Making Memories

Making memories has been the theme going on in my head lately. I didn't think about it much while I was raising my children, but I've been finding it interesting listening to what my daughter remembers from her early childhood, what I remember and contrast it to what my mother remembered. If I were thinking more about what my children would remember as adults, would I have made different decisions? How do those memories affect how they raise their children and relationships with their spouses? Maybe I would have been more conscientious of what I did and how I handled major moments while they grew up.

A comment my mother made often was "I never knew my mother loved me until I had a baby." She said that when my sister was born, she cried because the tender love she felt for the little one she held was so overwhelming and knew then what her mother felt when she had her. Now that I'm thinking about early childhood memories, it's hit me what it must have been like as a child not knowing love.

I asked her one time why she made that statement. She said the only thing she remembered about her mother was getting spanked. I had a hard time with that one. I was incredulous, "Don't you remember being at least hugged?" She said, "No, I might remember feeling a hand on my head as I was going to sleep, but no I don't remember any affection from her." She was orphaned when she was 5 years old. Her mother had died before her father, so she was very young and didn't have all that much time with cognitive memory of her mother. That, and the verbal abuse she suffered from her aunt, how did she grow up to be such an awesome mom and wife? Perhaps because she was a much stronger character than me had I been in her situation and maybe that one revelation when my sister was born was so profound that she decided that her children would know just how much they were loved. Fortunate for me and my sister.

I remember her telling a story that shortly after she and her brother were taken in by her grandmother that she got spanked when she spilled a sack of potatoes. She refused to cry and refused to pick up the potatoes as her grandmother ordered. So Grandma spanked her again and she still refused to cry or pick up the potatoes. Finally, Grandma grabbed Mom's hand and started making her pick up the potatoes and failing to get this stubborn child to see the errors of her way and in frustration sat down and started to cry. It was seeing her grandma upset that she said finally made her cry and said, "Don't cry grandma, I'll pick them up....I'll pick them up." That was the time she and her grandma came to an understanding and said her grandma never spanked her again; it was one punishment that my mom wouldn't stand for.

Now did I ever get spanked as a kid? Yes, but only by her and it was rare but she threatened plenty of times. But spanking in those days was the standard parenting technique for discipline. My mother used it, but it was sparingly, not heavy handed and for major infractions.

The reason I talk about spanking and memories is that I always carried a memory of getting into trouble for wanting to climb the backyard fence because I wanted to talk to the little boy on the other side. I remember being told not to climb the fence, but I wanted to talk to my friend. I remember a man nicely calling me that he had something for me and when I went to him, he had taken the strap off my roller skates and beat me with it. For some reason, for many years I thought the man was my Dad. Other than that memory, I never remember my dad ever touching me. I never told my parents as a kid because for some reason, I thought I'd get spanked again.

Years later, after having my own children, I told my mom about it and asked her if it was Dad. We figured out that there was a couple who baby sat me one time and it was that man. I saw the mama bear come out of Mom even then when I told her the story, when she realized who had done it and would have hunted him down and scratched his eyes out had I told her afterwords. But isn't it strange how that incident affected my early memory and placing my dad in place of a strange man? She said she remembered that when they were going to ask them again to sit me that I raised a ruckus not wanting them and she wondered why. She never asked them again.

That's one of my bigger negative memories, but I'm happy to have so many great ones and can't imagine children who don't have them. Therefore, I think, maybe it would be good for parents to think a little more about building as many happy memories in their children with affection, love and security as they can even in the midst of difficult times so they have them to balance things for the better and pattern their behaviors and to build good memories with the next generation yet to be born. It doesn't take that much to do; you don't have to be rich, have lavish birthday parties or give lots of toys. The thing a kid will remember most is seeing their parents love each other, lots of hugs from them, being a family unit that will form their little characters to grow up to be awesome mothers, fathers and spouses.

There are way too many people scarred from abuses, parents who constantly fight, hit, get lost in their own misery and forget about what their children are absorbing. The cycle continues generation after generation. So I say to the young ones who are now parents: you don't have to repeat our failures. Keep in mind what your memories are. Repeat the good ones and reject the bad. Build good memories for your kids and yourself. I refuse to believe it's too late for anyone. As long as there is breath in you, make sure your kids know how much you love them. And when it's time to let them go, they will always take that piece of love with them for the rest of their lives.