Quality time with your children
August 2nd, 2008 / 8 Comments
“Mom, what can I have for breakfast?”
I yell from in front of the comfort of my computer screen: “There’s cereal. You can get it yourself.”
My 12-year-old is certainly old enough to get her own breakfast, why should I disturb my ease?
But there were nagging questions going on in my head:
1. Do I want to answer email or spend time with my daughter?
2. Is this one of those precious moments I can grasp to be with my daughter?
3. Can’t I answer email later?
4. Have I been too preoccupied to spend time with my daughter?
5. Am I just being lazy and don’t want to move from my chair?
6. How can I have a parenting site and not do some real parenting at home??
So I got off my bottom, got myself to the kitchen. “Hey, let’s have cereal together, girl.”
Photo by lanuiop
Comments
You did the right thing… too many people pass on spending time with their kids.
Beautiful! Thank God He deals with these areas with love and patience and His wisdom so that as parents, we can follow His lead. Thanks for sharing. This blessed me greatly.
Don’t have a 12 year old or a daughter. However, knowing the awkwardness of the age, sounds to me like she was reaching out to spend time with you but didn’t want to appear too direct. In my book, you made the right decision.
Thanks for the encouragement, everyone. Kids don’t often verbalize their needs, but I am sure as with everyone, love = time.
It is so, so hard. It is probably the number one thing I struggle with. My wife and I run a pre-school where both of our children attend. We are with them seven days a week, and yet whenever I want a moment to myself and I hear them chirping for my attention in the background, I feel bad if I ignore them. Yes, I know that I shouldn’t spoil them with overindulgent attention either, and I don’t (or at least I try not to), but I ALWAYS feel guilty.
Writer Dad: You are brave to be around children all day AND night! A little bit of guilt keeps us on our toes…But don’t feel guilty if you go play golf once a week or something
Spending time with your children is a very great thing to do.When children are young, we tend to want to spend our time with our parents and tell them things to impress them.Even if you dont care about the topic, its still good if you’re pretending to be intrested.As i’ve read in a post before, forgot where, children want to tell you things and if you make them wait till later they wont feel like telling you anymore.Really you can check your e-mail later cause your child should be first.Now to contradict myself, if your childs doing something, dont try spend time with him/her.Say if i was on my computer and my mum came in to spend time with me, i wouldnt want her to.I’d rather play the game by myself then talk about it to my mum.Sometimes the child wants you round, sometimes he/she doesnt.Really, its all in the timing.Your child will come to you when he/she wants you to spend time with him/her so wait for that time to come.
-JY
JY: You are right, and I think you read that on one of my other posts here.
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