WALK IN THEIR SHOES!--By Maria            Maria No.59               9/86

         1. WHY WOULD OUR [SOME OF OUR] TEEN GIRLS MENTION ON THEIR TTC QUESTIONNAIRES THAT THEY ARE AFRAID OF GETTING PREGNANT? Why would they be afraid of getting pregnant & having babies when we have such a good Godly attitude about sex, lovemaking & babies in our Family? Where did they get such an idea unless the parents & adults talked negatively about these things in front of them?
         2. ALTHOUGH TEENS CAN EASILY MISUNDERSTAND & EXAGGERATE THINGS SOMETIMES, THE MAJOR PROBLEM STILL LIES IN US, all parents & adults, who obviously have the most direct & strongest influence on our children's lives! Sad to say, it's our own unthoughtful, condescending, insulting remarks or condemning, forceful attitudes, even foolishness or belittling, that injure our children more than we realise (besides setting a terrible sample which they in turn imitate), because if we fully realised it, surely no parent nor adult would deliberately do so.
         3. COULD YOU TAKE THE SAME KIND OF TREATMENT FROM OTHERS THAT YOU GIVE YOUR OWN CHILDREN? Perhaps it's now time to ask ourselves this question. Did you unthinkingly discuss the facts of certain situations in front of children, i.e., how So-&-so had hard labour for 24 hours, or someone else had to have so many stitches, or someone had a Caesarian operation, or even heavier facts? Just these common, bare facts could scare children half to death because children & teens are very sensitive, observant, alert & aware of everything they hear adults say!
         4. PRACTICALLY ANYTHING ABOUT A TOTALLY NEW ASPECT OF THEIR LIFE THEY HAVE NOT YET EXPERIENCED CAN EASILY SCARE THEM, even through their own misunderstandings of the situation. So if some seemingly factual & objective presentations of some of these subjects--sex, pregnancy, childbirth & all--have affected them adversely, think of all the additional times adults comment on things with negative attitudes & a lack of faith! Even a testimony or a prayer for a mother having difficulty in childbirth could scare children, especially little girls, & talk of sexual problems in front of them could easily scare them. Dad has said that often, early negative childhood experiences continue through one's lifetime as fears or even phobias, & people often do not even realise why they are scared or fearful of certain things if it happened as a bad experience in babyhood.
         5. DAD EXPLAINED HOW WHEN HE WAS VERY YOUNG HE WAS PUT TO SLEEP IN AN APARTMENT LOCATED DIRECTLY BESIDE A RAILROAD TRACK. Dad remembers being sound asleep in a crib in a dark room by himself when a train came roaring, thundering, clanging by in the dark & almost scared him to death! For many years after, whenever he heard the loud sound of trains nearby, especially in his sleep, it evoked a fearful response. Even after he was a grown man with a family of his own, sleeping in a trailer park next to a train track, the sound of a roaring train passing by caused him to leap out of bed, race down the aisle of the trailer & barrel out the door, even breaking the lock in an attempt to get away from it! He didn't even wake up until he was outside! So that fear of loud roaring trains stuck with him for many years.
         6. OF COURSE, HAD THE ADULTS NOT LEFT DAD ALONE AS A LITTLE CHILD IN A STRANGE, NEW, DARK ROOM, THE WHOLE BAD EXPERIENCE COULD HAVE BEEN PREVENTED. If someone had been there to help him & explain to him & cuddle him & love him when he was so scared, he probably would not have experienced such trauma then, or ever since. This is just one example of a traumatic experience that most likely could have been prevented had the adults anticipated the child's feelings & probable fears resulting from his being left in a strange, dark room all alone, & planned for any such possible terrifying experiences. It's really sad some of the things adults can do that scare children, even intentionally, but many times very unintentionally, mostly because the parents & adults simply aren't putting themselves in the child's place & realising that it would of course scare them too in the same situation.
         7. PARENTS SHOULD TRY AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE TO HELP PREVENT THEIR CHILD FROM HAVING THESE TYPES OF FEARS & PHOBIAS & at least teach them to really fight & rebuke the fear of the Devil! Sometimes such fears are very spiritual & obviously attacks from the Devil, but on the other hand, we adults can cause lots of these fears that children have. Probably much more often it's our fault, not just the Enemy's, for causing or inflicting these fears & phobias on the children by doing or saying things that actually scare them. This is another example of needing to put yourself in the child's place & being more prayerful about your direct influence on little people who are so extremely sensitive.
         8. A RELATED PROBLEM WE'VE READ ABOUT IN THE TEEN QUESTIONNAIRES IS ADULTS MAKING FUN OF THEIR CHILDREN IN A JOKING WAY, or laughing at the things children & teens say, which can deeply hurt them, especially when they're often already shy & sensitive about expressing their feelings openly! Of course, many things that children say really are funny, but they're usually not meaning to be funny, they're actually being serious & trying to express themselves openly about some serious thought or trial they're trying to communicate. Here we are supposedly trying to encourage our children to be more honest, to express themselves more openly, share their lessons & confess their faults to us, & be more free & inspired to share their opinions, & when in their hesitant attempts to speak before us, we laugh at them! No wonder they can easily develop inferiority complexes & be so terribly embarrassed or hurt that they never want to try it again! We have heard of adults who intentionally make their children the brunt of jokes & make them a laughing stock before others!--This is intolerable & inexcusable! Most of us, however, do the same unintentionally, with the same sad results.
         9. (SARA: THIS CAME UP IN THE TEEN QUESTIONNAIRES TIME & TIME AGAIN & usually in answer to the question, "What was the most embarrassing experience in your life?" or "What are your biggest battles?"--Many teens mentioned how they've said something in a group & the adults have laughed at them, when the teens themselves didn't consider it the least bit funny!) It's very easy to laugh, as so many things they say are really funny, but adults should be hesitant to laugh, even at something funny, unless they feel the child would appreciate having made them laugh. But adults should never deliberately make jokes about the children & at their expense, especially in front of others, nor should they laugh at them in a condescending, patronising way. We may need to help the teens learn to have a better sense of humour & not be so sensitive & "have a good laugh at themselves" sometimes, & not mind if adults sometimes laugh with them, teaching them that they're helping others to have an entertaining moment & cheering everybody up with a good laugh. But we're talking here about adults laughing at children & teens in a belittling & ridiculing way, not the teens laughing at themselves & others with them all together appreciating the good humour of the moment.
         10. WE ADULTS CAN BE SO THOUGHTLESS ABOUT THESE THINGS. In the same situation adults certainly wouldn't like it either, if when they opened their mouth or tried to communicate something in a serious manner, especially to a group, everybody would laugh at them or ridicule them for mistakes or funny ways of doing or saying things. Adults just don't realise what they're doing, because they're not "walking a mile in their children's shoes" to discover what they'd feel like if put in their children's places. We adults need to realise that some thoughtless remark or laugh or something we do without praying can really hurt our sensitive children. And worst of all, deliberately making fun of anyone is a very cruel, unloving thing to do, especially of our own children, and especially purposely embarrassing them in front of others!