Falling off that pedestal

[Anonymous]

As a kid I fell off the pedestal my parents had hoped for. It was a hard fall on all of us. By many accounts of fallen children mine was really more of a scratch not a fall, but those pedestals are big and when you fall you only go down.

When I was a young adult my parents fell off their pedestals. They didn’t have the same issues as your family, but my vision of them changed dramatically. I had anger at my mom for years. It was all I let myself see, and we had been close, but I let some human temper moments erase the good.

Now my husband and I have fallen off our oldest daughters pedestal. And it’s more like yours. And it hurts. I explain this not to lessen your pain, but to let you know it happens in the best of families. It’s all related to expectations. It happens in LDS families and non-LDS families. The advice of just keep trying really is best. I look back at the anger I had against my mom and I now see a different me. Yes her failings were real, but so were her successes. I still model so much of her just by coincidence of being part of her life.

As humans we all can make fantastic lists of what went wrong, what we didn’t get, what we feel robbed or cheated of – the challenge is to look for or not forget the good. Maybe you should begin to remember and to share vocally all the good memories you share with your kids, things you’ve done together, places you have visited, start turning the conversation. Don’t mention your fall or the knowledge you have, be the leader and loudly count the blessings, compliment their smallest deeds each day. You will plant seeds of healing.

[Anonymous]

SilentDawning wrote:

Falling off this pedestal really hurt. It was a long fall for me. Still not over it. The comments here help. I felt angry at first as it was sort of a key part of the relationship– at least, a major part of it to me. To be told your advice may not matter anymore, is tough to swallow.

SD, I can see how that could be painful. I guess one positive (possibly) that you can take from this is the fact that the advice and wisdom that you’ve already given your children has allowed them to start putting it into practice on their own. I think the fact that they’re starting to experiment with independent decision-making means that you’ve done your job well. Now, you get to see how they do with putting your advice into practice, and be prepared to catch them if they fall, or support them when they come back and need some more of that fatherly advice. You’ve been teaching them how to ride the bike. Now they’re starting to get their balance and pedal for themselves. They’ll still have a couple of falls, and they’ll appreciate when you’re there to pick them up, dust off their scraped knees, and help them get back on the bike to give it another go. Good luck! :clap:

[Anonymous]

Yep…I’ve been trying to figure out what to say and how to handle it.

I think I’m going to go in to my child, and have an open conversation about what happened, that I accept the independence of my advice, and share the moment my Dad fell of his fountain of knowledge pedestal when I was a budding adult. I still remember when it happened, where I was, what he said, and how I shared it with my minister I was meeting with at the time.

I also intend to share the need for all people to brace themselves for that moment when they are no longer a super hero to someone who is growing up. I also want to describe some parameters on the limits of my ability to make a save. That’s the price of taking your own advice.

[Anonymous]

SD you said,

Quote:

…I accept the independence of my advice, and share the moment my Dad fell of his fountain of knowledge pedestal when I was a budding adult.

I am curious how this moment of honesty with your Dad changed your relationship with him.

I would suspect that, over time, you developed a closer relationship. (I don’t want to put words in your mouth.)

My sons are about 40. They became aware of my fall from the pedestal, about the time they went to college.

Today I believe that we are closer because of the process of becoming more honest. Plus, they became Husbands & Fathers.

That makes a big difference too.

[Anonymous]

Minyan Man wrote:

SD you said,

Quote:

I am curious how this moment of honesty with your Dad changed your relationship with him.

I would suspect that, over time, you developed a closer relationship. (I don’t want to put words in your mouth.)

I don’t believe he ever knew that he fell off the pedestal. I told the minister what I was seeing at the time about his weaknesses and he said “Isn’t it stirring when you learn your parents aren’t perfect?”. It was a good, neutral comment. I don’t think I ever told my Dad. Now, from the lens of a mature adult, I don’t see the thing he did as all that bad. Maybe not stellar, but something I understand him doing given the stress he was under (he was forced out of a business in which he was a shareholder, and criticized the main business partner to a few business clients on the phone — he was in sales. It must have been very stressful at the time with no income and starting a new business from the ground up).

As I got older, I did once openly criticize both my non-member parents against the ideal standard of what I THOUGHT LDS parents did — based on what I heard about at church. I compared them to the image of parenthood and family the church portrays, which I now believe to be idealized. I have since learned that what we hear about at church — FHE, undying love between parents, never a fight or a raised voice, constant harmony — it’s not like that for all families — probably, for many LDS families. And that my parents did a decent job – I emerged with values, chastity, with a sensitive nature to others feelings, with a good heart, a service orientation, ambition, faith in God, spirituality,a hardworking nature — enough that I identified with Mormons as a young adult and joined the church. My brothers and sisters and myself all went on to have responsible careers in medicine, business, education etcetera. They did a good job, in spite of no family home evening, no scripture reading, etcetera.

[Anonymous]

SilentDawning wrote:

And how do you as parents cope with the knowledge that your children see you as you really are, and not as the pedestal occupying figure you once were?

I don’t think that children see parents as they really are. I think children see parents more clearly as the years pass, transitions are made, and the children become parents themselves. I think the pedestal part is a part of the innocence of childhood that gets rubbed off at some point.

I think that the goal is from day 1 to have a relationship with your child that can expand into a relationship with your adult child. I think this includes treating them with the respect you would treat your adult friends as much possible when you are interacting in non-parent instruction interactions. I think this means building your view of your child as a person who needs age-appropriate guidance and support, rather than a child who with guidance and support will become a person.

Example: I have a mentally handicapped sister who was given the assignment to sweep the kitchen floor (she was about 10 at the time). When she was done, she came and asked my father to inspect it and sign off on it. I wandered along and saw everything she had missed. My father gravely praised the spots that she had gotten right the way that a respected peer would review work when requested. He pointed out a few obvious spots she had missed, and requested she redo her efforts. As we wandered off, I asked him about it, specifically why he had “let” her get away with missing some of the work. He pointed out that he was working with her to help her do the best job she could – and that he saw her as an adult-in-training rather than a child and treated her accordingly. Some of the issues I had with my mother were because I became an “adult” in areas before her internal “child” calendar said I should, so on some levels there were power struggles over my independence. NOTE: I was not trying to assert my independence in the traditional WoW or LoC ways, I think I just wanted authorization to think differently about things, and have my opinion treated with the respect you would treat a peer’s opinion rather than a child’s opinion.)

[Anonymous]

I came to the realization the other day that my father (who I have looked up to for years) is more of a fundamentalist Mormon then I had figured. Growing up, he had always known and told us that he was not a conventional Mormon, and we were not a conventional Mormon family. That was helpful growing up because it made it easier to just be ourselves, and not expect to conform to the Mormon society (in southern California – we wouldn’t have made it in Utah). In terms of doctrine, I thought that my views and my father’s were similar enough that we were on the same side of the spectrum – but now I know that on a variety of issues, we are on opposite sides of the spectrum.

It was just eerie, because through the years I have seen my siblings disagree with my father over random things and principles (they are much younger than I am) and now I understand what they were experiencing. I finally get it.

I know how to handle the situation, and I can always go back and re-read the threads on loving family with differing beliefs – I just never thought it would apply to my dad. I am surprised, a little sad, and feel both a little wiser and a little more foolish at the same time.

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