Diapers Are Easy (It's All The Other Stuff That's Tough)

Truth Tuesday

When my kids were younger and I was dealing with a full-time job outside of the house and two babies just 22 months apart at home, and I was straddling between the worlds of busy and overwhelm, people would say to me:

“Just wait….little kids, little problems. Big kids, big problems.”

I didn't quite get that. Plus, despite my uncertainty as a new Mom, I always thought I knew better. I figured once I mastered the diaper changes and the fever control and the formula-mixing, I’d be a pro and we’d all live happily ever after.

But now, with these once-babies now on the verge of 11 and 13, I can say I finally get it:

Diapers are easy.

Learning to change a diaper was perhaps the easiest thing I have done in my 12+ years as a parent.

Once we learn how to change the diapers, we never have to learn again. We never have to second-guess ourselves, wondering if we fastened the diaper correctly or applied the rash cream well.

We know. It works. And unless there is some defect in the diaper itself, that’s all she wrote.

Done, end of story.

From the moment we first become parents, we are teaching our kids while still learning ourselves: The right way. The wrong way. The best way. The easiest way. The Way.

We teach them all the things that work or happen a certain way: How to put toys away, brush and floss, say “please,” say “thank you,” say “excuse me,” put on pants, take off pants, pee, poop, wipe, use a fork, solve math problems, brush their hair, brush their teeth, floss their teeth, call home, call Grandma, lock a door, unlock a door, get all the shampoo out, blow their nose, use a straw, write with a pencil, erase with a pencil, dial a telephone, turn the TV off…..and the list goes on.

We teach them stuff that has a beginning, middle and end. Stuff that gives us an easy, neat or acceptable way of doing it: Do it this way and it will work. It’s been proven. You can’t mess up. Just trust me. End of story.

But what about the hard stuff?

The stuff that’s neither black nor white?

Hit-and-miss stuff?

The stuff that might not always work out the way we want it to.

The stuff we’ve learned the hard way?

The stuff we may not still have answers to, the stuff that still stumps us?

You know….stuff like how to be a good person, what playing nicely really looks like, when to walk away from a bad situation, saying “no,” saying “yes,” how to recognize true love, what being a real friend means, how to love with abandon, finding our real voice, loving ourselves, embracing our truth, avoiding regret, dealing with deep hurts and facing our fears.


How do we teach them things that must be experienced, that must be lived, to really make sense?

And the answer that many parents don’t want to face is this one: We don’t. We can’t.

Nothing can prepare us for these lessons and experiences except for the lessons and experiences themselves.

We can’t live their lives for them. (Heck, we are still works in progress ourselves. Some days we are doing great and other days, well, there’s always more to learn.)

Oh sure, we try. We tell them how much we know better, how we have lived, how they can benefit from our experience, how they need to trust our wisdom.


They may or may not listen, but they will never truly “get it” until they try. And succeed. Spectacularly. And fail. Miserably. And  soar. High. And fall. Hard.

They will have their hearts broken.

They will be offered drugs, alcohol and Lord knows what else.

They will have teachers who treat them unfairly and bosses who do the same.

They will be bitterly and heartbreakingly disappointed. And hurt. And lied to. And misled.

They will have friends and significant others who betray them. Or love them too much. Or not enough.

At the end of the day, we have very, very little control over anything they do, say or think. After all the years, and the diapers, and lessons and explanations the weird truth is that there isn’t much we can do to prevent or predict any of it.

So all we can really do is arm them. Like soldiers preparing for the war. We can give them the weapons and the ammunition and the uniforms and canteens and protective gear. Then at some point, we have to send them off and simply trust that they have what they need to make their way.

We arm them with self-confidence. With a love of themselves. With the knowledge of when to speak up and when to keep quiet. With the ability to be equally comfortable whether totally alone or in the midst of a great crowd. With a sense of wrong and right. With kindness in their hearts, with a strong trust in their “gut” feelings and with the desire to help and support whenever possible.

That’s all we can do.

It’s a tall order. But it isn’t everything. There’s more we’d like to give. And some we’d like to take from them, too (like the pain of a broken heart or the low of a doozy of a mistake).

We can arm them. We can’t fight the battle for them.

Diapers are easy. Heck, even explaining right and wrong may be easy. But navigating life – and watching our children make their way away from us and into this life – is not always easy. It is natural, and it is what is “supposed” to be. 

But that doesn’t make it easy.

Comments

[DooneyPug]

Allison

This is a great article and so very true. It's hard sometimes to stand back & let our kids discover life & apply what we have tried to teach them, even if they might take a wrong turn or have a less than happy result. We have to let them go bit by bit & let the chips fall where they may. Easier said than done, though, isn't it?

Another great post to enjoy. Thanks for including us in your world.

Lori F

[Allison Nazarian]

Hi Lori, thank you!
It is SO hard sometimes. Don't want to give mixed messages, don't want to fight battles for them, doing stuff "for" them is not really helping them in the long run. So many ways to mess up :)
~ Alli