Blog – August 2022

Are you failing as a woman or trying to fight the nature of the “beast”?

This blog will not relate to all women and also not all single parent women, but it will definitely relate to many.

When I became a single mom/parent I purposefully anticipated the many challenges that I knew would lie ahead.  I was fairly accurate with many, weigh off base with some, and then there was the one that totally side swiped me and took me by surprise.  In fact, I didn’t even realize the actual issue until I was so far into it I felt there was no point of return.  What could that have possibly been? You may ask. Well, it was something that lay at the core of who I am and has challenged me to amazing points of growth.  It continues to challenge me now, but what I realize is that I have choice and even if I have already gone down that path,  I can choose to understand it and make positive decisions from it.

The battle between my feminine and my masculine.  Yes, we all have both and one may be dominant at any one time.  It is seldom that you find a perfect balance between the two and perhaps it’s not meant to be that way anyway. Apart from the obvious challenges of being a parent such as making mistakes, endless duties, parenting through your own wounds, being riddled with fear for your children, not being able to control outcomes, feeling unappreciated, the shape of your body on a downward slope, low self- esteem, exhaustion, feeling alone and judged, there was this fight between my need to nurture and love, (the feminine), and the need for discipline and firm boundaries, (the masculine).  After feeling as though I was being pulled through the bush backwards and feeling as though I was failing miserably, I realized that my natural desire and wish is just to love, appreciate, nurture and grow my children.  The whole thought of disciplining them and being the “grumpy” stern parent was met with enormous resistance in myself.  I also realized that if don’t explore my masculine side of parenting and at least get it activated, there would be very uncomfortable consequences to pay as my children grew into adults, not to mention the difficulties I would face in the wonderful and challenging teenage years, where their need for autonomy becomes a “live or die” situation for your teens. Yes, the fight is definitely on when the teens arrive, make no mistake.

At first, I would negotiate my way out of stepping into the “dad” shoes and try to find another way.  At times I would slip through, wiping the sweat off my brow as I thanked my lucky stars I was able to avoid it “this time”. But I knew, I would have to put my Big Girl shoes on and tackle this challenge sooner rather than later, and that I did! Yes, at first it was met with some resistance from the teen chickens but with some carefully thought out learning moments, where I explained my actions carefully, just to let them know there was purpose behind my behavior, they slowly started to respect my actions and even when they would get rather annoyed with decisions and consequences, they understood and had no choice but be accountable for their own behavior.  Part of what I had to do was identify what was important for me to teach them so that they could grow up to be responsible, respectful and accountable adults.  I then had to choose a strategy that I know I could cope with and commit to it.  Don’t get me wrong, it is not always easy , and on those days that I am feeling less than resourceful, I still let things slide to a degree but I am always careful to nip it in the bud as soon as I am feeling stronger and continue the mission as though I never stepped off it.

So to all the woman out there who are feeling less than perfect, start now to make friends with that part of yourself you prefer to pretend does not exist, team up, create a do-able strategy and  commit. You’ve GOT THIS!

Author: Lara Park