Thursday, February 5, 2009

I Want...The Ability to Know the Right Thing to do and Say in a Given Situation.

I have had several times this week where if I had someone instructing me on the right thing to say and/or do in certain situations, the end result may have been different. Mostly, these situations revolve around my children. For example, when my 7 year old is up until midnight and is basically wanting me to go get in my bed with him when all I want to do is take care of my business that I don't get to during the day. Would it have made a difference if I had put aside what I was doing to climb in bed with him at 9pm? Maybe so, maybe not. Hard to say. He may have gone to bed before midnight, but what lesson does that teach him? Running a daycare, I have very little time that I can sit and do exactly what I am doing now. The evening is MY TIME to have a little adult time and kick back and relax and not worry about the little people in my life that should be sleeping. Don't get me wrong. I LOVE to cuddle with my kids. BUT this is something we have been dealing with with him for some time now. It gets old real quick. I feel manipulated in a way. This also holds true for his general behavior at times. It gets hard to know what to do when they are acting out. Parenting is rough, people! ROUGH!

The other situation that came up is a friend in need. I wish I knew what to say to someone who is obviously distraught over a situation and calls in tears. I NEVER seem to know how to handle this, other than to just listen. It breaks my heart that there is NOTHING I can do to help the person on the other end of the phone (it was a phone call I got late one evening). I feel so helpless in this kind of situation. I want a magic want to fix things up just so! Oh wait! That can be another want for another day!!

1 comment:

Lisa Coffey said...

But you did help your friend - you listened and more than anything, I would bet that's what she needed :).