Acting Like Husband and Wife: I wish I had said that!
townhall blog
My favorite advice columnist, John Rosemond, has done it again: penned a column with more wisdom per column inch than anything I've seen in a long time. In response to the question, what is the biggest problem today's kids will face when they become adults, Dr. Rosemond answered: Many, if not most of them, are not developing a functional sense of what is truly meant by "marriage", and therefore "family."
What does he mean by that? That even kids in two-parent families grow up in child-centered families, where their parents do not act as husband and wife, but always as father and mother. Rosemond claims that kids do better when the bond between the parents is the strongest bond in the family, among other reasons, because this gives the kids a secure base from which they can latter launch their own lives.
Read the whole thing. I wish I had written this, that's how strongly I agree with it.
townhall.com
"Acting like husband and wife"
by John Rosemond
A journalist recently asked: "When they become adults, what will be the biggest problem facing today's kids?"
I answered: "That many if not most of them, even those growing up in two-parent homes, are not developing a functional sense of what is truly meant by marriage' and, therefore, family.'"
How's that? Today's all-too-typical child is prevented from learning what marriage is all about by well-intentioned parents who rarely act from within the roles of husband and wife; rather, they act almost exclusively from within the roles of mother and father. This is, after all, the new American ideal, based in large part on the nefarious modern notion that the more attention you pay to, the more involved you are with, and the more you do for your child, the better a parent you are.
I am a member of the last generation of American children to grow up in families where the marriage, irrespective of its imperfections, occupied center-stage. Your mother was a house-wife, not a stay-at-home mom who was in perpetual orbit around her kids.
Even if she worked outside the home, as mine did, the 50s mother did not arrive home from work bearing a load of guilt which she attempted to discharge by dancing as fast as she could in her children's lives through the evening until they finally consented to go to bed.
Likewise your father, when he came home from work, had no intention of romping with his children all evening, "re-bonding" with them. He came home looking forward to spending a quiet evening with his wife, his intended partner for life. After dinner, Mom and Dad retired to coffee and conversation in the living room, and the kids, well, they found things of their own to do (including their homework, which they did on their own as well). They did not slink off into the Land of Unwanted Children.
There were exceptions to this general rule, of course, but there are two living generations (mine and my parents') who remember that once upon a time in America, the husband-wife relationship was stronger than the parent-child relationship, as it should be.
"Come on now John," someone is saying. "You don't actually mean stronger. You mean as strong as."
No, I most definitely mean stronger. Unlike today's mom, the mom of the 1950s and before was not married to her child; she was married to her husband. And unlike today's dad, the dad of bygone days was a husband first, a father second, and he was most definitely not his child's buddy (the new ideal in American fatherhood).
Under no other circumstances can children learn what marriage truly means and involves, and make no mistake about it, that learning is far more important than being an honor student or a star athlete infinitely more important, in fact.
If you want more proof of why the husband-wife relationship should trump that of parent and child, consider this unarguable proposition: Nothing makes a child feel more insecure than the feeling that his parents' relationship is shaky, that it might come undone at any moment. It follows that nothing makes a child feel more secure than knowing his parents relationship, while not perfect, is strong enough to endure any hardship, any disagreement.
The primacy of the husband-wife relationship gives a child full permission to begin preparing for his emancipation. The fact that he is not essential to his parents' well-being that their well-being is contained within their marriage gives him full, unfettered permission to leave and venture out into a life of his own. A child's leaving home should be cause for celebration, exciting and full of promise for all concerned.
When the parent-child relationship is foremost, however, emancipation is difficult for all concerned. Sometimes, the child is able to leave physically, but not emotionally. At other times, emancipation takes the form of a painful "divorce" from which it is difficult for any of the parties involved to ever fully recover.
The greatest gift one can give a child upon his emancipation is not the keys to a new car or condominium, but the security of knowing that in the truest sense, he can always come home again not to live, mind you, but to visit. I have spoken to many young emancipated adults who tell me that the greatest pain in their lives involves the turmoil they go through when trying to decide how to split up "visit time" between Mom's house and Dad's house.
Sometimes, our own children tell Willie and me how "lucky" they are that we are still together and to know that we always will be. It's actually a slip of the tongue, because they both know that luck has nothing to do with it. It was, and is, a matter of keeping the natural order of things in their natural order.
rosemond.com |
