Written by Tammi Pitzen, Executive Director of the Children’s Advocacy Center of Jackson County 

With motherhood comes many worries and many rewards.  There is a quote that  goes something like, “Being a mother is learning about strengths you didn’t know you had and dealing with fears you didn’t know existed”  by Linda Wooten.  I think no truer words were ever uttered.

It seems like today around every corner there is a danger we must guard our children from. I think those of us parenting in the here and now feel like there are more of those dangers than when we were growing up.  I am not sure that is true.  What is true is we are becoming more educated on what dangers lurk “out there” waiting to invade our world.  We take steps to protect our children based on those things we are learning.

When I was growing up in the seventies, the greatest fear was that a stranger would kidnap your child.  We were taught to be leery of the man in the trench coat handing out candy.  We were warned about the “Ted Bundys” of the world.  We were taught about the dangers of hitch hiking or picking up hitch hikers.

But there were a hosts of dangers that were present in our everyday life that no one seemed aware of or did not recognize they were dangerous.  At my high school there was a teacher that made lewd comments to girls and gave them higher grades if they wore lower cut shirts, tight jeans or if they accepted and laughed at his lewd comments.  I won’t name him or the subject he taught.  He was never charged or I assume even investigated by anyone.  Everyone knew.  I have no idea if he ever made good on any of those lewd comments.  We had a substitute teacher who was fairly young that would go out and party with some of the athletes and pretty students.  I had heard he asked one out on a date.  We had a photographer who would take pictures for the school for dances, dance line members, band members, and of the contestants for our “Holiday Bell” pageant who regularly exposed himself to female students or wore a bath robe when taking the pictures as I remember at his home.  That can’t be right?  At his home?  But that is what I remember.  I knew one of the girls he exposed himself to.  It was brought to the school’s attention but he still took pictures.  In fact students laughed and called it gross.  Those feel like dangerous situations to me.  I don’t know if any physical interactions ever came about in any of those situations but it feels like they were discounted.

I want to be clear that I don’t think anyone at that school at that time was handling things any different than any other school.  It is similar to the way other dangerous situations were handled.  We didn’t wear seatbelts.  We didn’t wear helmets when riding bikes or skate boards.  We didn’t even buckle infant carriers and generally babies rode in the front seat so that if something happened mom could attend to the baby from the driver’s seat.  There were no chicken pox vaccinations.  There were no flu shots.  No one gave a second thought to band practice being held in the 100+ degree heat with 100% humidity—sometimes in full uniform.  No one was reminding you to drink water to stay hydrated.  No one wore sunscreen.  I hear all the time about the “good old days”.  I did love growing up during that time.  However, bad things happened.  A high school friend was raped walking down a well-traveled road.  Several friends died in car wrecks that seat belts might have saved them.  I have multiple friends who have various types of cancer, some of which started as skin cancer.  Several friends suffered head injuries as result of activities in which a helmet would have prevented.  It was not that the dangers were not there.  It was that we did not recognize the danger.

I am by nature a “worrier”.  I worry that I am not worried about things enough.  When I am not worrying, I worry about what I am missing to worry about.  It isn’t quite that bad. But I do like to be “prepared” and when I feel like I am not then I start to think about all the dangers and things that could go wrong.

Parenting is all about risk management but the stakes are super high.  The best risk management is to educate our children in an age appropriate, non scary, matter of fact way.  At our house we have very frank, open conversations with our son.  Sometimes too frank and open for other people’s comfort.  All age appropriate.  I feel like if we don’t have them with him, he will have them with someone else who may not give accurate information.  I also want to normalize all conversations.  We want our son to know that no matter what, we are here and can have a calm, conversation and help him work out whatever the issue is.  Sometimes it is about abuse.  Sometimes it is about politics.  Sometimes it is about life choices.

When my head hits the pillow at night, my mind races going over the day and calculating all the shortcomings I feel guilty about.  Then slowly moving to triumphs.  On a good day the triumphs outnumber the short comings.  On a bad day there are no triumphs.  Some days it is a “wash” as my grandma use to say.  I sometimes wonder if my husband does this.  Do other parents do this?  There is no other thing in my life where I question so much my effectiveness or my success!  Sometimes I think about my Mom.  I wonder if she still lays awake wondering about her children and if she counts her triumphs and shortcomings?  Did my grandmother do the same?  In the end usually comparing the three generations of motherhood I feel like I come out with the most shortcomings. But as I drift off to sleep I remind myself that I do the best I can do and that I am pretty sure that my son knows that I love and support him. That I AM his loudest cheer leader!

As Mother’s Day comes around I have been thinking a lot about Mom’s and our role in our children’s lives.  While my Dad has always been my hero, my Mom has always been the person that keeps everything moving and together.  She was the one who talked to us about important safety stuff.  She was the one we went to when we couldn’t figure out the answer or understand the outcome.  She was the one that taught me about “being nice” and caring about others and about being a family. She is the mother I strive to emulate.

I want to encourage all the moms out there to take care of yourself.  I want to encourage all the moms out there to have those uncomfortable conversations with your children so they have a template or an example of how it can go when they come to you with the hard questions or big problems.  Educate yourself on how to manage the risks that face your child every day.  Learn how to reduce the risk that someone will abuse them in their life—as a child or as an adult.  You are not alone and helpless.  The Children’s Advocacy Center of Jackson County and our Protect Our Children program can help support you, educate you and guide you in taking action in providing safety to your child, your grandchild, your niece, nephew, your neighbor’s child—ALL the children in your life.

Happy Mother’s Day to all the women out there who are mommas, who are about to be mommas, who are mommas to children who need them –regardless of whether they are your bio children, adopted children, foster children, in your classrooms, in your after school programs, in your churches or just in your neighborhood.  We appreciate all you do and know how hard it is to do it!