I have already needed your forgiveness more times than I can count and your ages combined are barely double digits. So far, you have obliged without any begging or pushing or crying. You are just children, so you have yet to learn pride or resentment, which is what keeps us from forgiveness the older we get. I just say sorry, and you hug me and tell me that it is okay. I don't want to think that this will ever end. I have learned the beauty of true forgiveness and I hope I teach and pass it onto you as wholly as it is instilled in me. But, I am a realist. I know there will be a time when something I do, or do not do, or decide for you will offend or hurt you. I would like to think it will always be in love and that my choices concerning you will always be about your well being...but I am only human, and expect to make mistakes. Sometimes, especially as parents, we make big ones. I have a few big ones under my belt so far- things that I will think about and wish to undo probably for the rest of my life. I know there will be more. I know that my best may not always be good enough for the two of you. My best, at times, may shortchange you greatly. For this, I am sorry. For this I will need your patience, understanding and forgiveness. In my hopes and dreams neither of you are ever on a plush sofa in the office of a therapist, angry and hurt and broken because of me. We do not have strained relationships where you dread being around me or having to deal with anything concerning me. In my dreams you come over for dinner on random week nights because you want to see me. You call me to talk about nothing for hours just because we are friends. In order for these dreams to come true, I will need your forgiveness. Lots of it.
I love you both with every last bit of me,
Mom
I have discussed a similar sentiment many times, with many parents. The truth of the matter, as I see it, is that when your children are grown, they will believe that you parented them wrong. It might be just one thing, or a few things, or a hundred things. Nearly every adult alive today believes that they were parented incorrectly and they try to change it in their own parenting styles. Your kids will believe that in some way, you screwed them up. It's the nature of the beast. Once we accept this fact, things become a whole lot easier. Most parents do the best that they can, in the moment, with the tools and resources that they have available to them. We all make mistakes and the beauty of family is that, in the end, love offers forgiveness.
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