Doing our Best

Parenting is hard.  I don’t think anyone ever looks at the prospect of being a parent (planned or not) and says “I’m just going to do a half-ass job raising this kid”.  Every parent is going to try as hard as they can to raise their kid to the best of their ability.

I’m pretty judgemental when it comes to parenting and I see what I believe to be horrible examples of parenting in the world. (Like that time I overheard a dad telling his daughter that she couldn’t get a toy that was meant for boys.) I suspect other parents are equally judgemental of my ‘style’.  But I’ve gotten pretty good lately of reminding myself that this person is just trying their best with what they have.  And I don’t have any idea what kind of environment they themselves were raised in. For all I know the father that I mentioned above was physically and/or emotionally abused growing up. Maybe he was born into a horribly sexist family and I’m actually seeing a more watered down version of that sexism. I still don’t believe this is morally right, but it is a step in the right direction.

So to all those parents out there that I might have smirked at or given the stink-eye to, I truly apologize.  It is insensitive of me to judge you without knowing the circumstances of a given situation.

Parenting is hard. Every parent thinks about their own childhood and how they vow to do things differently or the same.  Fortunately, (or maybe not) there is now the Internet and more information than any parent can possibly sift through.  We pick and choose what we want and try to do what sounds good to us. 

For me, articles like this about not being perfect are a good blueprint for the kind of parent I would like to be. But even in striving for less perfectionism, no one is perfect. I have raised my voice unnecessarily when speaking to my daughter. I have acted poorly in communicating with my family. Ideally, I should apologize after these incidents, but I don’t always. 

Parenting is hard.  I’m doing my best. Go ahead and judge me because I will continue to judge you. But after we judge each other, let’s remember that we’re all just working with what we have. Nobody is trying to be an ass. We just can’t help ourselves.