In the café the parents hovered around the child who was three or four years of age. They watched anxiously as he addressed a very enticing ice cream of many colours with his spoon. If he got ice cream on his chin it was dabbed off at once. They suggested he try some of the vanilla as well as some of the strawberry ice cream and made approving sounds as he dug into it. When he pointed to his mum’s ice cream she handed over. They looked stressed out as they tried to create the perfect experience for their child.
On the other side of the table sat two grandparents who stared at the child in admiration, as if they had never seen such a perfect child before, as if amazed that such a paragon could possibly exist. When the child finished his ice cream and commenced to run up and down, to the alarm of the waitress with her loaded trays, the parents made ineffectual efforts to persuade him to return to the table while the grandparents beamed.
It struck me at the time that I might as well have been watching Kim Jung Un surrounded by awe-struck generals.
But actually that is probably unfair. The child was just being a child and the parents were doing their best to be the perfect parents. I found myself wishing, though, that the grandparents would advise the parents not only that they didn’t need to be perfect but that perfection would not be doing the child a favour.
If he grows up with perfect or adoring parents, or as near to that state as they can get, how is he to handle a world that is rough and tumble at best and harsh and cruel at worst?
That’s the problem with perfect parents: they are not a representation of the real world. The concept of perfect parenting has, of course, changed over time. But many of the strict, disciplinarian parents of the past were also trying in their own way to be perfect. And sometimes perhaps they produced adults who found it too difficult to approach the world with the softness or gentleness that sometimes the world needs.
It also struck me that the two parents were so similar to each other in their demeanour that it was as though they had left their separate personalities behind them when they exited the maternity unit with their new baby.
But if the parents are at one on everything, how is the child to learn to handle the range of personalities he or she will encounter later in life?
When the parents differ, for instance one being easier to get around than the other, the child learns to play the, in my view valuable, life skill of playing one person off against another or at least learns how to turn one person’s no into another person’s yes. This applies whether the parents are living together or apart.
Of course we’re not talking here about extremes. You don’t want one parent sneaking off to smoke a joint with the child in order to sabotage the other parent’s no-drugs policy.
I’m just talking about differences that occur within the normal and reasonable range of human behaviour. If one parent lets the child stay up for an hour later than the other on an access visit, it’s hardly the end of the world. If one parent lets the child stay off school without good reason, then it’s a different matter.
Respect for the other partner and respect for the child’s needs has to underpin the differences between parents. But that must include not trying to give the child such a perfect upbringing that he or she is unable to face the real world.
My aim is not to suggest that parents go around obsessing about ways to be imperfect in the best possible manner for their child. It is more a suggestion that parents need to cut themselves some slack and to accept that, normally, being “just good enough” is good enough.
Padraig O'Morain (pomorain@yahoo.com) is accredited by the Irish Association for Counselling and Psychotherapy. His latest book is Mindfulness for Worriers. His daily mindfulness reminder is free by email.
pomorain@yahoo.com
Twitter: @PadraigOMorain
