I took my daughter to the eye doctors today and the diagnosis was that she needs glasses. Now, part of me doesn’t care that she needs them because it’ll help her see better, but the other part of me thinks that I did something wrong as a parent to let my kid get out of whack.
Now, I know the latter comment us pure senility, but for you parents out there, don’t tell me you haven’t been in this situation before and not thought the same thing — whether it’s glasses, braces, diabetes, etc.
As I said, I totally understand this thinking is pure lunacy. While kids are like their parents, they are also that much different. They will have their own issues to deal with, their own problems to solve, their own growing up to do, their own life hurdles to content with, etc.
So, what do we parents do when we learn that our kids are just as flawed as we are? I needed glasses and wore them for nearly 10 years. Luckily enough, my eyes corrected the small issue I had. My daughter now suffers from the same issue — not being able to see far away out of one eye.
As the doctor was going through her routine, she asked me all types of questions and I told her all about my plight as a kid with glasses. As she finished up the exam, she said, “Well Kayla, looks like you are going to need to wear glasses just like your daddy did.”
Despite my daughters excitement to go pick up pink and brown glasses, My heart immediately sank because it appears that her ailment is probably due to family history, i.e., me.
We spend an inordinate about of time trying to protect our kids from every cold, germ, harmful drug, violence, etc. that they are and will be subjected to, but there are some things that you can’t control just because it’s in your DNA. That’s the killer. As a parent, you want to help and protect your kids as much as possible, but situations like this come up and you quickly realize that they are just as flawed as you are, but you love them for it so that’s ok.
