Never Give Up
Some of the most important lessons our kids learn start in the toddler years.
Photo by Julie Miley Schlegel, of the third kid learning to climb the wrong way up the slide.
When we bought our house in 2009, the prior owners left their backyard swing set for us to use. It had three swings, a ladder up to a platform that fit three to five kids safely, and a slide down to the grass. Under the fort was a sandbox that provided a secret 4 x 4 square feet for playing with a dump truck or dolls underneath the slide.
We have a home movie from that time on which you can hear my husband, the narrator, laughing as he stood inside at the window filming my then 2-year-old son as he tried to climb the slide from the ground up. Over and over again, my son would get over halfway up the slide. Almost to the top, where the climb was most steep, he would slide back down to the ground below.
He tried getting a running start, and slid back down. He tried spreading his legs more widely, and slid back down. He tried crawling up the slide, walking up the slide, going up backwards. Each time, his tiny body would slide back down to the dirt below. In the video, you can hear my husband’s voice. Even though my toddler was outside and couldn’t hear it, he coached from the window. “Come on, buddy, almost there.” “Keep trying – a few more steps.” “One more time, you’ve got it!” “Nooooo, not again!”
My son sat at the bottom of the green slide, little toddler feet on the grass. God only knows what was going through his mind, but he seemed to be talking to himself or singing. Perhaps it was his favorite Thomas the Train song, or an Elmo mantra. Whatever it was, he stood up, turned around and headed back up the slide again.
When he got to the place where, on prior trips, he had slid back down, he stopped. He gripped the slide with his little arms and inched his feet up the slide. One chubby hand at a time inched higher and higher. Finally, he threw his top half over the top of the slide to the platform and swung his legs up. Exhausted, he sat on the platform and smiled.
Seeing his success, my husband walked out of the house to tell him what a great job he did by not giving up. Spending 45 minutes trying to climb a slide may not seem like important work, but to a toddler, this is the work of life. Every single thing a toddler or child does in play provides lessons for his future life. There is no wasted time for a toddler at play.
That child who worked so very hard to get up the slide is now an 18-year-old man, graduating and heading off to college this fall. He has had many more videos taken of him, and he has withstood many more lectures and lessons from his dad and me.
One night in the last few years, I heard what we affectionately call the Schlegel Rant coming from the living room. Voices were raised as teenage son disagreed with fatherly advice regarding his evening choice to skip lacrosse practice a few days before a game. Like my son didn’t know his father was filming him from the bathroom window, my husband didn’t know I was typing his advice into my “future blogs” notes on my phone.
“Son, the only way you fail in life is by quitting. Yes, you’ve had some bad luck. But you’ve also made some bad luck for yourself by skipping practice. You have your good moments and your bad moments on the field. That’s what sports is about. The point is to try to get better. Mistakes happen on the field. When you’re an athlete, you live and die with mistakes. You either plow past them or you never get better. That’s the difference between great athletes and mediocre ones.”
Then he came in with the bang: “You are not going to succeed in life if you quit every time you face adversity.”
It would be nice if our toddlers learned the lessons once and then carried their value through life, but that’s not the way life goes. Just like we adults have to learn lessons over and over again, our children do, too. A lot of times, parenting feels like my toddler climbing the slide for 45 minutes. I have said the same things over and over. Made the same meals over and over. Given the same lectures and asked the same questions over and over.
You pat your infant on the back 500 times but on pat number 501 she goes to sleep. You clean urine off the floor 50 times but on the 51st time, you flush it down the toilet. 1000 baths until they can bathe themselves on the 1001st. Drive them to school for 15 years until, in year 16, they can drive themselves. Ask if they’ve done homework, or chores, or applications 300 times until one day you don’t have to ask because they’ve done it themselves.
Parenting is hard. It is the hardest and most rewarding thing I have done with my life. My three children have taught me more about life and about myself than I could ever have imagined. But it’s not always a smooth journey. I slide back to the grass over and over again. But, like my son, I have to keep showing up for the climb. Even when I’m exhausted. Especially when I’m exhausted.
The advice and opinions herein are by no means meant to be a substitute for professional medical advice. Please contact your personal physician, mental health provider or health care professional for medical advice. Opinions are my own.