“Parents offer an open womb. More than anyone else in your life, mothers, and sometimes fathers, can kiss it, and make it well whentheir grown children need to regress and repair. More than anyone else in your life, mothers, and sometimes fathers, can catch you when you start to fall. When you are in disgrace, defeat, and despair, home may be the safest place to hide.” NeedsWellsMayChildrenSometimesHomeMotherFallFatherParentOffersKissingDespairDefeatWombDisgraceGrown Children Author:Frank Pittman
“We never really are the adults we pretend to be. We wear the mask and perhaps the clothes and posture of grown-ups, but inside ourskin we are never as wise or as sure or as strong as we want to convince ourselves and others we are. We may fool all the rest of the people all of the time, but we never fool our parents. They can see behind the mask of adulthood. To her mommy and daddy, the empress never has on any clothes--and knows it.” PeopleKnowsWantMayStrongParentBehindsGrowing UpWiseFoolClothesAdultsConvinceMaskAdulthoodDaddyPostureEmpressesMommy And Daddy Author:Frank Pittman
“The child who would be an adult must give up any lingering childlike sense of parental power, either the magical ability to solveyour problems for you or the dreaded ability to make you turn back into a child. When you are no longer hiding from your parents, or clinging to them, and can accept them as fellow human beings, then they may do the same for you.” GivingHumansMayChildrenProblemWould BeTurnsParentHuman BeingsAbilityAcceptingGrowing UpGiving UpAdultsFellowsHidingClingingChildlikeParentalLingering Author:Frank Pittman
“Parents can fail to cheer your successes as wildly as you expected, pointing out that you are sharing your Nobel Prize with a couple of other people, or that your Oscar was for supporting actress, not really for a starring role. More subtly, they can cheer your successes too wildly, forcing you into the awkward realization that your achievement of merely graduating or getting the promotion did not warrant the fireworks and brass band.” PeopleParentRolesFailingCoupleBandAchievementActressesExpectedRealizationPrizeCheerGraduatesAwkwardOscarsPointingPromotionNobelNobel PrizeWarrantsBrassFireworksBrass Bands Author:Frank Pittman
“Parents have subtle ways of humbling you, of reminding you of your origins, perhaps by showing up at the moment of your greatest glory and reminding you where you came from and demonstrating that you still have some of it between your toes.” WayStillsMomentsParentGlorySubtleToesRemindingHumblingShowing UpDemonstrating Author:Frank Pittman
“Parents vary in their sense of what would be suitable repayment for creating, sustaining, and tolerating you all those years, andwhat circumstances would be drastic enough for presenting the voucher. Obviously there is no repayment that would be sufficient . . . but the effort to call in the debt of life is too outrageous to be treated as anything other than a joke.” YearsEnoughWould BeLife IsParentEffortCircumstancesCreatingJokesDebtTreatedSufficientVaryOutrageousSuitablePresentingSustainingDrasticVouchersRepayment Author:Frank Pittman
“Some parents were awful back then and are awful still. The process of raising you didn't turn them into grown-ups. Parents who were clearly imperfect can be helpful to you. As you were trying to grow up despite their fumbling efforts, you had to develop skills and tolerances other kids missed out on. Some of the strongest people I know grew up taking care of inept, invalid, or psychotic parents--but they know the parents weren't normal, healthy, or whole.” PeopleKnowsTryingStillsWholeCareKidsTurnsGrowsProcessParentEffortGrowing UpGrewHealthySkillsNormalGrew UpToleranceDespiteAwfulHelpfulStrongestImperfectPsychotic Author:Frank Pittman
“In colonial America, the father was the primary parent. . . . Over the past two hundred years, each generation of fathers has hadless authority than the last. . . . Masculinity ceased to be defined in terms of domestic involvement, skills at fathering and husbanding, but began to be defined in terms of making money. Men had to leave home to work. They stopped doing all the things they used to do.” MenYearsTwoHomeLastsAmericaPastUsedFatherParentTermGenerationsSkillsAuthorityHundredDefinedPrimariesMaking MoneyMasculinityInvolvementOver The PastFathering Author:Frank Pittman
“Parents have to get over the idea that their children belong just to them; children are a family affair.” ChildrenIdeasParentFamilyAffairGet Over Author:Frank Pittman
“In considering the ledger equal, understand the greatest gift you have given your parents is the opportunity to raise you. The things a child gets from parents can't compare to the things a parent gets from raising a child. Only by experiencing this can you understand the degree to which children give meaning to parents' lives.” GivingChildrenOpportunityGivenParentEqualDegreesRaisesCompareConsideringRaising ChildrenGreatest Gifts Author:Frank Pittman
“There are great advantages to seeing yourself as an accident created by amateur parents as they practiced. You then have been left in an imperfect state and the rest is up to you. Only the most pitifully inept child requires perfection from parents.” ChildrenHas BeensStatesLeftParentSeeingAdvantagePerfectionAccidentsImperfectUp To YouSeeing Yourself Author:Frank Pittman
“The guys who fear becoming fathers don't understand that fathering is not something perfect men do, but something that perfects the man. The end product of child-raising is not the child but the parent.” MenChildrenEndsGuyFatherParentPerfectHe ManProductsBecomingDadParentingParenthoodRaising ChildrenBeing A ParentChildren And ParentsBeing A FatherPerfect ManParent ChildFatheringBecoming A FatherPerfect ParentsBecoming A Parent Author:Frank Pittman
“A man doesn't have to have all the answers; children will teach him how to parent them, and in the process will teach him everything he needs to know about life.” KnowsMenNeedsChildrenProcessParentAnswersTeachParenthood Author:Frank Pittman
“The end product of child raising is not the child but the parent.” ChildrenEndsParentProductsRaising ChildrenBeing A ParentChildren And ParentsBeing A FatherParent ChildFatheringBecoming A FatherBecoming A Parent Author:Frank Pittman
“Fathering is not something perfect men do, but something that perfects the man.” MenParentPerfectHe ManBeing A ParentBeing A FatherPerfect ManFatheringBecoming A FatherPerfect ParentsBecoming A Parent Author:Frank Pittman
“Each generation's job is to question what parents accept on faith, to explore possibilities, and adapt the last generation's system of values for a new age.” AgeJobsLastsValuesParentAcceptingGenerationsPossibilityNew Age Author:Frank Pittman
“Parents can make us distrust ourselves. To them, we seem always to be works-in-progress.” SeemsParentProgressDistrustWork In Progress Author:Frank Pittman
“No one, however powerful and successful, can function as an adult if his parents are not satisfied with him.” IfsParentPowerfulSuccessfulAdultsFunctionSatisfied Author:Frank Pittman
