I was talking to one of my friends tonight and she told me about how she no longer has her flat screen TV. Her son was playing with a toy and said toy broke, part of it flinging into the television and destroying its ability to function. She isn't mad at her kid. He didn't do this on purpose. It was an accident and she knew it was. The child wasn't yelled at or punished, other than being punished by the very real consequence of losing his television.
I'm glad she is sensible enough to realize this wasn't her kid's fault. I have to admit though, even as she was telling me the story, I inwardly cringed and thought about how happy I was that it wasn't me who broke her TV. Even as I was thinking this, I was almost paralyzed by a devastating sense of guilt and fear of the idea of that happening. It was a horrible little moment, but one I'm used to from my childhood.
See, when I was a kid, I WOULD HAVE been blamed for the broken TV. Even if it was an accident, even if it was a circumstance I never could have predicted, I would have been screamed at and made to feel guilty and told, over and over again, about how much money had been lost and how I had crippled the family. I wish I was exaggerating this, but I'm not. I would have been blamed and blamed until the people in charge were dead.
No, wait, let me amend that. There is no "when I was a kid" reality to that what I just described. All of my life, every moment of it until those people died, I would have been blamed, yelled at, and made to feel guilty. They seemed to take a perverse delight in finding my faults. Every time I did something wrong, it was pointed out, analyzed, discussed, and yelled about. They would never let it go. Once I did something wrong, once a sin was committed, it was an open topic for discussion. I could say I didn't wish to talk about it, but then what right did I have to say anything? I was the one who caused them pain and inconvenience. I was the one who cost them money and embarrassment. I was the problem.
Even though they are dead and I am more secure and rational, there are still places where these insecurities begin to cause me problems. I live in an old house with old plumbing and sometimes the washers on the faucets mess up and things have to be replaced. This means you have to turn the taps delicately, to make sure the washers last as long as possible. Even still, they will eventually wear out again, because it's an old house.
I get really paranoid about this. Whenever I get out of the shower, I turn my hair dryer on as soon as possible so that I can't hear if the faucet in the bathtub is making noise. I leave the dryer on as I put on my clothes and hum with my mouth closed so that it fills my ears as I walk into the living room. Whenever I go into the bathroom, I'll turn on the heater so that it will drown out any possible noise the faucet might make. Not that any of this would change ANY ONE THING if the washers have screwed up in the taps.......but at least I wouldn't have to hear it. Not yet. It's a false sense of security based on something that, most of the time, isn't even happening.
I don't calm down about it until my roommate showers. Once he's out of there, I'm fine. The reason? Well, if the taps mess up after he showered, then it wasn't something I could be blamed for. NOT that he would blame me because he's a grown up and realizes that this is an old house with problems. I wouldn't blame him either, for the same reasons. And yet, I still assume that I would be blamed. I still think that it would be seen as my fault, that I would have to defend myself. I worry that I will have to defend why I'm even here.
So, folks, if your kid is part of something that breaks an item in your home and the child's participation was completely accidental, don't scream at your kid. I know you may be frustrated or sad about what just happened, but if it really isn't the kid's fault, don't make them start thinking it IS their fault. They'll end up some basketcase like me who plays games with sound just to keep from worrying about a washer. They'll spend years thinking they are such a screw up that there is nothing they can really do to change that. Their reasons for this will be based on being blamed for things so minor that they have trouble distinguishing between the stuff that just HAPPENS and the stuff they really can change. Yes, even the smart kids will do this.
Because it isn't about being smart. It isn't about being logical. This kind of reaction is completely based in emotions, in self-identity, and shame.
No comments:
Post a Comment