You aren't always sure but you hope

For some weird reason a couple of weeks ago I had been remembering stuff I'd done wrong as a parent.  Every time I'd remember something I'd feel sad and grieve how I'd most likely done some sort of internal "damage" to my children.  It's not like I don't know that I'm forgiven; but there are still consequences to our behavior. Sometimes it's tough being a parent because you know you have such an impact on your children, yet you're broken yourself.  I always sought to have God help me but sometimes I screwed up.

Then out of the blue I got this instant message from my youngest son:

"Hey, I was thinking about how you taught me to serve others without expecting gratitude. Thank you."

I messaged back asking if anything had brought that up and he messaged me back saying he'd just been reading Proverbs 31 and thought about me especially when he read the 31st verse.  Wow. I've always seen that passage as the woman-who's-oh-so-wonderful and felt so much less than when I read it.  Yet here was Daniel saying he'd thought of me....what a blessing!

But it gets even better.

Last week we were talking on the phone and Daniel alluded to that conversation.  Then he said something about how he wanted to say more.  He sounded a bit nervous.  I steeled myself thinking okay here it comes, he's gonna tell me all the ways I was a mess up.  But that's not at all what he did. Instead he wanted to detail out for me all the things he was grateful for that I did for him.  I was so shocked that I can't even remember what exactly he said. But there were a few specific things that he said that meant a lot to me because of the story behind them:

* He said he was grateful that I always talked good about his father.
You know, the truth of the matter is that I did that by faith.  And by God's power.  His dad cheated on me. He said a lot of mean stuff to me (a common thing for a cheating spouse to do because it validates that it's OK what they did since you're so awful).  I was willing to forgive his dad and he wanted to stay in a marriage so he could be with his kids and save money, but he didn't want to remain faithful to me only.  A few years afterward I heard the boys saying the same kinds of things about the girlfriend that their dad had said about me in the end.  I knew they'd heard those things from their dad and were just repeating them.  Soon afterward their breakup became official and he was instantly with another woman. About a year ago something came up and my other son told me that his dad and that next girlfriend (whom he is still with) had an "open relationship". Back when their dad and I broke up I was so heart broken.  I knew divorce is awful for kids, I wanted better than that for my kids....I purposed in my heart to not talk bad about their dad because I didn't want them to be hurt any more. Their dad is super charming and it always seemed like he had fun times with the boys.  He had more money and could take them on fun & exciting vacations.  Sometimes it felt unfair.  But I tried to just run my race and do what I thought God wanted of me and trust Him.  Daniel saying that was validating for me.  I'm grateful that he recognized it.  It was one of those things where I'd never known if the boys would ever realize what I tried to do for them.

* He said he was grateful that I'd brought them up to see what Christianity was really about.
Isn't that what we always want our kids to say?!

* He expressed how much it meant to him, that he appreciated, what I did with World Vision.
It was a big deal to me and I wanted it to be an object lesson for my kids, so I'm grateful that it at least impressed Daniel. (I don't know what the others think of it or if they even remember). We were really blessed when I was single.  My kids needs were always met.  But we lived more frugally than most people.  I was working as an assistant administrator and working toward obtaining my administrator's license.  There's a huge difference between what an assistant administrator and what the administrator gets paid. We were always in church and I always gave and taught them about giving. But when I got my first job as an administrator I got the three of them together and told them how blessed were were and that I wanted to give out of our blessing.  Since there were three of them, we picked three world vision boys who were the same ages as my boys and began to sponsor them monthly.

* He told me that he always appreciated that I didn't favor any of them and treated them all as individuals.  I'd worked hard on that one and was grateful to hear that he felt that way!

I'm so grateful that Daniel told me these things.

So often as a parent you know your kids love you but you're not sure if they really get what you're trying to do or appreciate it.  What a blessing it is to hear that Daniel appreciated me.

I wanted to write it down as one of those things I can look back at and say look what God did.