Could I Be His Mother?

When a young man lashes out at society in the most brutal of ways, I cannot forget that he was some one's son. I have three sons. I cannot help but wonder ...

We take on the world when we raise a child. We do the best that we can with what we have. We learn as we go. There is no training manual and even if there was, each model is unique and responds to the same circumstances in different ways.

It was only last year that my adult sons told me just how hard their high school years were to endure. The pains that one son went through simply to fit in and be like everyone else. The pains the other son went through because he wouldn't conform to those standards and walked his own path. The advice and perspective that each one of them had as my youngest was on the cusp of entering high school was eye opening.

Teen age children walk through the doors of their high school years and life comes at them in a variety of ways. Teachers that may or may not understand and see them for the unique person that they are. A subculture within the school that labels them as they assume they know the person within. Peer groups that have the power to accept or ostracize. Then there is the pressure of a whole new level of learning, homework and scholastic expectations.

I walked through the doors of a high school as an adult last year and was confronted with a steep learning curve not unlike a new high school student. There was a feeling of 'survival of the fittest' within those doors. I didn't survive.

I  have a lot of empathy towards the students that fall between the cracks in life. At school. At home. Within their social group. In society. There are so many pressures out there. It isn't an easy life that we are asking our youth to walk through.

My children were at risk of becoming a statistic. They came from a single parent home. My oldest had to contend with a mother who was emotionally unavailable throughout his formative years which placed a wedge in the development of our relationship. He came from a background of abuse, addictions and violence. He lived through a lot of dysfunction in his young life. My biggest fear was that I didn't get him away from it early enough. It would affect his entire life ... the stakes are high when you bring up a child in the best of circumstances. We had walked through fire together ... then I 'lost' him during his teen years. It could have gone any way.

My middle son knows his own mind. It started when he was two and he never fully outgrew it. He knew what was right in his mind and he would stand his ground no matter what the consequences. It wasn't endearing at age two. It became somewhat volatile throughout his late elementary years. He never took his anger out on another human being, but we had to fix a few walls ... By the time he stopped going to high school, he was starting to shut down. He ached for an adult figure to reach out to him. His advise to me when I started working at a high school last year was to "Be aware ... reach out to kids that don't have their own voice..." Quitting school was his only way out. As his peers pecked away at his individuality, it could have gone either way.

My youngest has walked through those big, scary doors to his future. I am home to talk with him at the end of every day. We touch base and talk about life in general before he goes to sleep at night. I feel like I would see the signs if  he started to withdraw or change in a significant way. But he spends so much time alone ... playing on his X-box with games that have adult content (and dare I say ... violent). I shudder at all that I don't know about him ... even though I feel that I know him the best of all of my children.

We do what we can as parents. We cannot infiltrate our children's every thought and buffer out the world. We have to be brave enough to set them free and experience whatever life throws at them.

Is it enough that we do not live a life of violence within our home? Will that take away their violent tendencies?

Is it enough that we do not keep a firearm within our home? Does the lack of a weapon deter a violent nature?

Is it enough that even though we do our best ... that we are imperfect in our parenting? Each and every one of us. We can teach our children all that we know and life could still tempt them with something that we never in our wildest dreams imagined.

All I can do is provide the best home that I know how to give my child. I have fought to maintain the peace and serenity within these walls that we call a home. When it has been threatened, I have made changes. All that I know how to do is to create a world within our home and family that my children will subconsciously navigate their lives toward. It is all that I know how to do ...

Our world has become a strange and foreign place to me. There is a a quiet, subtle change out there that wants me to keep my teenage son safe within these walls. Even though my adult children have survived and appear to be thriving out there ... there is a fear that lurks within me.

When the some one's son lashes out at the world ... could I be his mother? It makes me shake in my boots to think that yes, I could. We cannot control the way that our teens internalize the world, their pain, their isolation and the way they perceive life. We can do the best that we can ... and it may not be enough.

Love your children. Young and old. That is all that I know how to do ...