Check, Please!

   

It is time for a reality check. The distance between your EXPECTATIONS and REALITY determines your level of frustration and pain. What can you do? Either lower your expectations or change your reality.

     As long as you have children in your house ( reality) you will have to give up the idea that your house should look like the cover of House Beautiful (expectation) unless you get a live-in maid (change in reality). The higher your expectation, the more frustrated you will become every time a child leaves a toy on the floor or a mess on the table. Messes in your house mean that people LIVE in your house. Believe me, there is PLENTY of time to enjoy a clean house later,  when your children are grown and gone ( but the empty quiet makes me long for the messes again!).
     Children are active ( reality). They are made that way. They do NOT sit still for long periods of time ( expectation). Please, do yourself and the world a favor....do not take small children out to nice restaurants for dinner. You can expect them to sit politely and quietly from now until the cows come home, but the reality is that they are wired to make noise and move around. Why fight it?  Take them out for fast food...they do fast food. Save the restaurants for an enjoyable date night and look forward to the time when your child demonstrates behavior at home that would lead you to believe that he could handle a long meal without having to be scolded repeatedly.
    Children have opinions ( reality). Although you teach and train them, as well as provide what they need, you can NOT make them LIKE every food you put on their plate ( or every cute outfit you purchase, etc) (expectation). So, lighten up. Do your children need to eat vegetables? Yes. But how about this...let them choose between two...carrots OR green beans tonight? Please do not become a short order cook-- making special meals for them beyond what you have prepared for a meal ( because they won't eat it)  unless you want your children to grow up to be demanding adults. I am a firm believer that what mom cooks is what should be eaten, at least a few bites of each item served. However, the reality is-- I hate brussel sprouts-- and chances are there is a vegetable you just don't like. I let each of my children have one vegetable that they just did not have to eat. Some of them loved lima beans and some just didn't. The dinner table should not be a war zone. Children will learn to like new things by trying new things-- in our house you had to try 2 bites-- but don't make a child sit, gagging, being forced to clean her plate. Nobody wins and everyone winds up being miserable. ( Believe me on this one! And again, I am sorry Sarah!)
    Your children love you, really. But they may not demonstrate it in the ways you expect--- until they are older. But I can tell you the reward ( phone calls, text messages, visits, cards and letters etc.) is ohhh so worth the investment in good, peaceful relationships with them when they were younger.
     BE THE MOM: Move your reality and expectations closer together by really looking at the truth of the matter and working with it. Don't  force and rush everything. Take your time and enjoy your children where they are NOW.
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