Let Them Eat Cake
I recently read a blog post after some friend put a link to it on Facebook, and I was APPALLED. It was something about a ‘hate cake,’ and making it okay for your kids to say they hate you. The mother wanted to show her teen daughter that saying “I hate you” wouldn’t shatter their relationship.
Mind you, I’m not saying I disagree with that part. Celebrate it with a cake; laugh and say that’s okay, I love you anyway; or shout, “I HATE YOU TOO!” – whatever works for you and your situation.
Around age eight, my daughter wrote on the back of her bedroom door, “I do not like my mom!” The writing was accompanied by a stick figure drawing with a big “X” across it; I assumed it was supposed to be me. When I finished laughing (inside), I said, “Well, sometimes I don’t like the things you do or the way you act, but I will always, always love you.” Then I made her scrub the door clean, and explained that we do not allow graffiti in the house.
However, what the 15 year-old girl in the blog said to her mother was, “You f***ing b*tch. I hate you!”
Say WHAT now?
If you’re a parent, you’ve probably had to deal with the hate phase; nearly every kid I have ever met has been there at some point. I went through it, too, when I was a pre-teen and teenager. I remember thinking, “OOH, I HATE YOU!” every time I got mad, or when I didn’t get my way. Actually, I don’t recall ever SAYING those words out loud, although I’m quite sure I muttered them under my breath a time or two. I was never brave – or disrespectful – enough to say those things to my parents’ face. And I never, ever, EVER called my mother a f***ing b*tch. I don’t even remember thinking about her in those terms.
Even at the ripe old age of…however old I am (forty-something, I can’t really remember right now), I rarely swear in front of my parents. I never swore in front of them until I was in my 20s, and I’ve certainly never sworn AT them. NEVER. EVER. And I never will.
For one thing, even now, my dad would probably slap the teeth out of my head. You just don’t say things like that. It’s about respect. It’s about right and wrong. It’s about permissibility. My parents were fairly strict, and would never have let that sort of behavior slide by. For sure, there would be no cake celebration.
And yet, ALL these readers (including a couple of people for whom I USED to have a lot of respect) were all, “Ooooh, I love this post!” “Oh yeah, that is exactly right! Our kids should be able to hate us!” and “Haha! I wish I’d have thought of a cake!”
SERIOUSLY?
FOR REALS?
ARE YOU KIDDING ME RIGHT NOW?
Everyone is okay with a 15 year-old brat calling her mother a f***ing b*tch, right to her face? It’s sickening, if you ask me. It’s sickening, even if you DON’T ask me.
No wonder our world is heading into the toilet. Nobody teaches respect anymore. Or decent behavior. Or consequences. Put that on a cake and eat it.
Shannon is a single mother of teenage twins and self-employeed businesswoman by day; by night, she saves the world (from herself) using her superpower of Sleep. She gets ranty, rave-y, and reviewy on her blog, Brain Soup for the Dysfunctional Soul.
