Shooting ourselves in the foot with fun

I am tough, dammit. I am not afraid to yell at my kids. I do not shy away from time outs or even, during the twos years, physical restraint when my spirited guy tried to kick his way out of time outs. I don't put up with put downs or back talk and I *hate* video games. I eat dinner with my kids every night even though that means I eat at 5PM (secretly you all know I love that). I talk to them. I play with them heartily. And I am also hanging on desperately to the fact that I am still the apple of their eyes. I admit it, I want to be their Best Friend.

Along comes this story, (MUST READ) which pretty much tells us what we already know: We are raising a bunch of spoiled fracking babies that do not respect us. We are being pussies.

The author says, "The biggest mistake we can make as parents is to want to be our children’s friends. Yes, they may like us more, their classmates may think we’re cool, (Really? Gosh, isn’t that lovely!) but the truth is that they also see us as weak. And weakness in those who ought to be powerful will always invite contempt."

Unfortunately, I agree with this statement 100%. I remember the very parents that, even as a kid, I had only contempt for because of what they inappropriately allowed their children to do. I was pissed off at my own parents, and I thought I even hated them, but there was never a minute of any day that I did not respect (and actually love) them. Fun certainly does not equal love or happiness, but we forget that, or we can't see it as well anymore. If I could have any wish at all in this world it would be that I act as a parent with equal talent as my parents did with me. And yet, parenting has changed so very much, and I am a different person than my mother.

I can only hope that my level of "friendship" is an appropriate one; that although I judge slam dunk contests instead of cleaning house (or making them help clean the house), the fact that I do not allow mean-spirited talk or behavior will save me from raising monsters. My kids are only 4 and 6, but it is probably never too early to teach a healthy fear. I cringe when I see friends let their 3 year olds backtalk them. Ooooh, the sass I have seen!

But I am so, so guilty of not instilling a healthy fear. My son is a master debater and I will literally eat my shorts if he does not end up as a litigator someday. The dude can weasel another five minutes before bedtime before I even realize what he's doing, and he can play me like a harp to get extra snuggle time even when I desperately need to get downstairs to get some work done. I know it's sweet that I love to hang with my boys, and really I do think they are turning out okay. But even I can palpably feel the difference between the way I grew up (healthy fear, huge respect, no space for argument) and the way I'm raising my kids (best friendship, lots of fun, lots of room for negotiation and self-expression). We like to see these as positive attributes, but really, are they?

It's a question I ask myself every day. I'm tough enough, in my humble opinion, that I've begun to raise some nice boys. But, am I doing my kids a disservice by not being more of a hard ass? I'm deathly afraid I won't have the courage to say NO to all the things my parents did: hanging out at the pizza parlor in Jr. High; sleepovers without calling to make sure a parent was home; drinking (I laughed at those joker parents that allowed drinking in their homes even as I was taking advantage of them - WTF?); staying out late when "everyone else" was doing it; and on and on. And those are the easier topics. How, I wonder, will I prepare my children for things I do not condone but know they will try (sex, drugs)? My answer has always been that I will denounce them and make them understand that and to scare and shame them into being so careful when they do finally try these things, that they will not injure themselves or anyone else.

Will that be enough? Do I need to start now or wait until they're seven to scare the living daylights out of them? It haunts me. But I gotta go cuddle.