I feel like parenting has hit me right between the eyes recently. Some things keeping me up at night recently (just to name two): YouTube hackers and teaching our kids healthy sexuality. These concepts aren’t anything new (sadly), but they’re new to me because I just learned about the horrifying “Momo” character on YouTube (cannot emphasize enough how disturbed I am by this) and last week we attended a parenting class on teaching healthy sexuality to our kids. Talk about more than a week’s worth of heavy topics!
I was on the phone with Stockton this morning on his drive in to work and I said “I’m just so overwhelmed by all of the parenting we need to be doing right now” (as I walked around the house picking up dozens – no really, DOZENS – of pairs of abandoned socks, toys and nerf bullets). “I feel like I need to govern every second they spend at home so they don’t end up on YouTube and stumble upon Momo; I feel like I can’t let the kids bathe together anymore because I don’t want any inappropriate behavior; I feel like I need to constantly hound them to not be slobs; but then I feel like there’s a hierarchy of parenting priorities, so maybe the cleanliness isn’t as important if we’re focused on the bigger things; but then the cleanliness and homework and ‘little things’ are in fact big things that form how they will live and act as adults.” And behold the dumpster fire that is my brain right now.
Ok, Mom and Dad, I think I’m starting to get it. I get the grey hairs. I get the sleep problems. I get it all. And yet, as people love to remind me, “little kids, little problems.” And OH, how I love the little problems now that I’ve gotten the tiniest taste of big problems. But I can no longer deny that the big, scary, important stuff is upon us and suddenly I feel like the last 7 years of parenting have just been a warmup.
So after our Teaching Kids Healthy Sexuality Class taught by Jim Burns, I subscribed to his newsletter and blog. His blog post from today is exactly what I needed to read after spending a little too much time in my head this weekend. You can read it here if you’d like.
Quite simply, it was a reminder of 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 (Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.)
On one end of the parenting spectrum, I’m still worrying about things like healthy sleep patterns with Merritt. On the other end of the spectrum, I’m trying to teach Navy all of the important things I want him to hear from Stockton and I before his friends at school give him their versions of the truth (like how babies are made! how to treat people! bullying! lying! the list goes ON!). And still, I know even these are considered “little problems.” But instead of obsessing and overthinking and spending all of my time in my head, I want to spend more time in the Word, more time in prayer, and more time simply being joyful. In this, I can have joy. In this, I will rejoice. “This” may be sleepless nights. “This” may be having the “body parts talk” with my five and seven year olds. “This” may be navigating loss and grief with my family. Whatever “this” is though, I will seek to be joyful in it.
