josh whitehead

Kim and I had the privilege to teach a session at the Faith Promise Marriage and Parenting Summit last Friday. It was an incredible time sharing our hearts with those who were a part of those 50-minutes together. The session was titled, Parenting: The First Five Years, and we reviewed the areas that we won and the areas that we needed improvement as parents.

During the session, we asked the couple to answer 4 questions, and I’m going to share those with you in a four-part post. So, let’s dive in:

As a couple, what have been your greatest relational struggles since you had children?

There were three answers that dominated this question:

1. Time together/intimacy
2. Agreement towards discipline/parenting styles
3. Feelings of exhaustion/energy

I wish that I could say that we’ve always won in these areas, and we could spend days unpacking them. However, I want to give you some thoughts that we believe will help you with each.

• Clarify your expectations. Each person in a marriage comes from a different background – spiritually, emotionally, relationally, etc. So, each person has a different idea of what time together looks like or parenting styles. Talk about your expectations in each of these areas, and compromise to a place of agreement that each person can feel good about the decision made. Then, live it out! Most of our struggles come when we have lack of clarity due to lack of communication. (Note to guys: don’t try to win…COMPROMISE for the best solution.)

• Establish family values. Discipline is often driven by values, and each of us have different personal values. When we have kiddos, our personal values collide! Establish family values that incorporate what each person sees as important. For instance, we value ministry (serving together). So, we decided that we would never “punish” our kids from serving or attending church. No matter what, they always get to be a part of ministry, because that is something we value as a family.

• Recognize the pitfalls. Lack of energy happens because of the often sleepless nights or the sheer exhaustion of the effort put forth in parenting. I think we deplete our energy level even more when we attempt to make major life decisions at the wrong times. Often, we want to argue and debate things that do not really matter or can wait because we are tired. Several years ago, a friend shared the acrostic H.A.L.T – Hungry, Angry, Lonely, Tired. Each of these areas cause us to have a skewed perspective of life, impact our decision-making skills, and ultimately lead us to situations of frustration. Lack of energy, or being tired, is a pitfall that leads us to make irrational emotional decisions. Work together as a couple to help each other see this when it is happening and trust each other to get out of it together.

Tomorrow we are going to look at the question, “As a parent, what are the top 3 struggles with your children?”