My daughter talks about getting married all the time. She describes the different boys in her class and her convictions for getting married and she asks regularly about when they should get married and what she wants to do when she gets married. Her current goal is to get married, become a doctor and a mother. She has plans for a minimum of three children and she wants to enter pediatric medicine.
The Dreams of the Young
She’s only six, but she has great dreams for how marriage should be. Part of that is she sees that my husband and I are doing well and that our problems do not affect her greatly because we shield her from that part of our lives. But it’s important to teach her about relationships and in that way, we teach her about marriage as well.
One of the ways we teach our children about relationships is in their ongoing growth and development of the relationships they share with their peers. Just yesterday, we took our daughter over to a friend’s for a play date. The friend was the little girl that she calls her best friend and the little one returns the favor. They adore each other. Our daughter also enjoys her friend’s younger sister.
The play date went very well until a pair of neighbor children came over to join in the fun. My daughter resisted their interference because she felt like they were taking her time away from being with her friend. They were interrupting her play date. She was very upset and by the time I arrived to pick her up, she fell to pieces.
Learning to Share the Ones We Love
It can be a difficult lesson to learn, but we cannot be selfish in our relationships with others. We cannot demand that they pay attention only to us. We cannot make them focus only on us. When we do this, we are hurting our friends and we are hurting ourselves. I spent a few minutes explaining this to my daughter and telling her that while I did understand her perspective – that these other children interrupted her play date, they also provided her with an opportunity to make new friends and to enjoy their company.
We have to teach our children about these facets of relationships and to give them a positive way of coping with the struggles they will face as young adults. That instruction begins when they are very young and must continue as they get older.
How do you teach your children about marriage?
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