Creative Parenting

Amidst all the busyness of caring for two children, it’s important to find some time here and there for reflection. I’m the type of person who often likes things to be relatively predictable and manageable. Whenever I come across some problem or challenging circumstance that makes me feel like I’m not in control, I often go straight to doing research, reading, or searching of some formula or solution so that I can get my life back to being predictable and manageable again.

While it is important to bear in mind particular principles of parenting (more importantly, biblical principles), a lot of times, how to carry out that principle can be challenging. There isn’t always some method out there you can simply follow.

This came to me as I’ve been reflecting on Nathaniel’s strengths and weaknesses (one of the devotions I’ve been doing recommended that you take the time to do this for your child so that you can pray for them).

Ever since Nathaniel was able to play with toys on his own, one of his “weaknesses” is that he can’t take things “not working out,” or to put it more harshly—he doesn’t like to fail. When he was a baby, certain toys that he couldn’t manoeuvre would easily cause him to cry. Now that he’s two-years-old, this behaviour hasn’t improved. The other day, he was trying to carry some puzzle pieces across the room. He put them all in his hand, but clearly, his hands were too small to carry all of the pieces. Next thing you know, half the pieces fell onto the floor. Rather than picking them up, or figuring out some other way to get all the pieces across the room, he started bawling. (With a newborn to take care of now—this can become rather annoying.)

This week, I started to consider how I was supposed to modify this behaviour (other than improving his problem-solving skills). I reflected on what I personally was doing to cause him to behave this way. Then an insight came to me.

Every time Nathaniel gets a new toy, I teach him how to play it. Furthermore, I teach him how to play it properly. Recently, someone at church gave our family a gift. It was a set of three baskets that came with bean bags. Nathaniel didn’t know what he was supposed to do with it—and in that moment, I realized what I had to do. Like always, he watched me demonstrate to him how to play with the toy. I threw the bean bag toward the basket, but purposely missed. Then I cried out enthusiastically, “Missed!” Nathaniel was amused. I did this again and again and again, purposely missing the basket every time. Then finally, I threw the bean bag into the basket, and I shouted, “Yay! I got it!” Nathaniel began clapping. Then it was his turn. Of course, he missed every shot, but this time, he jumped up happily and imitated me, crying out “Missed!”

One more example. I was very fortunate that for the first 18 months of Nathaniel’s life, he would eat anything I gave him. Mothers were warning me, however, that once he hit the toddler stage, his pickiness for food would kick in. Sadly, they were right. For months, I, like other exasperated mothers, had to find different ways to get Nathaniel to eat the food he was supposed to. The baby who once would scarf down anything, no longer wanted to try new food. That was the frustrating thing—that he decided whether he was going to eat a particular food before even trying it—deeming it unappetizing by the texture or the colour.

Then an idea came to me a couple of months ago. I wanted to get Nathaniel curious about food. I wanted to get him to enjoy trying new foods (the food that was good for him, that is). I decided to take a trip to Costco in the afternoon. Around early evening, different food stations were always set up for customers to sample their products. So there I was, pushing Nathaniel in the shopping cart. I would stop at each food station, and go, “Mmmmmmmm... What’s that?” I’d take the sample, eat it slowly in front of him, watching to see if he was curious. Of course, he was. I’d let him take a nibble. He’d smile, indicating he wanted more. Then we were off to the next food station, and I did the same thing, until we visited every one.

Sometimes, the food stations served chocolate milk, sometimes salsa, sometimes sausages, sometimes chicken. It didn’t matter. My point that day wasn’t so that he would eat healthy. It was to let him see how much good stuff he was missing out on simply by rejecting any food he didn’t recognize or deemed “unappetizing.”

I followed through by beginning to do the same thing at home. While he was playing, I would go to the kitchen and get myself a “snack”—something he had never eaten before. I’d sit on the couch and start to eat the food, making sure he saw that I was eating, but not offering him any. It was only a matter of time before he came to me and asked if he could have some. “Have some?” Sometimes, I ate some tasty snacks, but sometimes, it was soup, or meat balls, or whatnot.

While toddlers are not at all consistent with their behaviour, Nathaniel has begun to eat well again. I’m happy that, even though he’ll reject his dinner at times, for the most part, he will finish it, or at least taste a bite before rejecting it.

This is where Creative Parenting comes in. It’s a product of prayer, patience, reflection, love for your children and a desire to nurture them in a way that best fits their unique temperament and character. One method may work on a child and not the other; nonetheless, it takes a lot of perseverance and thought to bring out the best from them. And when the methods I apply do happen to work, I have only God to thank. He is the one who instils in me the vision of what I want for my children. He is the one who encourages me to press on—and to enjoy the process along the way.

Relying on God's Strength

“I can do all things through him who strengthens me.” Philippians 4:13

It is day three of my going at this “mother of two” thing on my own. The husband returned to work on Monday. While I couldn’t ask for better circumstances (a son who can play quite independently, and a newborn who, so far, exhibits minimal crying), taking care of two has posed some new challenges.

I consider myself a rather patient person. When I just had Nathaniel to take care of, while he may have disobeyed me from time to time, whined here and there, and taken lifetimes to finish his meals—for the most part, I could deal with all that without losing my patience. With two, I have discovered, it is quite a different story.

You see, it is easy to have patience when you have time. These days, however, I have found myself raising my voice more often with Nathaniel, and feeling irritated by his dawdling (which, not too long ago, I found endearing). Much of the time, I catch myself in the act and I quickly try to regain my composure. As if being taken out of a trance, I smile at him or hug him or kiss him. I’ve been trying harder to make Nathaniel feel like “nothing much has changed.” For the past two years, day after day, it has been just he and I. Days of taking care of one is like going out to fine dining: you have all the time in the world to savour the gourmet food; with two, however, it has become more like going out for fast food—just when I’m done taking care of one child, I have to zip ahead and take care of the other.

There is only one point of the day, if I am fortunate, when I have some down time. When the two go down for their naps. If Jenuine was particularly demanding the night before, this time is for me to lie down and refuel before the two wake up and I have to go at it all over again. What I hope for, even in these initial weeks, is that I get just enough sleep the night before that I can use this time for more productive activities other than sleeping.

I have two big fears right now. First, as a new mother the second time around, I have this fear that I might squander the few free moments that I do have. I desperately do not want to. In fact, I’ve been praying hard that I don’t. I want to use my time well. I want to use my time for God. But it is so easy— so easy—not to. My second fear is related to the first. I don’t just want to be a mother or wife that just goes through the motions, fulfilling my obligatory tasks day after day. I want to be the mother that God wants me to be. I want to be able delight in my children when I need to, tend to their needs as I ought to, and discipline them when I must. But it is challenging to keep all these things in balance. One sleepless night, one cup of milk that smashes to the floor, one child being excessively whiny, and I can be off-balance again.

Which is why my second fear is tied to my first. I have to spend time with God, or rather, I need to spend time with God. I have to cease everything and do that—otherwise, I risk everything going off-kilter. The threat is very subtle, but it’s there. My response to my present fears, I realize, must therefore be an active one, not passive.

I’ve been re-reading D. Martyn Lloyd-Jones’s Spiritual Depression. In these quiet moments when the children are asleep, I find myself thirsting to be empowered. I skim through the books lining my bookshelves, and I am eager to find a book that’ll just “hit the spot”—that’ll lift me up so I can carry on from day to day, making each day matter in the grander scheme of things.

You see, with two children, I very often now see my life flashing before me. All I have to do is picture Nathaniel in high school, or Jenuine on her wedding day (God willing), and all of a sudden, I’m near the end of my life. And that’s when the apprehension stirs: I don’t want to get to that day and wonder to myself—as a mother and wife, what have I done with all that time? Did I make that time matter? Did I genuinely and wholeheartedly offer my entire and best self upon God’s altar so that His glory could be manifest? The thing is—His glory is not simply seen in the big and obvious things—it is found in the every day, starting from the children’s newborn days, minute after minute, hour after hour, year after year, until God decides that my job is done. And that, indeed, requires all the prayer I can muster.

An excerpt I read in Jones today was this:

The Christian life after all is a life, it is a power, it is an activity. That is the thing we so constantly tend to forget. It is not just a philosophy, it is not just a point of view, it is not just a teaching that we take up and try to put into practice. It is all that, but it is something infinitely more. The very essence of the Christian life, according to the New Testament teaching everywhere, is that it is a mighty power that enters into us; it is a life, if you like, that is pulsating in us. It is an activity, and an activity on the part of God.

I really like the analogy Jones gives in this particular sermon concerning an error that we Christians often make. He likens our situation to ways in which we seek to improve our health. The wrong way is to spend all our time and money going from spa to spa, treatment to treatment, physician to physician. We end up never getting well. The error is that we have forgotten the law of first principles. What we ought to be doing is eating better and exercising more. “Health is something that results from right living”—and this is the same for the “question of power in our Christian lives… In addition to our prayer for power and ability we must obey certain primary rules and laws…” We must go to Christ. We must spend our time with Him, meditate on Him, get to know Him. We must avoid what would rob us from all of that—just as we would from those things which rob us of our health.

Jones provides his own translation of Philippians 4:13: “I am strong for all things in the One who constantly infuses strength into me.” I like the word “infuse,” because that is precisely what I am thirsting for. That surge, that flood, that infusion of God’s power that enables me as a mother and wife to not simply go through the motions of such roles but to do it with the power of God pulsating in me.