"You want to DRUG your child??"

I remember those days when I had to bridle my response to overt crass judgment against my most sacred call: to parent my children. The asking of that question uncovers a belief that 1) My child raising skills are nonexistent. 2) I’m too lazy to exert the effort necessary to train my children. 3) In response, my shallowness and poor character entice me to drug my children as a poor substitute for parenting. After all, my children aren’t like YOURS.

That’s right. My children aren’t like yours, and I have come to understand that your judgment is a poorer reflection on you than it could ever be on me. Parenting MY children takes 500 of my loving, consistent corrections for my child to make the connection, whereas your child needs only 3. My child has brain chemistry challenges and yours does not. As much as you loathe my child’s behavior, my child loathes him or herself all that much more.

My purpose in writing is to bring hope, humor and insight into the process of raising children who are different, necessitating that the parents also be different. I’m very different, more different than I would have ever been without the gift of my challenging children. I just might have thought that my children turned out so great because I did it right. Now, I know better. My children are so great because of who they are.