Are We Helping or Harming our Children Emotionally....?
Posted: Friday, September 14, 2007
by Sandra E. Graham
My Books and Articles
Its 3:30 in the morning and the windows havent yet begun to lighten with the gray tint of dawn. Trying desperately to clear your mind of all thoughts, you try for just a couple more hours sleep. But it doesnt happen. You lay awake looking at the shadows cast by the night light and try again to will yourself to sleep. Your mind, however, will have none of itthoughts pace back and forth across the floors of your brain. Maybe its financial worries, maybe its personal problems that are keeping your restless thoughts from giving you the peace and rest you so urgently crave.
Are we in good faith preparing them for the lifes ups and downs?
Or are we placing a burden on them that would be better left to a more experienced and perhaps a little older participant?
Certainly we dont want to give them the misguided belief that life is all roses and sunshine, but can you remember the feelings of fright and helplessness you felt as a child when you knew that your parents were having those same feelings? I canand at a very young age. I wanted desperately, willed it, prayed for it, for my father to be strong and protective and my mother to be happy and loving. Their worries and concerns, however, became mine and although, I hid my feelings from them for I was too young to know how to make them known, I wept inside.
Parents who fightphysically and/or verballyin front of their children (at any age) cannot begin to comprehend the irreparable damage they are doing. Sons learn first hand from their fathers or other father figures and daughters sometimes seem to gravitate toward father figures when picking a mate. When children are being taught all the things that are wrong in a relationship, they actually grow up thinking that these are all the things that are normal.
Although scientific progress has made our lives much easier over the past hundred years, Im not sure anything has done much to improve our lives emotionally and spirituallyif anything, times have become more stressful than ever. Prayers have been taken out of the schools so that parents who dont want their children to pray are placated, but what of the parents who do wish for their children to practice their faith and children who do wish to praywhat of their rights? Why can we not have both?
It may not be true for everyone, but in my experience, children who are brought up in a Christian and loving home, become good Christian and loving parents and have a much easier time learning to cope with whatever problems life throws at their families, through prayer. And if life throws us a few sour lemons that children have to be told about, teach them how to make lemonade and the sooner the better!
Sandra E Graham, authorAmos JakeyAmerican Book Publishing. Visit my website to check out all my books and articles: http://www.sandragraham-articles-books.com
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Top-level comments on this article: (3 total)hi sandra, excellent article, since i have struggled with these concepts. how much do you let your kids know, and what do you keep to yourself? i try to keep most to myself, but, as you said, we also have to prepare them for real life. we can't just sugar coat everything while raising them, and then send them out to the cold, calculating world. it's a tough subject. you handled it beautifully, best regards, sue thom
Sandra, this was another good article, I can surely relate to it. I appreciate your insight, and I am glad that I met you through your writings today. God Bless! Angie
Sandra, your comment about technology outstripping emotional and spiritual development is something that my husband and I discuss quite frequently. For all our gadgets and gizmos, it seems we are all really just "cavemen" at heart. I do believe, that whether or not parents are Christian, they should teach their children to deal affectively with life's curve balls. Sheltering them, as my parents did, does them no favors.
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