Parenting

Some days being a parent sucks. Today was one of those days. One of our children has a very feisty temper. Well, she just has a feisty everything really, but her temper can be especially trying on one's patience and kindness. For the past week or so, she's been pushing every single button she can. She has exhausted the gentleness of her father and me. Today was no different. She was especially awful today.

I had tapped out of parenting her by the evening. When I start clenching my fists it's time for me to say that I'm finished in that moment, and I had to tell her Dad that it was his turn. Chief took over and she was as ferocious as ever. In a beautiful moment, Chief came out of the girl's room, walked up to me and hugged me. He said "Help me to use kind words." I said "Who are you talking to because I'm so mad I can barely see straight!" He said "You and God. I think she needs kind words but I'm so angry with her I just want to scream at her."

It was powerful. It was also beautiful. There we were, two grown ups, being pushed and challenged by our five year old child. There he was coming to me for a regroup, and bringing us both to God for a collected mentality.

We snuggled for a few minutes and then off he went back to fight the good fight. When he went back in to her room, in the midst of her screaming tantrum, he walked up to her and hugged her. I know because I had an overwhelming sense that I should hug her myself and when I walked in I saw them hugging while he was talking to her. We all stood there hugging in her room, talking about this behavior.

The thing that is neat to me, is that the story didn't turn out like you might have imagined. It didn't all wrap up neatly before bed. She continued acting like a lunatic. She didn't all of a sudden start to behave and apologize for her rude actions. She didn't have any sort of revelation about respecting her parents and treating people with kindness. But we did. We were reminded that she is a person (it's extra neat that as I was writing that sentence, I was reminded of what our priest said today in church: missionary work is reaching out to people and connecting with them. It's not protests and agendas, but connecting with a person in a trusting and intimate way. Powerful stuff!). We were reminded that so are we. We were schooled on the notion of self control and kindness (notice I did not say surrendering, but rather kindness). We also were drawn closer to each other and we stood side-by-side tackling this challenge as one unit.

It's amazing to me how the behavior of our children can teach us so many lessons. In the heat of this outrageously challenging evening, Chief and I could have turned our emotions on each other. We could have become angry and yelled and screamed and acted just like our child. But because of Chief's wisdom... because of his self control, the entire tone of our conduct changed. That, my friends, is leadership. It is leadership and missionary work in the most excellent of ways.