what I do for him is a form of stimulation or an obsession. I also try to aligned my expectations with Deniz's ability.

For you who have teenager, try to build a good relationship through a two-way communication. Give your children rights to talk freely to convey their deepest expectations. You might also convey what yours. If both are not aligned, you should have discussion what works for you and your children. That is what we called "musyawarah". 

If you do several mistakes back then in the past. Please, do not be ashamed to apologize to your children. Because, it is never too late to change to become a good parents.

Let's recognize ourselves as parents for a better future of our children. ;')