A friend asked me to listen to a radio conversation about this….
Should a parent share her pain with her own children?
Would it help?
Would it wound?
Would it open walls?
Would it cleanse?
Would it explain?
Should a parent share his pain?
For when I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long.
–Psalm 32:3
Every man has his secret sorrows which the world knows not; and often times we call a man cold when he is only sad. –Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
https://www.moodyradio.org/programs/chris-fabry-live/2018/04-2018/2018.04.16-sharing-a-parents-pain/
https://dailypost.wordpress.com/prompts/parallel/
What do you think?
An interesting… but a loaded question nonetheless. In short, as children become more mature, they will not only be able to carry, but will want to carry some of your pain story – the narrative of how you came to be, for it informs them of how they have come to be (at least my adult children have wanted to know more). Of course, one needs to be discerning, since like luggage, a parent should not expect their (young) children to carry it alone, or to somehow become responsible to solve your pain narrative. Interesting enough, I tried my hand a 3 part series on “rewriting our story” as a way of working through the painful narratives of our lives: https://moreenigma.wordpress.com/tag/rewriting-our-story/
Thanks for your engaging article.
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