Been thinking lately about parenting and what I perceive as parent’s selfish priorities. As I may have stated before, I don’t feel it is the right thing to do to stick your kids in daycare or with a nannie or sitter if it is not absolutely necessary. Many parents do not want to be with the kids all day or may feel that their career or money is more important and I feel that the children suffer because of this. Parents that do so are selfish and have their priorities backwards.
I am adding to this list some things that parents do that I feel show their upside down priorities.
The first thing that bothers me is when some parents put their kids into some sort of extra curricular program, not to have the children do something that they love to do but in order to: get free time from the kids, be able to brag to their friends about how great their children are, feel better about themselves by living vicariously through their kids. Don’t get me wrong, if the kids want to do the activity then go for it. It is great for kids to be able to do activities that they want to do. But, when parents force their kids to do something–and continue to do so after it is blatantly obvious that the child doesn’t like it–they are only hurting the child in order to gain something for themselves. Really bothers me when I see a child in baseball, for example, who really doesn’t want to be there yet ends up there year after year while never getting any better. The parents, meanwhile, are not even there watching.
Another thing that bugs me about parents and their priorities is that they will drop everything that the child knows in order to chase their career or lifestyle. Relocating to another state for their career or just to be able to live in better weather or whatever the case may be is sometimes selfish, especially when it takes children away from all of their family and friends. Of course, as they say, children will be able to make more friends– but they only have one family. I am not talking about situations where the parents have no choice such as a military member etc…But when a parent chases their career for more money or prestige while hurting the child in the process, I feel it is very selfish. I have seen examples of this and, sure, the children will survive and will probably become happy with their new lives. Children are resilient and will adjust to many negative things which doesn’t make them right. However, it will be later in life when they truly realize the importance of family and the time with them that was lost.
Lack of participation in their kid’s lives. This is huge. Monstrous! Whether it is the lack of interest and knowledge of their child’s life, lack of play or talking with child, lack of affection and love, or any other lack of participation in kids’ lives, this will affect them the rest of their lives. And, they will always remember it.
The last thing bugging me about parents and their selfishness is the fact that they set a bad example for their kids with their selfish and irresponsible behavior at home. This behavior can be smoking, drinking, drug use, spousal abuse, constant arguing with spouse, laziness, lack of ambition, law breaking, bad health habits, letting them watch r rated movies at a young age, using obscenities excessively etc…..all while ignoring their kids. When parents behave in this way they are perpetuating this behavior down to the next generation who will eventually do the same. Whether or not the children witness the behavior or not, it is selfish and irresponsible.
The term “The apple never falls far from the tree” was coined for a reason.