Teenager-Induced Mom Guilt
Their choices really mess me over…again.
When my son joined the US Army, I felt a lot of guilt. I felt like I had failed him. I had raised him to be a nice, kind, loving man. I couldn’t help it that his father didn’t show up for him. I made sure he had a lot of time with good, solid, family men. He had mentors, scout leaders, teachers, and tons of uncles. He had my dad and the dads of his friends. What could I have done better?
I couldn’t help it that I only had sisters for him to play with. I couldn’t help so many things. But, here I was sending my son off to literally go kill people. You might consider this silly and dramatic, but I would consider myself a pretty-much passivist. My default is into negotiations rather than fighting. His choice hurt me.
It hurt because I know enough about my son to know what kind of recovery he will need someday when he is done. I know how he will have to negotiate so much each day as he just does his job. It’s not a bad thing. It’s just not what I had planned to experience with him.
As a homeschool mom, we talked about everything. We talked about peace and war, history, and our hard lessons learned. We talked about all things science and culture. He read nearly a million books before he left my home to go to the university. He was my little sponge-brained son.
