just being christian

It’s too many black women that can say they mothers/
but can’t say that they wives

The crisis of the Absent Black Father in America has been well chronicled. “Research shows that, in many inner-city African American neighborhoods, nearly 70 percent of the children will go to bed tonight without their father present. Further, African American men have a higher death rate, a lower life expectancy, and a greater incidence of serious diseases than males in other ethnic groups.” The situation is bleak, it’s cyclical and it’s one of the biggest obstacles standing in the way of strengthening the African American community.

Where reality comes to life is when you take a minute to get to know the Single Black Mother. Single parenting is one of the most difficult tasks imaginable. So much more so when the task is undertaken in the urban core where survival becomes the primary objective because thriving seems so unattainable. You struggle to keep your kids safe. You struggle to keep your kids interested in school. You struggle to make ends meet. It really can seem like a hopeless task, and equally as thankless. It’s a story that doesn’t seemed destined for a happy ending.

Last night I got to witness a different story. Last night I saw a mom filled with hope. Filled so full that hope displaced her tears, forcing them down her face uncontrollably.

Things haven’t come easy for this mom. There were times when her kids utterly frustrated her and others, bringing forth tears that tasted decidedly more bitter than tears of joy. But this mom kept at it. She kept parenting even though she was riding solo. And then people started standing in the gap created by the void that Absent Black Father had left. It was a sizeable gap, but fillable by a village of those called to love and serve and guide and support this mom and these kids.

Last night, the village and the kids and the mom received a return on the investment. Her kids were recognized numerous times at an annual community gathering. They were recognized for doing well in school. They were recognized for the way they are living out their love for God. They were recognized for their leadership amongst their peers. One of her daughters in particular was held up and affirmed as an example that all of the other kids in the community should follow in the footsteps of. These weren’t frivolous accolades given out without thought or intention. They all meant something, and each award held value.

On the surface, the event appears to be one that affirms the kids in the community who embody the values and practices that the community discerns are important. And that is certainly part of what’s going on. But in celebrating the growth of the kids, the event also encourages and motivates the parents. It shows them the overarching transformation that is possible in the lives of their kids, and it shows them that people are noticing that their kids are growing. Part of the credit for that growth goes to the kids themselves, but there’s a good deal of credit that’s given to the parents as well.

My encouragement for you this Mother’s Day is to thank and support moms who are going at it alone in spite of all of the challenges. Find ways to individually and as a community stand in the gap to breathe hope into their journey. Love them. Support them. They have reasons to not want to parent, or not want to parent well. We need to affirm their decision to do both.

Renew and Restore

Today I start one week of paternity leave.  No work for an entire week.  Actually, a better description would be “not going into my place of vocational employment” for one week.  I’ve learned that infants with even the mildest of temperaments still require quite a lot of work, especially when they team up on you with their 3 year old sister.  Pleasant to be around.  Pretty exhausting.

But as one paternity leave begins, another ends.  Today I end my two week hiatus from this site.  As you crunch the numbers in your head, you are clearly noticing that two weeks of online absence is twice the length of Zachary’s current lifespan.  True.  But the week before Zachary’s birth was hectic.  Stacy’s body started telling us that Zachary was soon to arrive, and thus I spent every day trying to get as much done as possible.  Living each day trying to tie up every possible loose end makes one terribly productive, but it also leaves little time for, you know, hobbies.

Now we are starting to settle in, though.  It’s been a strange process.  On the one hand, we are veteran parents with almost three years of experience.  But since those three years didn’t include the first nine months of our daughter’s life, we are a little in the dark about how to parent baby Zachary.

So far, two things have helped us.  The first is composure.  It must be tremendously difficult to be a first time parent, you bring your kid home from the hospital and they are up half the night.  While that scenario was frustrating, it didn’t break us.  There was never panic.  I knew from my experiences sleeping on the floor next to Elli’s crib on nights when she was ill that eventually I’d get to sleep again.  It might not be for another night or two, but there would come  a point when my child would chill out and find peace again.

In addition to composure, the other big help has been tools.  Newborns can’t talk.  Shoot, they can barely keep from punching themselves in the face and kicking their feet through their own poopy diapers when you try to change them.  So it’s tough to know what they want when they start to get fussy.

When I played basketball on a regular basis, I had a go-to move.  The turnaround jump shot.  I had practiced it for years and years, and it was second nature to me.  I knew how to use it to create space, and I hit it with regularity.  When my game got off or the team needed a bucket, it was turnaround J time.

As the parent of a newborn, I have a go-to move. The Happiest Baby on the Block.  Some of our friends have been using it, and we became believers watching them pacify their kid.  It’s amazing.  Sometimes I feel bad that I’m using Voodoo or The Force or something otherworldly on my kid.  It works that well.  I’m sure there are other helpful techniques out there for child soothing.  But this one had a sticker on it that read, “As Seen on Dr. Phil”.  It must be the best.

Renew and Restore

Before Stacy and I had kids, we always talked about how we would “try” things once the time finally came. Like, we were going to “try” to do cloth diapers. We would “try” not to do the McDonald’s thing very often. We didn’t want to be all pretentious and idealistic. Our guess was that parenting was going to be a lot harder than we could even imagine, so we needed to leave ourselves a little leeway in case things went wonky.

One of our “tries” was that we would “try” not to spank our kids. If we had our druthers, timeout and redirection would work well and we wouldn’t have to resort to laying hands on our kids. Neither of us were spanked very much as children because we were such perfect angels we were tender hearted people-pleasers who really wanted our parents to approve of us.

Overall, Elli has been the same way.  She’s a very tender spirit.  The fact that she made it 3.5 years without a spanking says more about her than it does about us.

But every child has a moment.

Ours came last Thursday.  She didn’t want to get dressed.  At all.  When it was time to do her hair, she chucked he rubber bands across the room.  She wouldn’t sit in timeout.  She was disregarding any request I made of her.  None of my Love and Logic tricks were working, and neither were my Jedi skills.  Things were getting really bad.

I tried to pull the whole “I’m just going to go about my tasks and not let this tantrum have any bearing on me” tactic.  I straightened up the house as she followed me around and cried.  It was a real battle of wills to see who would break first.

Then it all came to a head.  I started cleaning up her breakfast from the table, first ferrying her purple plate to the sink and then delivering her sippy cup of milk back to the fridge so that it wouldn’t grow all kinds of bacteria.

Elli, the definition of “contrarian” at the moment, grabbed the fridge door before it could close.  She grabbed her milk.  She threw it across the kitchen.  When the sippy cup smashed into the stove, the impact dislodged the lid from the cup and the kitchen floor turned into a dairy swamp.

At that point I blacked out for a second or two.  Images ran through my mind of a teenage Elli carrying around a ridiculous little dog in a sequined purse.  I saw a burst of light and then she reappeared texting in church.  Another burst of light and I saw her talking a mile a minute to a friend without saying anything of substance.  One final burst of light shot me back into reality.

I took a deep breath.  I looked at the floor.  I looked at Elli.

“El.  We’re going to have to do a spank.  You need to sit here for a minute while Daddy cleans up this mess.”

She sat and watched me clean.  All the while she kept with the loud protests.  Once the floor was again dry, I sat her on my lap and looked at her.

“OK, El.  Two spanks, because you weren’t talking nice, and because you threw your milk.  You can get up once you calm down.”

I felt bad.  Her tooshie is so little.  I wondered if I could just count one spank as double.  I paused to make sure I didn’t spank too hard.  Then it was time.

One.

Two.

Amazingly, her reaction was to stop crying for the first time in 15 minutes.  The spanking composed her.  She sat on her chair for a couple of minutes, and then got up when she had cooled down.  We got dressed.  We left for the day.

Don’t worry.  We’re good, now.  She cuddled on my lap for an hour this morning.  We read books and just chatted.

That’s the story of how I tried not to spank my daughter.  It’s the story of how I disliked spanking her about as much as I anticipated.  And it’s also the story of how sometimes kids need a little discipline, and when they get it they know you really love them.
Renew and Restore