Dear For Love & Money,
I’m a single mom trying to get out of debt from an expensive divorce and going from a two-income household to one. I’m trying to help my kids understand a new, “cheaper” lifestyle, and struggling!
Sincerely,
Stressed and Struggling
Dear Stressed and Struggling,
When I read your letter, I sensed a lot of guilt. I get it. While I’ve never been in your exact position, I know quite a bit about the guilt that can feel inextricably connected to motherhood. I want my kids to simultaneously have it all, but not grow up to be entitled parasites. I want my kids to feel my constant devotion and also see me modeling personal boundaries and self-care. I want my kids to be protected from any possible harm, but also learn how to calculate their own risks so they can eventually protect themselves.
The problem with wanting so many contradictory things for my kids is that I am setting myself up for failure. Although each of these contradictory ideals are half-possible, I never celebrate my wins, but instead spend an inordinate amount of time obsessing over my failures. It’s called mom-guilt — and you know it’s a thing when they add the “mom” prefix.
I don’t know your situation, but I doubt when you had children with your ex-partner you were envisioning those children accepting a cheaper lifestyle because their parents were no longer together. My advice, which is harder to take than it is to give, is to focus on what you’ve given your kids and not what they’ve lost.
Divorce is typically the result of the weight of one or both parties’ unhappiness growing to such a point that the marriage breaks apart under the strain. Your children are now free of this weight, a weight they always seem to feel no matter how hard we try to protect them from it. Your divorce lightened your children’s load, and that’s a gift.
Another gift you’re giving them is modeling the importance of living within their means, which is something millions of adults with crushing credit card debt only wish they’d learned growing up.
Maybe I’m wrong and you don’t feel guilt over how your new financial situation is affecting your family and you simply need help figuring out how to communicate to your children that they are going to survive smaller birthday parties and store-brand cereal. But my advice for how to help your kids understand their new, cheaper lifestyle still has more to do with you than it does with them.
You simply have to continue living within your means, saying no, and walking them through this new world until they’ve become accustomed to it. The problem is, because of “mom-guilt,” watching them cry over things they used to get but now you can no longer afford to give them is excruciating.
For her book, “How to Raise An Adult,” Julie Lythcott-Haims, an author, speaker, and the former Dean of Freshman at Stanford University, looked at the longest longitudinal study of humans conducted by Harvard University over the course of 75 years and found there are only two components to raising a successful child: love and chores.
Seriously, that’s it. According to Lythcott-Haims, chores give children a sense of purpose and belonging, while unconditional love provides emotional security in which children can thrive.
What I’m trying to say is, while I know that watching your kids adjust to a lower income may make you feel like you’ve failed to provide for them, if you’re offering them unconditional love and a chore chart, you’re giving them all they need to succeed. But just because you don’t feel guilty anymore doesn’t mean they won’t complain when their present material conditions aren’t measuring up to the past. When they do, encourage them to think about what they do have and not what they don’t.
The bad news is, they’re kids. They have experienced a two-income lifestyle and nothing you can do short of burdening them with your financial pressures will likely reset their brains with smaller expectations. But there’s also good news — they’re growing older every day, and at some point, they’re going to understand. Between now and then, stay strong, and remind yourself every single day of what you are giving them. Keep up this up long enough and they’ll eventually follow suit.
Remember that parenting is a long game. Your kids probably won’t understand this new, cheaper lifestyle right now, but they will someday. And in the meantime, they’ve still got an incredible mom.
Rooting for you,
For Love & Money
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