That Was a Good Thing

I was on Tik Toc the other day and I saw this awesome bit of advice that I wanted to share with everyone. I went back to find it and I couldn’t… darn it! So I will do my best to retell it myself.

As you know I’m struggling as a human but more specifically as a mom. So here it goes.

This child/adolescent therapist said she learned this not in her clinic or in the all her years of schooling or from her colleagues, she learned this gem from her dog.🐕‍🦺

When your dog sees you as you get home they lavish you with hugs and kisses. They miss you and love you. Your dog thinks you are the very best thing on earth. They miss you to pieces even if they just saw you! Every time you walk into a room your dog is overly happy to see you and loves you more than life.

When your child comes into a room you need to do the same. You need to get up and notice them, love them and make sure they know without a single doubt that they are the very best thing you have ever seen in your life. You love them to pieces and believe in them! When you do this it helps them to know worthiness so much that they don’t focus on the parts of themselves that they struggle with. Your love gives them confidence, strength, and kindness and grows them into the beautiful people you always knew them to be.

This is so important because when they become teenagers they turn into cats🐈. We all know about cats… They can be moody and can be loners at times… either way, they aren’t dogs. So if we don’t act like dogs loving on our kids when they are small and try to do it once they can become cats… Well… dogs scare cats.

Reflection:

In my family, we LOVE on our kids… lots of hugs, lots of “I love yous”. It’s like we are trying to make up for not getting enough when we were kids. Both my husband and I know we try hard to make up for our parent’s mistakes.

I think this is what happened between my Mom and me. She did not hug me and wasn’t protective or caring, she never stood up for me, and I don’t even remember her saying that she loved me as a kid. Yes, later in life she said it through tears… and I do believe she does love me. She hugs me now when I see her and I think she is a different person in a lot of ways now… Time and reflection do things to all of us.

I will say it felt awkward and uncomfortable to see her so emotional. Having her hug me and say she loves me. At this point, I was an adult and was 100% the cat being hugged by the dog… It was odd. I wasn’t wanting to be hugged, or loved on now… it was too late. I didn’t feel normal. It was never like I didn’t love her but I never knew her to be like this so it wasn’t natural. It was weird and it still is.

Now my Dad was different because even though he was much more aggressive toward me and plain scary at times, he was always, loving too. He said “I love you” often, and was very protective. He stood up for me so many times, I always knew I could count on him. I knew that he loved me even when he was mean to me. He showed me care, hugged me, and took care of me. So even when he was ugly and mean as much as it hurt and was confusing to me, especially as a child it was alien to me to get a hug and be told I was loved. I knew I was… it was strange love sometimes but I know he was frustrated often and even unhappy a lot. I gave him an out for his bad behavior.

As for my Mom, she just was a kid when she became mom, a selfish kid who wanted whatever she wanted. She wasn’t ready to be a Mom and when real life happen to her she did not handle it well and it affected us all badly. I was the oldest so I remember things my sisters do not. I do believe she should have had professional help but never got it. It was the 80’s after all. Honestly, she is not one that believes in therapy so I doubt she’d go then or now.

She never felt like a Mom to me but more like a Teenage high school mean girl… a mean girl that lived with me. She was someone I had trouble getting away from, her mean-girl tactics were a threat to me all the time. She used my Dad as her punisher to get back at me and my sister to get her way, to cause division in our house. She would compete with me and tried to squeeze into my clothes to show off. I didn’t view her as a mom so it was hard to respect her as a one.

I know that all sounds terrible. It’s true though and it makes sense. It makes sense that this is why I would have a hard time and it would be an uncounterable time with her trying to mother me once I was a young adult. Even then she went back and forth from time to time… I like you… I don’t like you.

We are fine now for the most part. I think once I become a mom everything changes for me. I knew I wouldn’t be perfect. I knew I would mess up, both as a parent and a mom but I wanted to make sure I practice saying “I’m sorry, I was wrong”, and always love on my family from day one. It’s us first always. When I did this I knew I wanted to be different in the best way. I had to do better. I don’t want to kick anyone out of our life unless it’s for safety. Forgiveness and moving on at my pace, within my boundaries, and understanding that life wasn’t great for my mom either. She didn’t get help and she needed it. But I can’t live in past… but still… we are who we are because of our environment.

SK❣️