In Reply to: Overcompensating posted by Laura on September 30, 2003 at 03:57:50:
the transition to raising kids outside the group to me is the toughest of all the tough issues exmems face. of course there are many variables... ages and experiences of kids b4 leaving, individual personalities and needs of the different children, environment into which you move, attitudes of extended families etc. we left w/ 8 kids, aged 1-16 at the time, and 3 oldest were still in. my wife and i saw very little in common at the time, as she was a reluctant departee back then, which further complicated things. and i was a total mess, trying desperately (a little too desperately, in retrospect) to sort thru every issue all at once. the kids were getting hit w/ "too much, too soon, too late"...no antibodies built up during early childhood, and even commonly held moral attitudes of society were in their minds associated w/ family teaching, and hence invalid. listening to many "christian experts" and trying to measure our rules by their worlds was equally problematic, due to the baggage the kids carried w/ them that most folks had no experience with. we've struggled w/ this stuff for over 12 years now, and made huge mistakes in perhaps every possible direction. but the most successful strategy that we've tried seems to be "grace and truth"..trying to explain issues from our perspective, but keeping rules somewhat flexible and trying to recognize the individual needs of each child, w/in reason. it is my hope that the kids, as they grow and look back will at least know that we sincerely tried to do the best we could to parent them under the circumstances, and that as adults they will come closer to figuring things out, knowing that at least we felt the issues of their lives important enough to struggle over. your attitude sounds light years ahead of where we started out. good luck!