If you are a parent, you know that raising a child is tough. It’s frustrating, aggravating, and stressful. At the same time it’s also satisfying, gratifying and wonderful. So how can a parent manage to keep sane amidst all of the trials and tribulations of nurturing a child.

The answer is quite simple, care. As a father of five, I’ve realized that I cannot afford to be indifferent or apathetic with any aspects of my children’s lives. I have to make sure that I am up to date with whatever is happening with them. In addition, I also have to stay focus with the day to day happenings in my house. In short, I need to care about anything and everything.

If I fail to get involved and if I fail to be on them like white on rice, then I fail to be a parent. And this is all that my children really need. They don’t need me to be their best friend, they need me to be their parent. They don’t need me to do anything heroic, they just need me to perform my parental obligations. If I satisfy my parental duties, then eventually everything will work out and eventually my acts will turn heroic, in a boring parental sort of way.

Unfortunately, when I am tired, frustrated, and stressed, I shut down and become apathetic with the simple things that goes on with my children’s lives. This is obviously what they don’t need. No matter how my day went or how my week is going, I still have the responsibility to know how and what they are doing. I have to make sure that our home and our lives stay as consistent as possible because what my children need the most is consistency and not chaos.

It’s not my children’s job to be considerate with how my day went because they themselves are just learning how to cope with their own growing pains. When they become parents themselves, their time will come when they have to devout themselves unconditionally to their own children. But right now, all they have to do is grow up happy and content.

Simply put, as a parent, I have to nag, annoy, and take care of my children.  

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Man, with this post, I can already sense the machinations that are brewing in my children’s heads right now. I know this post will be quoted many times in the near future.