Plain Old Love

Earlier this week, I spent four hours cleaning my middle daughter's bedroom.  Just me, all alone, in her room while she worked.  

I am telling you all, this was sacred work.  

The state of her bedroom has been the source of discussion, hand wringing, frustration, and argument for some time.  While I personally prefer a tidy space, I recognize that not everyone likes all their things to have specific spots.  But, her room was not merely messy, it was, well, really, really bad.  The gruesome details of that "badness" isn't necessary for this story, but she'd gotten in deep in terms of mess.  

We all want to raise children to be self sufficient, responsible, and to, you know, take care of their own stuff.  For a long time, I thought it was important for her to clean her own damn room.   "You made the mess, you clean it up" were words I certainly thought and maybe even said.  I tried so many tried and true parenting strategies - tough love, love & logic, etc., etc.  None of them worked.  Her room became more and more messy and we both felt more and more frustrated.  

Then, one day, after noting the clenching of my jaw and tightening of my shoulder muscles as I approached her room to deliver clean laundry, I decided to take a different tactic.  Instead of tough love, I decided to just love with no pre-fix or suffix or extra words.  I would just LOVE her.  

I took a deep breath and entered her room and calmly put the clothes in the growing pile in her unorganized closet and calmly said to her, "I'm wondering if you'd be okay with me just organizing your clothes for you.  I feel like this has just gotten to overwhelming to you and it's hard to know where to start.  Would that be okay with you?"

She sighed a giant sigh of relief and said, "That would actually be really helpful."

"Would you be okay with me picking up other stuff, too?"

"Yes, just don't throw important stuff away."  

A few days after that conversation, I entered her room with garbage bags and cleaning supplies.  I found my favorite playlist on Spotify and I set to work.  I organized and tidied and cleaned and sorted.  I washed her bedding and made her bed with a stuffed animal tucked right in her pillows.  I dusted and arranged and folded and tucked away.  Four hours later, her room was tidy and smelled of incense she'd gotten from my mom.  

I hadn't told her I was planning to clean her room that day.  I hadn't known that was my plan for that day until it happened.  So, when we picked her up from work. she had no idea that her room had been transformed.  I folded laundry while she ate a late dinner.  I heard her thump up the stairs and heard her bedroom door bump open.  Almost immediately she came down and asked me, "Who cleaned my room?"

"Me.  Who did you think would do that, silly?"

"Thanks, Mom.  I want you to know that I didn't mean for it to get that like and I wanted to clean it, I just couldn't."

"I know."

The thing about parenting strategies is that they work until they don't.  What I mean is, there is a time and a place for allowing kids to experience consequences and learn from mistakes and have to dig deep to do the work that needs to be done.  The thing is that this kid of mine does that every.dang.day just by being alive and doing the things she does.  She is brave every day. I'm so proud of her.  

So, this may have looked like I was indulging her and not allowing her to face consequences.  But, I don't think that's what it was.  Sometimes we need to know that when get in too deep, someone will help us dig out. And, honestly, what better person for that job than your mom.  

And guess what...the room is still clean. It turns out that just plain old love can help learn lessons, too. So when all the extra kinds of love "strategies" don't work, try the mantra of one of my favorite bloggers, Hands Free Mama ~ "Only Love Today."  

Love you..,