How do my children see me?

I am always fascinated by what my children think of me as a parent. Whenever we watch Wife Swap I make them place me on the line from one freaky parent to another, always wondering which way my mothering scales are tipping.

It can be hard to get the right balance.

Being a single parent makes it especially hard, as you somehow have to blend the two roles into one – good cop and bad cop become one flakey, inconsistent cop, who will let you eat M&Ms for lunch one day, (peanuts = one of your five a day surely?), and then go mad at you the next when you don’t eat your wholemeal bread crusts.

It is probably a sign of some deeper rooted insecurities, reminiscent of the hours I spent as a teenager fantasising about giving the whole school a compulsory questionnaire to find out exactly what percentage of people liked me.

(That sounds far more disturbing now I’ve written it down. Let’s move quickly on.)

This week though I got the chance to see, quite literally, how Belle sees me, as she drew me this:

Slummy Single Mummy portrait

I rather like it. It has a casual seriousness to it, the peering over the glasses, concentrating hard on who knows what. I love the expression she captures, not bad given we were in a cafe and she was sketching in felt tips.

Do you ever wonder about how your children see you? How would you like them to think of you?

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7 Comments

  1. 18 April, 2012 / 8:55 pm

    The Boy and I (see? I can do grammar) were reading a book about why animal young loved their mummies the other day. I asked him why he loved me (assuming he did) and he said, “Because you help me make things.” I’m happy with that, especially as I thought he saw me as a shouty mum

  2. 18 April, 2012 / 9:37 pm

    Love the drawing of you! Ha! Can’t wait to see drawings of me (my Little One is 2).
    I relate very well to the good cop/bad cop dilemma… Difficult time!
    Sometimes I would like to fast-forward 20 years to ask my grown up boy, “Am I doing OK?” then rewind back!

    Michelle x

    http://www.keungzai.com
    The online maternity boutique

  3. 19 April, 2012 / 11:08 am

    She’s a budding Picasso!

  4. 19 April, 2012 / 11:27 am

    Love it! I have a drawing of me and one of my other half stuck to my fridge, both drawn by his 11 year old daughter. In both cases we are younger, slimmer and more attractive in the pictures than in real life. Which is encouraging :)

  5. 20 April, 2012 / 5:14 pm

    That is a really good picture. I wish I had artistic talent. Oh well, I’ll stick to painting with words.

    • 20 April, 2012 / 6:02 pm

      It IS good isn’t it? I was terribly impressed, I am rubbish at drawing people. I can do plants, but that’s because they don’t have faces.

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