Breaking the Cycle

When our son was seven years old, after he had mostly stabilized and we had left the hospital, we began teaching him how to ride a bike. Or, rather, we began to reteach him how to ride a bike. The motor skills he developed riding a balance bike when he was three and then a bicycle with training wheels were wiped away and replaced by imbalance and ataxia during the early years of his seizures.

We brought his bike to a city park and found a quiet corner near the grass. I got him on his bicycle and ran behind him, pushing from behind as he found his footing on the pedals towards my wife further down the path. After he found the motion, I would slow down, and he would continue under his own power until he reached his mom, who would help slow him down and repeat the sequence to send him back to me.

I learned to run a bike the same way. My mother and grandfather pushed me on the street in front of my grandparent’s house for hours until I could ride alone. My mother probably learned the same way from my grandfather, who probably learned the same way from his parents. In many ways, parenting is a hand-me-down exercise where we learn how to be a parent from our parents.

But what happens when the approach or behavior that was done to you is not what you want for your child? Whether it’s because new information invalidated an outdated approach or times have changed, the techniques may not apply today. Or, for many people, we’ve learned what was done to us is considered abuse and is not a legacy we want to pass down to our children.

In those situations, our references are tainted. What we know is unusable. The only option we have is to figure it out for ourselves.

Figuring it out is the scary part. I’m constantly afraid that I’m not doing the right thing as a parent and that I will end up doing it worse than my parents did.

But maybe the fear is a sign that we’re on the right path.

It shows that we’re not just blindly repeating the past but actively trying to do better. Learning to parent without a perfect roadmap is daunting, but we are making progress every time we break a harmful cycle or approach our children with more empathy and understanding than we were given.

We may not have all the answers, but we have the ability to grow, adapt, and create a new kind of legacy—one built on love, effort, and the determination to raise our children with more care than we received.

And in the end, that might be what matters.

What Matters is the Repair

Hello, Hindsight, my old friend.
You’ve come to talk to me again.
Because a mistake I made today
Left its mark and pushed someone away
And the shame that was planted in my brain
Still remains
With the sounds of silence

On more than one occasion, my response to an action that my son did was out of proportion to the action itself. Usually, it’s because he repeated the same action, and there is an escalation of consequences. But sometimes, it’s driven by my trauma, insecurities, and fear about my son’s future.

A few weeks ago, there was the Chocolate Bar Incident that I wrote about in a previous post that involved him lying about sneaking candy. The candy wasn’t the issue; the lying was, and it triggered a knee-jerk reaction to take away his electronics “for I don’t know how long.”

I was so frustrated with his lying, and I didn’t understand why he was doing it. I had a hard childhood, and I feared that he was lying the same way that I lied because he felt unsafe like I did. I was also afraid that it was because of his impulse control and executive functioning issues. I needed to shock him with extreme consequences to change his behavior and stop him from lying. Otherwise, how could he go out into the world?

Like I said…out of proportion.

After I had time to cool off, I felt terrible. Yes, he struggles with impulse control and executive functioning, but so do a lot of people. Also, teenagers lie. It’s normal and doesn’t necessarily reflect on his future possibilities.

I thought about how I responded and how I should have responded and felt like an asshole. Feelings of guilt and shame washed over me, and I feared that my response would be what stuck with him about this situation and that it would affect or define our relationship.

I went in to apologize. I shared why I had my reaction, explaining how I was afraid he was having the same childhood and experiences that I did. That fear and projection about his future triggered my response because I wanted to change his path so that he didn’t have to endure the same challenges that I did. But I understand that wasn’t what was happening; it just looked the same. I told him I was sorry, and he accepted my apology like the sweet, kind, empathetic boy that he is.

That, I am learning, is what will define our relationship. What matters isn’t the mistake. What matters is the repair.

We all make mistakes. As much as we wish we could be perfect in our relationships, we’re human, which means we’ll stumble, say the wrong thing, or make a bad choice occasionally. Whether it’s a moment of lost patience, a misunderstanding, or a decision we wish we could take back, mistakes are inevitable. But here’s the thing: what matters most isn’t the mistake itself—it’s what happens afterward. The repair is what truly defines the strength and depth of a relationship.

When we mess up, there’s often a sense of failure or shame that comes along with it. We worry we’ve damaged trust or created distance in the relationship. But the reality is that the most meaningful connections aren’t the ones that never face difficulty. They’re the ones that grow and evolve through those moments. It’s the repair process—the act of acknowledging the hurt, making amends, and working to rebuild trust—that ultimately makes relationships stronger.

At the end of the day, it’s not the mistakes that define us—it’s what we do after them. We all face moments where we wish we had done things differently, but those moments can lead to greater understanding and intimacy if we approach them with humility and care.

Our children don’t need perfect parents; they need parents who are real, who are trying, and who are willing to own their mistakes. Children learn more from our willingness to grow than from our attempts to be flawless. When they see us apologize, try again, and love them through the messy parts of life, they learn resilience, empathy, and the value of authentic connection.

Pants on Fire

“I am sure I put the chocolate bars on the shelf,” I insisted.

My wife and I stood in front of our pantry where, only hours before, I had placed two chocolate bars that I bought from the grocery store earlier that day.

“Maybe you just thought you did,” my wife quipped.

I called out to our son who was in the kitchen.

“Hey, pal, did you take the candy from this shelf?” I asked.

“No,” he replied, a little too quickly.

As we scanned the pantry, my son suddenly said, “I’ll be right back,” and headed into the basement.

I had seen that move before because I’ve done that move before. I headed down to the basement and saw him standing at the side of the couch.

As I stepped towards the couch, I offered him another opportunity to answer my question.

I could see the anguish on his face as he thought about his answer. “Yes, ” he said. “I did take them.”

“Where are they?” I asked.

“Behind the middle cushion,” he answered with his head down.

I moved the cushion to find a stash of wrappers. Not only were the remains of the two candy bars in question there, but wrappers from other candy I had bought weeks ago that I had convinced myself that I hadn’t purchased when I couldn’t find them.

On the positive side, I’m thankfully not losing my mind. On the negative side, we’re noticing a pattern of lying with our son, and my wife and I are both responding based on our childhood experiences with lying. Those experiences come from two different extremes.

My wife came from a world of never lying, so our son’s lying, especially after she defended him, felt like an ultimate betrayal. She feared that the lying was a sign of his condition and that he wouldn’t be able to survive in the real world.

I came from an unsafe childhood and lying was a survival tool. I would lie to avoid dangerous consequences and to hide my overwhelming feelings of guilt and anxiety. While I logically understand that my son has a very different childhood than I did, I feared that my son was feeling unsafe in some way and that he would find himself on a similar path as me, wearing guilt and shame and anxiety like a heavy coat.

For both of us, our trauma led to fear for our son’s future, which caused our extreme responses to the situation. That obscured the reality that, during adolescence, teens go through a range of developmental changes, including a growing desire for independence, privacy, and autonomy. These factors can sometimes lead to lying or bending the truth.

In other words, lying is normal and doesn’t mean he can never enter the real world or that he’s carrying the anxiety and shame the same way I did. It means he is developing and trying to figure out his world.

Of course, there should be consequences, but they should be based on the incident and not distorted by our history or fear of the future. He doesn’t have those fears, but using language that makes him feel unfit for independence or acceptance will give them to him. Instead, consequences, yes, but open communication, clear expectations, and being a trusted source of guidance are how we help him navigate this stage of his development and come through it much better than we did.