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I didn’t have any experience growing up with how sons relate to their parents, so every behavior my son displays towards me is in the normal range as far as I know. Being a girl, I do know how I related to my parents growing up. I was a daddy’s little girl, until ‘womanhood’ hit, then both my parents were out to get me. Thankfully, those thoughts eventually went out the window.

Now as a young child, I remember some episodes of ‘running away’ from home because I was so mad at my mother. And yesterday, if she could have, my daughter would have ran away from our house. Only…we were in the van, she was buckled in, and so she had no choice but to cry and scream that she hated me for 20 minutes. After 20, she changed her tune, decided she loved me again, and then got upset because I was driving and didn’t stop to hug and kiss her.

She was tired, I wasn’t feeling very well, and the whole scene was ugly with me calling her a brat, explaining how that pertained to her, and then almost crying myself on the way home because I had hurt her spirit.

When we got home, we cuddled and hugged, kissed and made up, but I still felt like a shitty mother for the rest of the day. I wrestled with myself, it’s my job to be her parent, not her best friend. But she called me a big bully, and in reality, I was behaving like one. Verbally betting up a 4 year old. Go me. I suck. I didn’t want to live me either at the low point of the drive.

Things are calm, loving, and back to ‘normal’ today, and I know that scenes like yesterday don’t happen very often. But I hate that they happen at all. I fear her still feeling like I’m a bully when she’s an adult. Who wants to be the parent that the kids are bad mouthing with their friends, complaining that they are ‘understood’ or even worse ‘unloved’.

I know it’s not my job to be her best friend, it’s my job to be her mother. But being a mother isn’t being a bully. It’s not belittling someone by calling them names. There is nothing constructive about calling someone names or telling them what they are doing wrong without helping them change to do better. Some days are just tough, ya know?

Suz, if you read my blog in ten years from now, I love you. I love you more than you’ll ever know and I’m sorry about all the times I hurt you, criticized you, belittled you, or didn’t listen to you. I want nothing more for you to love and respect me when you are an adult as a mother who did her best, and to see my positives, with my faults, in a healthy balanced way. Not to resent me, hate me, or blame me.

Okay…you can blame me if I dress you funny, but not if it causes you not to have dates. I might have done that on purpose… Love you!