Pizzle on Parenting

What's good people?

Yeah, I know it's been months since I've posted. I was actually kinda surprised that my space was still here being that I haven't had much time to even log on and check out my own site.

But moving on...

So randomly yesterday, I had one of those "Saturday morning special" moments and had a couple random ideas about parenting:

"If you hug your daughter more, there's less chance she'll hug a pole."

"Kids that are actively productive have less time to be actively REproductive."

I'm not expecting any kids nor am I trying to have them anytime soon...but it just hit me, being that I work with adolescent kids, that there are many ways that people can raise "good, productive members of society". But damn if they don't fukk it up. We don't expect parents to always raise doctors, lawyers, etc...but you want your child to grow up and be a respected individual.

Working in mental health, I see a side of society that most folks see during holiday campaigns. The poor, destitute, hungry...all the things that come with long-term drug abuse, emotional instability, untreated psychological impairment, you know...all that fun stuff.

I've been noticing that there's a common denominator with all the people I've worked with over this last year. Each of them has suffered some level of bad parenting. I'm not saying that there's a specific list of things that every parent much teach their child, or a certain religion they must be raised to believe (or that you must raise a religious child at all). But dammit there's a few things that you just HAVE to do:

Feed your kids. That's basic, right? Simple enough? You don't like being hungry, do ya? How you think it feels for a kid?

Show your kids love. Yeah...act like you actually want to have the rugrat around. Now maybe you didn't PLAN on having that child. Maybe you had a wild night at the club, went home wit somebody you were feelin and "shyt happened". Maybe the baby daddy ain't shyt and doesn't take care of his child...NONE of these excuses are the child's fault. NONE. So don't take it out on the kid.

Give your child clean clothes. Kids are already gonna get picked on...don't set your kid up by sending them out the house smelling like 3 days of funk, chicken grease and Newports.

Give them something to do. Now this is a lil trickier than the others, but you have to find some way to keep your child engaged in something productive. "An idle mind is the Devil's playground." You wanna know why your kid is running around tearing up stuff and terrorizing other children and small animals? CUZ YOU HAVEN'T SHOWN YOUR CHILD HOW TO PROPERLY BURN OFF THAT ENERGY!!! Teach 'em to sit down and read a book, do their homework, stuff like that.

Now here's a couple DO NOT ideas (all based on true stories):

Do not give your infant alcohol to keep them from crying.

Do not give your pre-adolescent child drugs. (I don't mean "prescribed by a doctor" drugs, I mean weed, heroin, cocaine, etc)

Do not tell your high-school kid "You need to help me pay some of these bills around the house." Your kid needs to get an education. You're the grown-up. You're the one that can actually (well, hopefully) get a job that pays decent money.

Nobody is perfect. Nobody expects perfection. Sure, somebody will tell you when you're wrong...but we each have our turn. So don't feel pressured to have all the answers, don't feel like the world is watching your every move. You've got 15 years (cuz truth be told if you haven't at least laid a solid foundation with your kid by the age of 15, it's prolly too late) to get your kid where they should be. It's chess, not checkers. You may lose a battle, but keep fighting the war.