Previous Challenge Entry (Level 3 - Advanced)
Topic: Doctor/Nurse (11/02/06)
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TITLE: Balancing Act | Previous Challenge Entry
By Bob Truesdale
11/06/06 -
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Eleven years ago I was a single, selfish bachelor living in Florida, driving a convertible, and flying all over the world as a Flight Attendant. That all changed when I met a single mom from upstate New York. I moved back to my home town, married her and adopted her two little children. To say I was unprepared for fatherhood would be an understatement of the grossest proportion. I soon learned I was in way over my head! Without God’s grace and our family’s faith, I’m not sure we would have made it. Our son recently headed off to college so now it’s just the three of us. My daughter is fifteen and a great young lady. I’m having to realize however, that I can’t continue to look at her like the little five-year-old just learning to ride her bike. She’s at an age where her friends have a lot more credibility than me. I’m learning that I can no longer just be the doctor, giving out orders, defining problems, and proposing solutions. Now I must learn how to be the nurse. My wife is a nurse for hospice. Her title is caregiver. Oftentimes, all my daughter wants is for me to listen (to really care) as she relates all the convoluted little stories about who’s mad at whom, who got a new hairstyle just to impress the boys, and why she’s not currently talking to her best friend. I’d much rather just dispense some measure of advice like my doctor does medicine. “Here, take two of these each morning and you’ll be fine!” Instead, I’m learning how to effectively listen (difficult but doable), without feeling compelled to fix it all in five minutes. Like my wife, my daughter just needs to vent, and I need to learn to listen. Period!
It’s so tempting and easy just to want to ‘fix’ things in relationships, but that’s the cheap way out. You can’t build intimacy by getting just the ‘Cliff Notes’ of some matter that deeply touches the heart of another. You have to really care. Caring can’t be demonstrated watching Sunday football while pretending to listen to my daughter’s weighty matters. How many of us remember a stay in the hospital when a kind and caring nurse actually came when you rang the buzzer for a little care at three in the morning? We remember the one’s that came gruffly or with an air of discontent, but we especially remember the ones who offered gentleness, caring and compassion, even in the middle of the night.
My daughter is at a vulnerable age. As she grows more interested in meeting young men, how vital it is that she looks for Christian guys who value her enough to listen and care when she has a concern or issues she needs help with. I’m learning (slowly!) that if I just try and fix things, I don’t instill trust in my daughter to work things out on her own. That will lead to dependent relationships and a lack of confidence. That’s not what I want for her or anyone else for that matter. I must value her enough just to effectively listen, provide a little feedback, and enable her to reach a workable solution on her own.
Our kids will transition through life with or without us. As my little girl becomes a young woman, I’m realizing more and more that she needs less of the doctor and more of the nurse.
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