Praying Before Parenting

I have often struggled with parenting my children. For the first few years, I always doubted myself and felt like a bad mother; it didn't help that everyone had unsolicited advice to share with me that was generally the opposite of what felt right for me to do.

Thankfully, I am now passed all of that, but parenthood, particularly motherhood of the stay-at-home variety, is always a struggle; everything from teaching our children to disciplining them is a daily concern.

I frequently feel like I'm yelling at my boys, or calmly scolding, or shooting a disapproving look their way

"Don't jump on the couch!"
"Don't push your brother!"
"Sit down right now!"
"Stop slamming the doors!"
"If you do that one more time, I will put you in time out!"

It's tiresome, and it doesn't feel very good at all. Plus, it never seems to work.

Sylvia over at Adventures of an Orthodox Mom recently posted a wonderful blog entry that dealt with praying before parenting our children.

Pray and then speak. That's what to do with your children. If you are constantly lecturing them, you'll become tiresome and when they grow up they'll feel a kind of oppression. Prefer prayer and speak to them through prayer. Speakto God and God will speak to their hearts.That is, you shouldn't give guidance to your children with a voice that they hear with their ears. You may do this too, but above all you should speak to God about your children. Say, "Lord Jesus Christ, give Your light to my children. I entrust them to You. You gave them to me, but I am weak and unable to guide them, so, please illuminate them." And God will speak to them and they will say to themselves, "Oh dear, I shouldn't have upset Mummy by doing that!"And with the grace of God this will come from their heart."

This post gave me some real food for thought, and I posted a comment about that on her blog. I said that I would give this a try the next time the opportunity should arise, and I knew it would happen soon.

Yesterday as I cleaned the kitchen, I heard the boys playing together. They were behaving themselves quite well, chasing each other and laughing, hiding in the bedroom, and then popping out at the other and laughing. It was adorable until the game included slamming the bedroom door. Not only is the sound a little on the irritating side, but it's not safe to slam doors. In fact, my younger sister is missing the tip of her pinky finger because it was in the hindges of the door when I slammed it while we were playing as young children.

Not wanting the boys to get hurt, and also the desire to spare my ears another SLAM, I went to their room to stop this nonsense.

Usually, that would be, "Do not slam this door. Do not play with this door. It is not a toy!"

Instead, however, I tried this:

1. Deep breath.
2. Thoughts of God, and asking for God's guidance.
3. Without another thought, down at eye level with each child and explaining calmly that they shouldn't play with the door because they could get hurt.

When I finished explaining to my 20 month old, he said a new word to me! He signed and said, "Please" - it actually came out "eees", but I knew what he was saying because he signed it as well. I was so excited, but I kept my excitement low and smiled and told him, "Thank you for asking so nicely, but the answer is still no, because you could get hurt."

With that, he huffed at me and walked away disappointed and upset. But, they stopped playing with the door! :)

Success! Naturally, success with the blessings and guidance of God!