Sticking to it

As a child when things get hard we are always told to stick with it and it will get better, like sports or math. It can also be true for illnesses, stick with these antibiotics and you will get better. But like antibiotics if you fail to take the whole dose what you could get is a nasty drug resistant strain of disease. The same can be true for parenting, if you don't stick with your rules then you are prone to raise a child that doesn't respect them. Yesterday a rule was broken in our house which has a pretty strict penalty. I could go through it blow by blow but in respect to the rule breaker who could read this later in life I will decline. I will relate the important bits. The rule in our house is that if you throw something in anger it gets thrown out. Yesterday a very special pair of light up shoes was thrown and because of that action the shoes were thrown in the trash. I would definitely rank this as one of my most difficult parenting moments. There are times in life when you almost think the battle isn't worth the war. Yesterday I found myself snapping in response to the breaking of the rule, however the fallout was intense. I find sometimes that parenting is difficult but by sticking to rules it will make both my children and myself stronger. The realization that actions cause reactions is not only handy for physics but also for real life. I think I impressed a friend yesterday by sicking to our consequence but I impressed myself by believing this is an effective way to parent. This morning I received an unsolicited apology, I also got one last night, and a request to buy new shoes with a gift card on vacation. In that moment I felt I made the right decision. It is our job as parents to raise the best kids we can, yesterday I suppose was the hard part of doing just that.