Parenting ...

So I read your recent post on parenting, and it triggered a boatload of thoughts. This has been on the forefront of our minds recently, as my wife's parents have decided to make it an issue. The long story boiled down is as follows.

Several years ago, my wife and I made a decision to root our lives here, in the Chicagoland area. We did so for two reasons.

1. Chicago was the compromise location. I gave up my vision of leaving this state and she gave up her vision of living within an hour of her parents.
2. By maximizing the distance between our family and her parents, we could minimize the impact that they had in terms of reinforcing values in our marriage/children that we do share. We have seen this influence play out in her sister's marriage and family; and we wanted to avoid that in our own.

Consequent to our decision to live three hours away from her family, we have dealt with a near-constant reminder that her sister chose to live in town while we "wrongly" chose to live farther away -- implied evidence that we are not as committed to the family.

Now consider the issue of children. The sister has two children, one girl and one boy. The girl is the chosen grandchild because she is of the proper gender and she is the first-born. My in-laws raised two girls themselves; and consequently have no idea what to do with boys and their high-energy output. So put this all together:

1. We are bad because we do not choose to live in rural America near them.
2. The sister is good because she chooses to live in rural America near her parents.
   
3. Girls are best because they are easily controlled and do not disrupt the household in the same way that boys do.
4. Girls who live close by are best because ... they live close by.

So what does this yield? A telephone call from my father-in-law explaining that they do not care for our parenting. Their evidence:

1. After waiting in line for 45 mintues, our oldest son cried hysterically in front of Santa because he was flat out done with the whole experience.
   
2. Our son broke the battery plate on their remote control (a remote control that we offered to replace because our son failures are our responsibility)
3. We fail to discpline our child in the same way that my father-in-law chooses to discipline. In other words, we fail to spank our child so harshly and to scream so loudly that he cowers sobbing on the couch for five minutes before he is brought to stand before my father-in-law a second time for more screaming. We fail to be so intense with him that 15 mintues later, he will not allow me to put him down and physically trembles at the sight of his grandfather. We fail to be so intense that a week later, when my father-in-law's name is brought up, my son begins to cower all over again.
   

So where does this leave us? For the first time in our marriage, my wife has said to me that she does not wish to go to her parents for Christmas. She does not wish to purchase presents for her family. She does not wish to go down for several days after Christmas -- something she has done every year for the last six years.

The wierd thing is, all of this has lead to us doubting ourselves. Our son is very high-energy and he is very stubborn and very independant. But he is also two-and-a-half and is extremely well behaved everywhere else we take him. Are we failing as parents and allowing him too much freedom (e.g. we allow him to explore his environment including remote controls)? I don't know. But your point about there being no great parenting manual is something that we have been struggling with ourselves. How great would it be to have an authority that you could appeal to in every circumstance.

I have to run now, but if you think about us, please pray for my family. We are going down to my in-laws this Christmas (for less than 24-hours). We are doing so not because we want to but because we desire to minimize the emotional fall-out that would surely follow if we dared not show up for a family gathering. In the end, we are still trying to make this work. While I am at a place where I sincerley doubt that it ever can work (due to differing values), I want to give my wife as much latitude as possible to reach her own conclusions. (Of course, this latitude is restricted by their behavior towards my children. They will no longer be allowed to be near my children unsupervised, nor will any comments comparing my child to the "chosen girl" be accepted.) More specifically, please pray for my wife. This has been a very trying time for her as she is witnessing her family behave in a way that is causing a rift that separates us from them. I love her dearly, and it pains me to watch her suffer like this.

P.S. Greg, please note that I will no longer rise to your obvious Bono-baiting. You must find someone else to taunt. ;-)