Mommy Bloggers: Sometimes, You Just Have To Let Them Go Without. . . .

When my children were in the elementary grades, they would occasionally forget to grab their lunch off the kitchen table and bring it to school. First and second grades: I was right on top of it with lunch money or a grandmother who would drive out to school with a Happy Meal. Upper elementary grades: I let them go without.

Yes. I am a mother who required my children to reap the consequences of their actions. Grabbing the lunchbox before going out the door in the morning was their responsibility, and either they did it or they didn't, and if they did, they ate the lunch of their choice; if they didn't, they ate peanut butter or whatever the cafeteria was doling out to forgetful moneyless students that day.

The first few times, they would come crying to me. I sent them back with a "you did it, you deal with it." Because I am just that kind of stern and unmoving mother. Then I would have to fight tears and worry all afternoon that my child was sitting in a pitiless classroom, hungry and shaky and wishing she/her had a mother who loved him/her.

Funny, though. . . . I only had to do that a few times for each child, and somehow after that, they both remembered their lunches.

I had the same policy with forgotten books and homework and band instruments. After a few humiliations, they remembered.

From kindergarten through 8th grade, I was in their building, teaching on the top floor, just a few steps away. It would have been easy for me to come to the rescue over and over. However, I only did it when it was truly an emergency. If it was a matter of simple forgetfulness, a responsibility they let slip by, they were on their own.

I have had 8th graders whose mothers came to school almost daily with forgotten items. I found this appalling.

Let the consequences fall on their heads a few times, and they'll remember.

School is about more than spelling and math and science and history and standardized tests that have stomped all the joy out of learning. School is also about organization and remembering obligations and becoming independent and learning about natural consequences.

Stand in the way of that, and you're standing in the way of your child becoming responsible for his/her own actions. We all know how repulsive that kind of adult is. Why do we enable such qualities in our children?

Let's just not, okay?

Did I mention that doing this is hard? That's it's REALLY HARD? Did I mention that to know your child is going without, or is having to explain to his teacher why he/she doesn't have the homework or the violin or the bassoon or the lunchbox or the money, etc. because, well, he/she forgot it, is really, really hard? Heartbreakingly hard? And that his mother, who put out many, many reminders, let the child leave it on the kitchen table because it was a good lesson in remembering the next time, is going to be thinking about it all day and hoping her child has what it takes to make the best of a situation of his own doing and do better next time?

It's really hard. But allowing your child to grow up without ever reaping the consequences of his own actions can be harder still, down the road. Really hard. Harder than anything you can imagine while they're small.

That consequences do not fall out of the clear blue sky but are direct results of their own actions or inactions is one of the best and most important lessons we as parents can teach our children. And, as I said before, one of the hardest. For them, yes, but mostly for us.

Comments

We've had lunch mix-ups usually where the lunch is at school with the child, but she forgets. Their school lets them buy a full hot lunch and bills the parents after when that happens.

Posted by: margaret | March 25, 2008 5:10 AM

I'm all for natural consequences even though it is hard. Simply put - kids learn better from them than they do from a nagging parent or a parent that will do everything for them. Great post.

Posted by: Jules | March 25, 2008 7:47 AM

Sometimes, You Just Have To Let Them Go Without. . . .

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