I couldn’t sleep last night, bitter and distracted by the situation with my kid. I don’t know how to handle it and the rancor of the thing kept me up all night. What kept kicking around in my head is the thing my partner said. She asked me what my kid’s big brother is doing about it (more or less) and as it turns out he doesn’t know, because his little brother doesn’t trust him enough to tell him. He has not been the best big brother. Ever. He cheats at games and finds ways to make it not fun for everyone else or straight quits when he is losing. This is troubling because it is reflective of his personality and really argues that he is a selfish person that cannot be relied on. Which means I raised a selfish kid who cannot be relied on to look past himself, his pleasure, and his personal gain. While he is one of the hardest working people I know, that work is directed solely at self-improvement. I’ve done nothing as a parent to teach him balance and it honestly feels like it is too late. Have I created a monster? I want to believe in my heart that he is a good person. He is a good person, but he is not a self-sacrificing person. He is also loathe to go out of his comfort zone.
I struggle with the reality of kids growing up and becoming people you don’t always get along with or want to be around. I have one kid who is often entirely contradictory to my personality and who I want to be as a person and that chafes. I have another kid–the subject of this rant–who has been handed everything in the world and coldly expects more. I recognize that eventually these kids leave the nest and go off to be their own people and that they have to be able to be who they naturally are, but I want to love them. I want to want to spend time with them and more and more I find that I don’t enjoy the moments as much as I used to. It feels like maybe all of that is a part of all of us growing up.