I want to like the Gilmore Girls, because the story pulls a few of my strings. But… the “best friend” style parenting there sometimes irks me. I was not my children’s friend. I was their mom. Don’t get me wrong, we LOVE each other more than BFFs. But I’m mom.
“Mom” is a minor deity in my kids heads, I think, more like the Mayan jaguar goddess than a guardian angel or benevolent force. Being “Mom” meant, often enough, putting my foot down and letting my children hate me for a while.
I can be the bad guy for a good cause.
When people ask me what I did to raise such wonderful women, it started with forbidding things that were bad for my children (even if they were convenient), providing 100% solid rules that never wavered (even during tantrums), treating them like equals even when they were small (or I was in a rush), never ever punishing moral behavior (even if it was admitting something bad), holding myself to all the same standards (even when it meant I needed to apologize), and then working hard to keep them fed and clothed until they grew up (even though sometimes I failed at one of the “provider” jobs).
They made it. Which I thank my lucky stars they eventually did.
And I wanted to like Gilmore Girls but I sometimes feat Lorelei needed to do all that gabbing with someone else and let her daughter be her child. Although I liked the show better than I thought I would.
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