My husband and are always fighting about the kids. He says I never listen to him on parenting but why should I when the things he says are ridiculous! If it were up to him even our boys would be pregnant and all three of the kids would have flunked out and be in jail. How can I get him to understand that I’m not going to listen to stupid ideas but I would really appreciate it if he would come up with some good ones because I’m really tired of doing all of this myself?
signed,
Married Single Mother
Dear Married,
Wow. You are busy. I could see why you would be wanting a slave. And that’s of course what your husband would be if he was raising his kids according to your strict personal guidelines, thereby ignoring the value of his own wisdom and experience, and whatever his parents taught him about parenting.
Look, I’m sorry to be blunt, but I had to rewrite your question just to tame it down for public consumption. Simply put: talking about your husband in those terms is unkind, unreasonable, unloving and most certainly unhealthy for your marriage.
I’m sure you’re an able and dedicated parent and that you live your life always intending to do the best you can. But it is arrogant for any of us to assume we have a personal monopoly on all of the good ideas in any field of human endeavour, including parenting.
What you’ve done by describing things as you did, is that you’re doing to your husband at home, what some men still do to women in the workplace. You’re suggesting he doesn’t deserve to be ‘there’ (a co-parent) just because you disagree with him.
I’ve done what I do a long time, and I’ve been asking questions and analyzing people since my accident at five years old. It is common for kids to list their fathers as their favoured caregivers because they feel the dad’s are the ones who trust them, because they feel the dad’s are generally more open to mistakes. You see his willingness to let them make those mistakes as a failure to parent.
But if that really is a failure to parent, then that leaves your kids on eggshells, fearful that anything short of perfection will be met with the same anger that was in your original ‘question’ to me. If it’s your husband’s job to prevent all mistakes then how will the children ever learn to calculate and manage consequences as adults?
This is all done because you love your kids, but you should think about taking a step back. By the very provocative and aggressive way you phrased your question, I’m able to tell that if your kids hear talk like that, you’ll be likely to come across to them as a tyrant. Meanwhile, your husband would then be seen as a wise man deserving of pity, and they’ll know he has good lessons regarding how to stay out of trouble.
Let’s talk about listening since that’s what your husband asked you to do more of. Listening is not just hearing someone and then comparing the shape of their thoughts to the shape of your thoughts and then telling them ‘yes’ if the shapes are the same or ‘no’ if they are different. You’re not here to judge anyone (yourself included).
As I often point out to couples arguing over parenting, the person each of you is arguing with is the one person you chose to have children with out of a possible 3.5 billion other candidates. Surely that person’s as trustworthy as a $25 a night babysitter. You did choose to attach yourselves to each other for life. So maybe if you had that much confidence you could also believe that they might know a thing or two about how to deal with other human beings they deeply care about?
You each have a lot of life experience. You’re both worth listening to. And real listening is when you take another person’s ideas seriously. You listen for what the objectives are, the potential, the challenges and the rewards. And then you weigh that and decide whether or not to act based on your results, not just on an initial rejection based on the fact that the idea doesn’t line up with your preconceived notions of how things “should” be.
Your opinion should be a flexible thing based on experience. Therefore you can’t reject things because they don’t align with your current opinion. Otherwise you would never have any experiences with the potential to change or broaden that opinion. If you don’t allow different and challenging ideas, you’re essentially saying that you’ve prevented yourself from growing through experience.
When you’re with him, don’t just hear the words and then spew back your pre-recorded answer. Actually engage with what the other person is saying. Take it seriously. Do thought experiments with it. Truly wonder if it could work. And if you’re unsure, feel free to test it. But you can’t say you respect someone if you won’t even try something that they are strongly recommending as being good parenting.
Surely you both know that you feel the same way about your kids? They’re like extensions of yourselves. No parent has a monopoly on the feelings of love or protectiveness that accompanies having children. Both care deeply, and all advice comes from that place, no matter how much it might clash with your current beliefs.
Your spouse should be the (or one of the) most respected advisers in your life. And because you’re married, you will already align on most things. But the stronger your disagreement, the greater the difference of opinion. So those are the cases in which both parties should be most prudent. Because if there’s enough to worry about that you’re going to actually get angry, then the price is high enough that it’s worth it to tread carefully and ensure we’re making the wisest decisions.
Our partner’s lives are deeply intertwined with our own. It therefore behooves us to take their thoughts into serious account. And to do that we really must learn to quiet our own judgmental inner voice and instead just focus on carefully listening to the wisdom that is being so lovingly offered to us.
Try to stop busying your mind by thinking of replies or opinions while your husband is are still talking. Just listen instead. Listen as an activity unto itself. Do this and you’ll be surprised at how much you’ve been missing, and how helpful it will be to your relationships with your husband and your kids. And since you appear to be feeling overwhelmed, that extra level of connection should prove quite valuable.
Listen carefully. Enjoy your days.
peace. s
