Monday, May 20, 2013

The Illusion of Control

My kids are older now and having older kids can be kinda scary. Not that having younger kids isn't scary. Some of us have spent the duration of parenthood downright terrified of the responsibility involved in raising the screaming masses set before us. But having older kids is just different. As I lay awake last night with my old buddy, Migraine, I tried to understand it. I think it all has to come down to control. Or rather the illusion of control.

It is easy to think, and in some cases it is true, that we can control our children when they are young. And it is easy to think, and some "experts" will tell us, that if we control our children when they are young we will, in effect, control them when they are old. They use Proverbs 22:6 ("Train up a child in the way he should go: and when he is old, he will not depart from it.") ad nauseum as a guarantee for their formula for success.

But the fact of the matter is, we can influence, but we can never truly control. The younger they are, the more variables we can control, but we can never really control them, because we can never really control their hearts.

Control is such an evil sounding word (think Big Brother) but we all want it. You might be the most baby-averse person on the planet but open your loins and push out that bundle and in no time there is nothing you wouldn't do to protect that pile of squawking, wrinkled flesh. God made us that way.

But from the very beginning, even before the very beginning, there was so, so much we could never control. We can't control if we conceive, unless we opt for in vitro, in which case we can't control if the fertilized egg will take. We can't control if the baby will thrive or die in utero. We can't control when we go into labor, though from the dawn of time, we have tried . . . OH HOW WE'VE TRIED!

Babies should be easy enough. We can control where they are, who they are with, what they wear, etc., but those of my friends with newborns—and the rest of us, if we can even remember those early days (likely erased forever due to a combination of sleep deprivation and shock)—know that you can't make a baby sleep. Or eat, for that matter. You can lead a horse to water but . . . .

Older kids and even toddlers really aren't any different. We can childproof the house into Fort Knox and serve up only the healthiest of fare but somehow . . . SOMEHOW, unless our little wonders are kept in the dog kennel 24/7 (and even then...these kids are tiny Houidinis of the cleverest type), SOMETHING'S gonna happen. That's why stitches were invented, and Dust Busters, and Poison Control. You can't really get ahead of a kid or get into his head. (It truly never occurred to me to tell my 8 year-old son not saw open an aerosol can with a steak knife. To his credit, he claims he knew to check and make sure it was empty first and, indeed, nothing blew up.)

Then there is school. Ah, the choice that has split a thousand churches, or so I've heard. Parents have different reasons the education choices they make for their children. Homeschooling obviously provides greater variable control and public schooling probably the least, but it is still the variables that we are controlling and sometimes not even those very well. We opted for moderate variable control and sent our kids to a very solid Christian school. But even there, there were dud teachers, and evil science fair projects, and unfair athletic coaches, and taunting classmates. Even there, there was heartache. Nothing crushes a mother's heart than when her third grade daughter gets into the car at the end of the school day and hands her a note: "Mommy, nobody would sit with me at lunch today." No control over her broken heart. No control at all.

It never ceases to amaze me how different kids are. And a lot of it has to do with temperament, and temperament—or how we are wired and knit together in our mother's womb—is not something we can control. Take my two oldest children. Same two parents (I promise—I was there), both girls, born less than two years apart. Same rules, same variables, same schooling, same younger siblings, same major life events, same bedroom for 18.5 years. And you would never even guess that they are remotely related. They are both beautiful (an objective fact), but in vastly different ways. Their personalities, interests, strengths, and weaknesses are so different they can have a tough time even relating (maturity is making that easier). Don't anybody ever tell me that all kids are alike!

We don't wire our children. God does. It is like he sends them into this world with a backpack filled with their hair color, eye color, body type, personality traits, learning style, athletic ability, and on and on. And none of these things we can control (except for hair color, but that's another story).

I think you get my point. I've already written too much. Parenthood is hard. It is **** hard. But I think it is harder when we think we have control over something that we really don't. Sure, we can lead that horse to water . . . well, even that depends on the skill of the one leading and the temperament of the horse itself. But say we actually get the horse to the water, there is no power outside of the God of the universe that can make that horse drink.

Sure, from the very beginning, we can (and in a lot of cases should) control many basic things. What they eat (sometimes). What they wear (well, if you want to get OCD about it). Who teaches our children and what they teach them. What movies they watch and what music they hear (for a while, anyway). We can control who they play with, when they get their driver's license, and maybe even where they go to college. Basically, we can control, to a certain extent, what goes in. We cannot control how it is perceived and how it is processed and how plays out in their lives. Yes, we can speak, guide, discipline, model, train (for some reason that word makes my skin crawl), but we can never truly control them because we can never control their heart.

That fact brings me great relief. I am not qualified to control my child's heart. I didn't create it, I don't keep it beating every second of every minute of every hour of every day. I am so thankful that the very Creator of my child's heart is the one who can work his will in it. Last I saw, I had not been given the title of Holy Spirit. I'll take the influencing and do the best I can, but I think I'll leave the controlling up to him.


  1. I totally agree. Which is why I have decided to let my kids have dessert before breakfast if they want. I can (and do) control how many treats come into the house with the groceries each week so there are some limiting factors. But, really, does it matter if they have dessert before breakfast or after dinner? If they are only eating one sweet thing a day, why does the time matter.

    So, yes, I agree with you. Except for one point. I am a stepmother. I am not evil. The ex-wife has malicious mother syndrome and has caused havoc for all involved, especially the kids. I have tried to give them a stable two-parent home to overcome her drama. Please edit your piece to remove the horrible generalization about stepmothers. Most stepmothers do more for the children than a non-stepmother could ever imagine. And it is hurtful when people lump us in with Big Brother.

    1. I am sorry for that thoughtless comment. I have removed the reference because you are so right. Please forgive me. I have removed the reference.