I’ve been blessed with three beautiful daughters, and I wouldn’t be the person I am without them! In retrospect, I don’t regret one single challenge, not one single moment when I wanted to pull out my own hair or resign from my job as Mom. It’s amazing how fast time flies…..the saying is actually based on fact! Before one knows it, one’s 5 year old is fifteen, and the issue of the day is soooooo different.

But I discovered along my journey that the inner resources I’ve had to pull up from somewhere deep in my heart, (or gut, or left leg), to meet these challenges have always been the same no matter how old my child was. Patience is patience, no matter what. Being open and receptive is crucial to communication with a 3 year old as much as with a 16 year old. Loving firmness is a basic tool that must never waver. In fact, it’s clear to me now that during the younger years, I was growing up along with my children, training and honing my skills so that when they became teens I was so good at my job as Mom that I didn’t “lose” them. Teen time is the proverbial “generation gap” time, and one can actually lose one’s child. I’ve seen that happen too often, and always hoped it wouldn’t happen to me……..sometimes I wasn’t sure that it wouldn’t. I count my blessing that it didn’t! Now I’m enjoying a degree of mutual respect and support with my daughters that I could not have imagined when they stormed out of the room in a huff at 12, screaming “I hate you mummy”

So enjoy the challenges! Rise to the occasion, even if it is the 900th time! They’re blessings in disguise, and believe me, one can even get nostalgic about them in later years, when one is facing other more hard core situations. Take heart, don’t give up on yourself or your child…..you’re both so worth it!

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