The parenting runway is getting very short for us as our boys are getting ready for takeoff. Our precious little boys are now in high school with graduation fast approaching for our oldest! When they were first born, we felt like the diaper years would never end and now we are living the cliché of “they grow up so fast!” As we reflect on our parenting years, we thought it might be encouraging to provide you with a brief overview of what each phase (or season) of parenting looks like and some lessons we’ve learned along the way at each stage.
Discipline Phase- Birth through Pre-school Years (1-5)
These early years are characterized by Discipline… for your child and YOU!
When will I ever sleep again?! Will you please put the food in your mouth and not your ears/nose or mommy’s eyeball?! Why is potty training so hard?!
We have such a tender heart for all of you who are in these years because we remember how tired we were! Isn’t it amazing how someone so precious and adorable could be so difficult at times? That is why babies, toddlers and their parents need discipline. Discipline in the form of structure, coupled with encouragement and correction of basic behaviors and actions, characterizes this earliest stage of parenting. As parents we also need discipline so that we don’t overreact or fail to deal with our children’s behavior because it’s just too hard or we have no idea what to do. It was when we reached about halfway through this phase with our oldest and his brother was a toddler, that we realized we had no idea what to do and we needed to become disciplined ourselves in order to be consistent and set ourselves up to succeed in our parenting.
Training Phase- Elementary Years (5-12)
This is one of the most challenging and rewarding times of parenting. You are training them to do EVERYTHING! As they begin to mentally develop in this stage, their capacity to understand grows and we must explain the “why” behind moral and practical behaviors. We also, must model for them the things we may think are intuitive. For example, how to greet an adult is something that needs to be taught and modeled so they know how to do it. Explaining the moral courtesy of why we greet adults this way so they will take ownership of that behavior. This is training! And like all training, it can be long, tiresome, and hard to keep yourself and your children motivated. Yet, your time and attention during this and in the discipline phase will reap huge rewards in the next stages!
This was also a time of personal growth for us. Training and leading our children caused us to examine our own character. We all dread being defined as the hypocritical parents. So fully understanding and applying moral and practical courtesies opened our eyes to many areas where we were personally lacking. This ranged from how Shelly and Rich spoke to one another to remaining consistent and disciplined in our training.
Coaching Phase- Pre-adult Years (13-18)
Hello puberty and what have you done with my son? The early part of this phase, is what we have affectionately called the caveman years for our boys. There was lots of grunting, sweating, and eating. Puberty is the perfect storm of hormones and self-realization that you are becoming an adult. We can joke about it now, but making the transition from the elementary years was challenging for both of us because it took us awhile to transition as parents. We still tended to view our growing young men as little boys. We learned we needed to allow them more freedoms to apply for themselves all the training we had provided them. Letting a child struggle a bit (children only fail when they don’t learn/grow from the experience) and have their own successes can be difficult. Of course, the amount of freedom must be appropriate.
Like a coach, you must continually evaluate freedoms, teaching into perceived failures and encouraging accomplishments. At this stage, you are still developing a relationship built on trust. If appropriate freedoms are withheld, there is a tendency towards rebellion. If too many freedoms are inappropriately provided, then there is a tendency toward entitlement and lack of personal growth and character development. Both can likely lead to a lack of trust between you and your kids and a show up as disrespect and contempt toward you.
Mentoring/Friendship Phase – Adult Years (18+)
We are not quite here yet, but we can see what this looks like as our boys truly enjoy being around us! Our oldest turns 18 in 3 months and our youngest gets his driver’s license in 6 month’s time. It does not seem possible our babies are nearly grown and we are that old! We have relationships with them built on trust and know that they will freely seek our council. They have tested what we have taught/modeled and found it to be true as they have applied it to their lives and developing faith. Ultimately, they will come to view us not only as their parents, but also as close friends. We have seen this played out with many of our friends like Dave and Lis and their children. Their children are in their twenties and the relationship they have is what we think all parents long for. This is why it is it so important to “put in the work” in all the phases. The work you put in now ultimately leads to this fulfilling reward!
Again, this is just a snapshot of what the parenting phase looked like for us to this point. The ages for entering each phase can vary depending upon the child and each child in your family is different. So they may not hit the transition milestones at the same time and the transition itself may look a little different for each child.
Taking parenting classes and going to marriage seminars helped us keep our perspective, be more consistent, and stay encouraged throughout all the phases of parenting. You will have challenges in all the phases/seasons of parenting, but don’t give up! The joys we’ve had in each phase are precious treasures and, by far, outweigh all the difficulties we encountered.
Blessing to your family,
Shelly and Rich