Normally, I feel pretty good about my parenting skills. Well, there are those times that I am trying to reason with the 3 yr old and I wonder if I have ever been a mom before. (For those who have not had the privilege of a 3 yr old, there is noooooo reasoning with them.) Or those times the girls ask me things like, “why did God make us right now to be your girl?” Those questions catch me off guard, but NORMALLY, I feel like I know what I am doing.
Except when I am with other people.
I hate parenting with an audience. When I am in the grocery store and the girls keep leaning on the check out belt. Again and again. And I don’t see it and the cashier tells them not to do that. I feel like she is saying, “Parenting Fail.” We’re at church and the girls start running, and someone looks over and I see in their eyes, “don’t you teach your children to respect the house of God.” Even at friends houses. Am I being too hard on my kids, too soft on my kids, am I not disciplining things they would correct, am I feeding my kids something they would never let theirs snack on?
I hate parenting with an audience. I always feel off kilter, so I feel like I am waffling, demanding of my children one moment, soft on them the next.
Does this ever end? Is it that I’m not really a good parent? Do other parents feel this way? Or am I just not confident in myself?
Do you struggle with this? Or am I alone? Do you care about what others think of your parenting, or do you know yourself well enough stand bravely on your own two feet?
Survive til you Thrive!
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