iThink...thereFore, iAm

These are your child(ren) speaking, or at least some of us.

We want you to know that we love you very very much, and we know the lengths you have gone to take care of us. Shuttling us around, sending us for classes (even the ones we didn’t want to take - hey, after a while we have to admit that they did us some good, even if it wasn’t the good that either of us intended to happen), seeing us through school, taking us on holidays, and basically seeing us grow up.

That’s the hard part isn’t it - seeing us grow up. Because then you have to admit that there comes a time where what you think and what you say and what you feel isn’t law anymore. We think for ourselves and we decide for ourselves, when we’re grown up enough. And i’m sorry to say this but sometimes none of us, not even ourselves, decide when we grow up. It just happens. Sure, it happens over a period of time, but it just happens all the same.

So there comes a time where you cannot hope to shove your opinions down our throat as if that is the way things are supposed to be, you cannot hope to use “i’m your mother/father” as a logical end and irrefutable argument to a debate, you cannot tell us what we want to be, and you simply cannot dictate our lives. We have to grow on our own.

We say this partly out of frustration, because we know we will always be your little girls and boys and you will want to take care of us, but it simply doesn’t work that way anymore. The things your parents did to keep you in line (which we all deeply appreciate) may not be applicable anymore - society has changed and we have changed along with it, whether we or you like it or not. How things happen now is going to be vastly different from how things happened in the past.

Which isn’t to say we don’t respect you or honour you - you deserve more than just that out of a commandment. We do, or at least most of us do, with all our hearts. But all we ask is to live our own lives, make our own decisions. You can give us your input, but it’s nice also to hear a concluding reminder that we make the final choice. It’s even better to hear that you will support us in whatever way you can, no matter which choice we make. We know sometimes that will be hard, especially when you don’t approve. We know saying this might one day come back to bite us in our asses when we have our own children, but the principle is clear - the children one day have to grow up and live their/our own lives. One day we will have to decide on our own, and we need to live the life we were meant to live, not one that you fashion for us.

It sucks to hear that you feel disrepected because we want to be independent. It sucks for you to call us ungrateful when what we want, when being able to make decisions for ourselves, isn’t what you want for us. It sucks to be called a prodigal when all we wanted was some unconditional help within your means. It sucks the most to know that if we fall while we make our own choices you will leave us to get up on our own even when we need help - please don’t ever do that to us, and as we learn and have children of our own, we will never do that to our children.

Being a parent is a thankless job. We know. If we don’t know it now then we will, eventually. Forgive us - remember that you have a good 20-plus years of life ahead of us, and don’t expect us to operate in your generation, at your capabilities and at your level. Each generation has its own, just as you had yours.

Love us for what we are, what we hope to be. Discipline us and mold us if you will, but do it lovingly so that we don’t hate you and we learn the lessons properly. Yes, being a parent is a thankless job, but we ask you to be a parent to us - also so that we know how to be parents to our children and perhaps experience the same thanklessness you do now.

For that, we will be thankful.

We love you mom and dad. Don’t give up on us.

Sincerely,
Your children