Thursday, November 11, 2010

i think i've figured it out

i've been pondering all day on this little "situation" that occurred yesterday. when i was describing to david this morning exactly WHAT all transpired yesterday, i was having a hard time putting my finger on why I was so upset. There was the obvious- the fact that no one rested and that meant a longer, harder night for me. The fact that no one did what they were supposed to do. The fact that my closet was destroyed. The fact that special surprises and secrets that David and I have been planning for weeks were no longer going to be surprises. But it was more than that. I woke up today and still had this pit in my stomach. And felt that way all day long.

I get that it sounds totally shallow. My kids got into their Christmas presents. Big deal. We are healthy. We have more than what we need to survive. I mean - there are kids without PARENTS for crying out loud. Kids without clean water to drink. Kids whose dads or moms are soldiers and are putting their lives on the line every day for us. We've got friends whose parenst won't be with them on christmas this year because of several different circumstances. So what's the big deal?

I think I've figured it out. Here's what I've come up with:

1. I LOVE surprises. I LOVE to be surprised by something. I love to look forward to it. I love to wait and anticipate. So it REALLY upset me that this aspect of Christmas was being taken away. Still pretty shallow, but I think explains why I took it so personally.

2. The deceit and disobedience involved. This is being nipped in the bud. Enough said.

3. The biggest reason is because I think my kids have too much of a feeling of entitlement. That they deserve whatever they want. I'm not sure how this has happened - but we've got to get it taken care of. I'm sure part of it is the fact that their birthdays are RIGHT before Christmas - so it's a LOT of talking about what they want. It's pretty sickening. I don't feel like we spoil our kids by ANY stretch, but obviously they are not getting the point that it's NOT all about them. We're going to be dealing HARD with this one.

Because NONE of this is okay. I think I'm done with these depressing posts for now.

3 comments:

Judy said...

Well let me know what you come up with about the entitlement thing because I'm really struggling with that with Christian. I do however think that I am responsible for spoiling Christian and Ryan is too. Ryan grew up without much at all. He had to start buying his own clothes when he was in 5th grade. Christmas for him was socks and underware (literally) so he has an excuse to want to spoil. His childhood was hard so it's natural for him to want to give our kids the world. BUT... I know that good behavior should be expected and that it doesn't need a reward but a certain 5 year old doesn't get that. Christian is desperate to pull out his next tooth just so he can get money to buy something. Yikes. That's not good.

Courtney said...

yes, let me know what you guys do! it's so HARD! i hate how confusing christmas has become...we want to give our kids a "good Christmas" yet we also want them to understand the TRUE meaning behind it. so hard!

SO sorry about all this, katy. wow. i can ONLY imagine how mad you were. these kids...they have NO idea what they do to us, do they??

LOVE YOU!

The Stein Family said...

Ditto on letting me know what you come up with on the entitlement. From time to time it rears it's nasty head around here too - and often after I've gone out of my way to do something extra special for the kids. Not sure if it's entitlement or ungratefulness, but they seem to go hand in hand. Glad to hear it's not just here!