I have main custody of my son but he spends every other weekend with
his dad. He leaves every other Friday afternoon after school and
comes home Sunday evening. During those two nights that he is gone
he becomes almost like a different child. By the time he comes back
to me it's like everything I've worked so hard to teach him over the
years about respect, etc has went out the door. As soon as I mention
one thing to him about taking care of his stuff or picking something
up he starts throwing all these refusals my way.
"My dad doesn't make me do that, my dad doesn't have those rules, my
dad let's me do this, my dad's house is fun, I want to go live with
my dad." More than likely as a single parent you've heard one, if
not all, of those statements. These words come out of my son's mouth
pretty frequently when he gets back from a visit to his dad's house.
I don't know about you but it drives me nuts! There are times when I
just want to call his dad and tell him to come back and pick his son
up. That would be the easy way out but not what the Lord wants or
what I want.
Instead I have to spend more time being consistent with him over the
next few days. I can't let my guard down and become lazy, I have to
stay on my toes and reprogram him to what mom's house rules are.
It's challenging, frustrating and time consuming but it's part of
the consequences of mom and dad not being together.
This past visit when my son came home none of the 'normal'
words/phrases came out of his mouth. Instead what he said broke my
heart. As we were praying before he went to bed he informed me that
praying, church, God and the Bible weren't his thing. He informed me
that his dad said I shouldn't push him to go to church and do church
things if he doesn't want to go! Well the crazy thing is we haven't
been to church in quite awhile but that night I decided that I have
to get my son back in church and raise him up the right way, the way
that God wants me to raise him. His dad may think that at 8 years
old our son can decide whether he wants to go to church, kids
church, etc but in my house and under my rules my 8 year old son
isn't old enough to make those kinds of decisions. Again, this just
shows how different each household is for Caleb.
With the Lord's help I'm bound and determined to take all the time
that is needed to reprogram Caleb every other weekend when he comes
home from his dad's house. No matter how long it takes I'm going to
teach and re-teach Caleb all about respecting me, following my rules
and understanding that in my house he will abide by my rules and
that means getting involved in church, kids church, praying, etc
again!
