Children are annoying most of the time, before they truly adapt to our life style. Of course they give that big eyed look and that smile which lights up the entire house, but when they start screaming they simply stretch your nerves until you often snap. I know a lot of mothers who just cry in the closet until their child’s crisis pass, feeling useless, or others who just can’t take it and scream back. You cannot restrain yourself from raising your voice at them once in a while and although you regret it the minute after, it doesn’t really matter because the harm was done. I am no angel, I tend to raise my voice at my daughter when I see that she is trying to test my limits and find better ways to manipulate me, because whether you believe it or not, they do try to manipulate us all the time and they do it very well (why do you think they have that cute face). Of course the minute my voice is raised I can see the surprised look on her face and I melt instantly into regret. Today I tried to see her point of view. As adults, we often put ourselves in other people’s shoes to try and understand them better and I realized we almost never do that with our children even if we think we do. So, let me tell you a story and maybe help you see their point of view.
On a beautiful spring day the giants invaded our world. They were everywhere and people were panicking and screaming on the streets. They pretended they didn’t want to hurt us, but try and help us adapt to a better world, a new world, their world. We all got along for a while and a beautiful bond was being created; they made lovely new houses for us, bought us new and interesting things to explore and watched over us so that we would be safe. As the time passed, the giants started to get on with their daily routine, the routine they had before invading our world. It started to be more and more difficult for them to accept that we were a never-ending presence in their lives, so they began to use the word “no” a lot when talking to us. We adjusted to that too but not without a serious protest first (but they were giants so they knew better, right?). Sometimes we would be in their way and they were getting frustrated just for having to avoid stepping on us, on the streets, whenever our paths crossed. We weren’t terrified of them anymore because they had created this sense of security that no one and nothing would harm us, least of all one of them. One day, there was a big celebration going on in this huge park. There were both giants and people participating, having fun, dancing, laughing, talking. All of a sudden, one of us little people, started running all over the place and laughing loudly. One of his giant friends told him “No, you can’t do that, you might get hurt!”, but he didn’t care and continued running and laughing. His giant friend became frustrated out of fear that something could happen to his little friend, so he grabbed his little hand and started yelling at him the same sentence as before, as if he had been deaf the first time. The man stopped, paralyzed of fear and couldn’t understand why he was being yelled at. His good friend the giant, the friend that protected him all this time, that made his life easier and taught him all those new things, was now scary and turned into a monster.
I think that is the image that children see when we yell at them and force them to adapt, out of fear that something bad might happen to them. I think that whenever they drive us crazy, we should think of ourselves as Gulliver in Lilliput and maybe reconsider their feelings and the fact that we can destroy their trust in us in just a split second.
