Less Is Best--lowering your standards

In this picture, David and Laura look to be exactly the ages they were when I was twenty-nine, at the time I had my surgery. They’re sitting in a chair at Dot and Bill’s house, Phil’s parents who stayed with us and took care of them for the ten days I was in the hospital and for five weeks after. Had it not been for them I’m not sure how we could have survived. 

Bill was a hospital administrator and Dot a housewife, so they were available almost any time we called, and we did often.  They lived two and one-half hours away—always were willing to drop everything, come to our house or let us stay the weekend with them, or longer. They kept the kids when we wanted to go on vacation, or just get away for the weekend when the kids got older. 

It was in Sturgis, where they lived, that I wrote He Has Made Me What I Am. I knew I needed uninterrupted time and that Dot would take care of the kids royally. I wrote the entire series of thirteen lessons in one weekend. 

Never did I ever have to worry if they were being taken care of. Her care always surpassed mine. I never had that motherly instinct that supposedly every mother is born with. I've only heard one other mother say that she wasn't born with one either. I guess Dot was born with both of ours.

Laura developed a very close relationship with Dot because she was always there for her, giving her her undivided attention when I could not. Regretfully I was so focused inward that nothing else seemed to matter around me. 

I have minimal memories of Laura’s childhood, especially the very early years. Knowing little, but some, about emotional detachment, I would say we qualified. I explicitly remember the night terrors that would come years later.

Dot is now widowed twice and lives within two miles of us. Laura, now twenty-nine (the age I was when I had the surgery) spends as much time with her as she can.  You can see the closeness between them; it’s quite obvious. 

With Dot and Alton (whom Dot married after Bill died) was one place Laura lived when I insisted she moves out when she was in college. She was living at home, I was speaking nationwide and our values did not mesh. I made a wrong decision I painfully regret it now.  (If I could take it back I would.) In some of the most difficult years Dot was there, even then.

David has told me he has very few memories of me actually spanking him, which is great, but I do. One of the few memories he does have, however, is extremely funny, looking back; it was not at all then. I was getting ready to spank him in the bathroom and as he was backing up to get away from me, he stepped inside the commode. Oh, how I wish I had had a sense of humor! What a laugh we could have had. I’m sure the spanking would have fallen by the wayside.

I mention all of this to say, children are resilient. If you’re suffering from depression, or some other mental illness, or your life is just a mess right now, you’re probably doing the very best you can. Don’t be too hard on yourself. There was a time when I considered a successful day just getting to the end of it alive. Remember? Supposedly, children will even put up with abuse just to be with their parents.  

Even though David and Laura are very different, they both learned something from my illness, each in their very own way. 

David says he is determined not to be an angry parent and make the same mistakes I did. He is a very patient, loving, active, caring father – everything I wasn’t. 

Laura is now a mental health counselor, working with children from grade school through high school. She has first-hand experience with dealing with adversity, though not nearly to the degree she sees daily.

God can take a very bad situation and make something very good come out of it.

Ultimately how did I become a better parent? Basically, I lowered my standards. When I have said that’s what I did, some have said that’s unacceptable. God doesn’t think so. 

Look at why my standards were so high and what God thinks about lowering them.

1) I was rarely praised and felt like I was never ever going to be good enough. My dad had been a very strict disciplinarian, believing praise would go to a person’s head. 

“Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.” Romans 8:1 NIV

2) The only form of discipline I’d ever known was spanking. I honestly didn’t know any other. I remember being spanked frequently, which may be a wrong perception, I admit. But it has always been mine.

“Parent, don’t come down too hard on your children or you’ll crush their spirits.” Colossians 3:21 The Message

  

3) I was a perfectionist, largely because of the above. God does not require perfection, he requires faithfulness. He expects us to fail. That’s why Jesus was in the plan. 

“For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, and are justified freely by his grace through the redemption that came by Christ Jesus.” Romans 3:23 NIV

4) I was saved by works, not by grace. Grace simply did not exist. I look back one generation from my parents and I understand why. It did not exist for them so they could not pass it down.

Nearing the end, in a nursing home, dad hopes he’s going to heaven when he could rest assured. 

“For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this is not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast.” Ephesians 2:8, 9 NIV

5) I did not understand the nature of a child.  Being the youngest child, and having never babysat, I had never been around children. I expected them to be little adults, knowing not to spill the Cheerios. If they did it was a corporal offense. 

"When I was a child, I talked like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. 1 Corinthians 13:11a NCV

Even though this entry may not apply to you at all, I hope it helps those of you with children, who may be worrying about what effect your illness is having on them and that it gives you permission to lower your standards. God probably isn't being as hard on you as you’re being on yourself. Accept yourself just as you are. Give yourself the grace God extends to you.