When Our Babies Are No Longer Babies…

We raise our babies so that they will grow up to be adults of faith, honesty, respect and wisdom that they have learned from little on up. We pour our love and soul into our children so that they will know how to treat another human being with the utmost respect; starting with their parents.


Our children get into their teens, and it is like a switch goes on. The peer pressure sets in and the signs of hatred and depression can be seen... some even get physically abusive to the ones they love the most.


We, as parents, right away feel like it is our fault and end up taking the blunt end of much our teenager and/or adult child’s anger. They take out the anger they are holding in, on us because, they feel we are their safe zone. We as parents, want to continue to nurture them. We want to understand them. But most of all in the back of our minds, we are still blaming ourselves and wondering where we went wrong. If you are a parent that has made your children your world and been there for them, you are not at fault. We, as parents can only do so much. If we continue to give and give, then our children, no matter what age they are, will continue to take and take and not learn for themselves.


Our children can be raised in a most Conservative Christian home, or a very dysfunctional one, and have the same outlook on life, no matter what the parents have tried to instill into them. They most likely will get to the point of no return. They break your heart, you spend time crying and worrying about them and most of all you continue to love them. It adds stress to our lives, not only the pain we are going through as parents, but seeing our children no matter what age they are, destruct themselves.


I write this knowing many of us as parents go through this. I, myself, have went through one of my children dropping out of high school only a few months from graduation. She then travelled into the world of drugs and became addicted to meth. I was devastated. I felt I had failed her as a parent. I continued to watch her go downhill and there was no way of stopping her. She was thrilled with her new life. I sat day in, and day out, crying and praying for a miracle. She continued in her world of meth and brought three children into her world. I continued to blame myself. What could I have done different? Why did she not listen to me about drugs and what they can do to you? Many more questions ran through my mind and tore at my heart. I was the one that became depressed, and could not focus on other things that are important in my life too.


Then through prayer and knowing God loved us both, the reality came that this was not my fault. We raise our children to be of good spirit, loving and giving. We teach them right from wrong. It is up to them to accept the teachings from us. Otherwise, they will make their own mistakes and while doing so, we as parents have to pray that they learn by them. They have to face the consequences of the decisions they make.


My prayer is for the parents that are going through this now, or even in the past, that they realize that they can only do so much. They are not parents that have failed especially when your children are your world.


This verse has much meaning to me. Not just as a parent but as a person. I fall back on this verse many times for many different things in my life.


“Be strong and of good courage, do not fear nor be afraid of them; for the Lord your God, He is the One who goes with you. He will not leave you nor forsake you.” Deut. 31:6 (NKJV)


Blessings,


Gee Lucero