Relationships

 I have not had the best relationship with my children. I believe a lot of it stems from the difficult relationship I had with their mother. Both my children's mother and I grew up in dysfunctional homes. So we passed that on because our kids were grown without a perfect family background. The best thing you can give your kids is a good home life. But the reality of it is we live in a dysfunctional world and a dysfunctional home is quite normal. I don't write this to blame their mother, as I had my own dysfunction to deal with. But I know I loved my children, both of them. I loved my biological daughter and I loved my son just as much even though I was not his biological father. It may have been dysfunctional thinking of a very young father in his low 20's to decide I would never tell him that I wasn't his biological father. I was very young to be a father and in hindsight, I wish I had done otherwise. But we can never go back to the past and change it. It's done, I cannot fix it. I even thought I was a pretty good father for many years but looking back like so many others I started off being very selfish.  But I have good memories of time with my children. I remember coming home from work, tired and laying down on the couch and this little tyke would lay on my chest and we would both doze off.  I remember playing cars with him in the back yard and making roads for toy cars in the dirt. I remember a neighbor looking over the fence and seeing me with my 2-year-old playing cars in the dirt. He made a comment about me playing cars and I felt embarrassed as a twenty-something-year-old young man. Looking back on it I was doing the right thing playing at my son's two-year-old level.  I don't even think the neighbor meant anything negative with his comment. Through the years I have many good memories. I loved him as my own.  My daughter came along and I loved her also. She was a girl and probably played like a girl and perhaps I didn't do as well. I remember her making a song "It's raining its pouring, my daddy is boring". I probably wasn't giving enough attention to her. But I loved her. I made soup for lunch one day and my son finished his soup and without me watching, my daughter switched bowls because she didn't want it.  I made him finish his soup which was really hers because I was looking at the bowls in front of them and didn't really realize until later what had happened.  I wasn't a perfect father but I loved them. I remember when my beautiful daughter chipped her front tooth. I felt like it hurt me. I loved them.   Around age 14, a well-meaning relative told my son that I wasn't his biological father and it seems like it went downhill from there. It seems ever since there has been a chip on his shoulder like I always mistreated him and treated him differently than his half-sister. I was the disciplinarian, their mother didn't want to be a parent, just their friend. So any discipline fell on me. We were not together as parents on almost anything. I think the very last time I gave a spanking to my son was when he pointed a rifle at his neighborhood friend over what was probably a $10 or less item.  He hasn't forgotten it. He feels I was too harsh. I may have been, but what I wanted was to teach him to never point a gun at another human being for no reason. A $10 toy is not a good enough reason.  Perhaps if he had been my biological child he would have gotten past it and learned the lesson I desired to teach.  He felt I treated him differently than his sister, and I believe that is true, simply because boys and girls are different, simply because no two personalities are the same ever. I know that I loved them, as the imperfect father that I was.  I always felt as he matured, he would understand, but even in his forties, he still seems to hate me. I can't fix it, there is nothing I can do to fix the past. I believe the only solution is to forgive any and all wrongs. If we don't fix the dysfunction in ourselves we set the next generation up with the same family sins. I have prayed for thirty plus years for my children and it seems I will go to my grave without seeing healing in our relationships. I often wonder what can I do differently. Any mistakes are long past, there is no going back and reliving them. It is by grace alone that I will face my heavenly father. None of us can earn grace. We simply receive forgiveness from God and move on. I will go to my grave knowing I loved my kids and did the best I knew at the time. I hope they will find the same forgiveness and I'll see them in heaven someday.  It is the same in our world today, people talking about our racist past and failing to see the progress that was made in the '50s, '60s, and even in the last President when we had a Black President for two terms. We cannot fix the past. Tearing down statues does not fix anything. The past still happened just as it did so many years ago. The path to healing is to forgive any and all wrongs.  Perhaps someday we will realize how important it is to forgive others is. People, all people have sinned and fallen short. We need to forgive and move on. The only one that can wash away our sins is Jesus. He died on a cross for that very purpose. He didn't stay dead, he rose on the third day and now lives in our hearts if we will let him in. I think about my past relationships and what is going on in our country and feel forgiving one another is the key to a healthy happy life. Forget the past, forgive it, and move on. Eternity is nearer than it has even been. We do answer to God for the life we lived, relationships are the only thing we will take with us. I know I loved my children, as imperfect as I was, I loved them the best I knew.  God bless, LVZ. 

There is nothing wrong with me that I know of. I just try to examine my heart periodically to see if I am in the faith. I want to make heaven someday.