Children are your life—but not really
Millions of people get married every year to begin a new life. Out of that union, millions of couples bring children into their lives and create families. And as families grow to all sorts shapes, sizes and colors, parents rearrange their lives accordingly. As the years go by, children require less and less supervision and direct involvement but few would disagree that parental involvement would drop to zero even as the children become adults themselves. Some parents, however, don’t let up and continue to be involved. Whatever the case, we already have decades of research to show that as much as children are the focus in our lives, there is an emotional toll of being too involved in our children’s lives, both for the parent and especially for the children.
The reality of my life is that I’ve gone from being a single guy to married couple to divorced man and now a single-dad in a span of 9 years. My life has changed so much I have now molded my lifestyle around a shared-custody schedule as our daughter bounces between mine and her mother’s house. I’ve also made major career changes to accommodate the lifestyle. Every time I change tracks, I pray I don’t derail everything. However, what’s important to me is my daughter and being there for her when she is with me (and also when she is not) in the here and now. I put in a lot of time now both because I want to and I need to. But my long game is very different. My goal is to teach my daughter to become independent so she can provide for herself. It’s the proverbial adage of teaching someone to fish so they can feed themselves rather than fishing for them eternally. While I don’t think my viewpoint differs from many parents whose ultimate goal is similar, it is the way I approach this, which has resulted in much strife between me and my daughter’s mom.
Recognize that parenting is a responsibility that has a definable end date can potentially bring some limits to parental overreach. At the end of the day, children are a result of love and marriage, not the purpose of it.
I’m a dad who is comfortable with my daughter taking acceptable risk, spending alone time, walking to a neighbor’s house by herself, having sleepovers and using sharp Henckel knives. I truly feel that when you allow a child the freedom to explore the unknown knowing you have her back, she’ll be less likely to seek it out behind your back. Essentially, I believe people don’t pursue things they already have; they scream out for the things they want (or need). Kids are the same way. And so that is why I have presently rearranged my life to be with my daughter as much as possible during these formative years. Being a finance guy, I look at it like investing for the future. Save heavily now so you have less to worry about later. In contrast, if you don’t make the investments now, you’ll never be able to catch up decades later. In a few short years, she’ll want to distance herself from me as her burgeoning personality really begins to bloom. But wherever she goes, she knows where home is and knows she’ll always have a key to our house.
Contrast this with friends I know whose children mean everything to them and have even become their children’s best friends, an idea I’m very opposed. Over-involved parents start off with good intentions which snowball into an avalanche of interference that ultimately suffocates the child’s independence and thwart the development of their self-worth. Their singular focus of shielding their children from harm has ironically produced the opposite effect. In 2005, Dr. Missa Murry Eaton of Pennsylvania State University coauthored a study correlating parental self-worth with their children’s accomplishments. It found that 20% of parents base their own self-worth on their children’s performance. She continued to stated that while all parents feel badly when their children don’t do well, only over-involved parents feel badly about themselves.
In a worst case scenario, I know couples who stayed together for the sake of their children in the sanctity of marriage. Unfortunately, this sanctity has brought untold misery to everyone under that roof. Children are never responsible for the conflict between their parents, but when parents make the decision to stay together for the sake of the children, these children will grow up blaming themselves for everyone’s misery under which they all lived. Recognizing that parenting is a responsibility that has a definable end date can potentially bring some limits to parental overreach. At the end of the day, children are a result of love and marriage, not the purpose of it.