Stopping the Bad Stuff

A rural road is lined with a comical and confusing array of traffic signs, ranging from standard warnings to humorous and nonsensical ones, set against a backdrop of autumn foliage and overcast skies.

Parents typically spend a lot of time thinking about The Curve that could (or is) coming up in the road of their child's life. Parents think about:

• the upcoming change in schools

• the best friend who is moving away

• the demands of being on the travel team

• the divorce or the impending death

Parents who think about these curves in their child's life will often want to prevent / delay /avoid the curve. They see the warning signs. They know that bad stuff could happen. They suspect their kid might not Be Okay as they navigate the curve... or after the road straightens again.

This often prompts parents to call me. They want to know: "How do I make sure my child is okay.. or can manage... or can avoid... the Thing that is coming?" Some parents are absolutely insistent that they have enough brains / education / money / time / friends /sheer determination to change the trajectory of their child's road or, at the very least, carry their child through the curve on their own backs.

The truth is: parents can't stop the hard stuff from happening to their kid.

And the bigger truth is: they do their child a disservice by trying.

One of the most amazing and mesmerizing characteristics of children is their elasticity. They are natural at recovering. At bouncing-back. At re-trying. Watching a child learn to walk, it is amazing and exciting to see how many times they pull themselves up. And watching them start to run? Ahhhhh, this is where to find the joy of parenting. It's only us old fuddy-duddies who have trouble with resilience and have to stretch, sometimes mightily, to allow ourselves to recover and rise again. This is not the case for our kids.

So, what can a parent do as their child is barreling toward a curve in the road of their life... maybe on two wheels... or without a guardrail near the edge... ignoring all the warnings signs...? They can:

• make their child aware of the curve, in the most honest / transparent way possible

• share their own experiences of navigating similar curves

• take the time to talk through their child's plan for navigating the curve, offering observations of nuances that might be unseen

• breathe and lean into their adult partnerships, to manage their own stress

But the Most Important Thing a parent can do as their child is approaching a curve is to have unwavering, infallible, and very loudly-expressed faith in their child's ability to navigate the curve and return to a more predictable stretch of road. Parents' words are the voices in a child's head and the child needs to hear, repeatedly and often, that they will Be Okay in The End.

If you are the parent to a child who is approaching a curve in their life and you feel you simply must Do Something... give me a ring. If there are practical things that can change, I'll let you know. And, if this is a time for you to lean into faith, I've got your back there, too.