I made brownies. I’m not a huge baker or dessert person, so for my family it felt like a big deal.
After dinner, kids kept popping into the kitchen asking if they could have a brownie yet. When I said, “not until dinner’s been cleaned up and put away,” they’d disappear into another room and reappear three minutes later and the whole process would repeat itself.
And suddenly I realized – not one child had offered to help me so we could get to dessert earlier.
My kids aren’t entitled. They set the table, they clear the table, they do their own laundry, they scrub toilets. But this was an eye opener and an opportunity for another lesson.
So I told them that they weren’t getting dessert. They could have a brownie tomorrow, but not tonight. Because instead of offering to help me clean up, they just watched TV and kept groaning every time they had to wait longer. They failed to think about anyone other than themselves.
Obviously, they weren’t thrilled. One kid stormed off to her room.
But I didn’t do it because I was mad. Or even annoyed. Frankly, I was just disappointed that my kids were being so selfish so I took the opportunity to teach them a lesson I hope they’ll remember. Because, contrary to what they believed in the moment, learning a character-building lesson when the only thing at stake is a brownie is a whole lot easier than learning it when the stakes are higher.
So for the next fifteen minutes I sat on the couch and listened to my daughter scream in the other room while reminding myself that parenting well sometimes means making unpopular decisions and having your kids be unhappy with you. But can I tell you something else? I also spent that time second-guessing my decision.
Was I too harsh?
Is it unfair that I didn’t give them a warning?
Should I have asked them to help me?
Am I causing them to develop an unhealthy relationship with food?
Later, when I went to bed, I fell asleep praying. “God, please help me know if I did the right thing. Show me how to handle this in the future. If I messed up, tell me how to make it right with my kids.” And the next morning I asked my husband, “Was that too harsh? Was I out of line?”
Being strict and following through doesn’t mean you’re always harsh and rigid. Good parenting means admitting that we don’t have all the answers, seeking wisdom about how to parent our kids well, and realizing that we’re raising eventual adults.
It also means separating our own feelings from our children’s actions and reactions. Yes, they may make us angry or frustrated, but bringing that emotion into discipline only escalates the situation and confuses the behavior correction.
I checked on my daughter in the midst of her wailing. “Do you want mama, or do you want privacy?” {Spoiler alert: She wanted a brownie.} But eventually she wanted me to snuggle with her, then she came out into the living room and we played a game as a family and we even joked about the brownie situation.
Parenting didn’t ruin our evening. It just took it on a little detour.
Throughout the rest of the week I still joked about the brownies. And my comments were met with sheepish smirks and eye-rolls and even a chuckle or two. I reminded my kids that my goal is to raise adults, not selfish jerks, and that I think they learned a lesson they’ll remember.
And maybe next time I make dessert they’ll help me clean up after dinner.
You Can’t Parent with Grace If You Don’t Regularly Enforce Consequences, Too
