I’m guilty – are you too?
No, not talking about murder here, but the smaller crime of being hooked onto our mobile phones.
I’m a working mum – and especially because I work from home, I need to be connected to my colleagues around the world at all times. But at the same time, I choose to work from home so I can also be with my kids. Yet, my phone is always in my hand, if not, in my pocket, in my bag or very close to me – at all times.
Sometimes (actually, quite often, because I’m not a perfect parent), my phone and the information it gives out, takes priority over my kids and the messages they want to give me. I feel terribly guilty at the time telling myself I’ll never do it again, but then I go ahead and repeat it.
Reality has a way of slapping you on the face very hard when the time is right – and this dad’s post is just the wake up call I needed.
“Don’t let your phone make you a sh##%y parent”
Popular blogger Brad Kearns of DaDMum describes a scenario all too familiar to all parents.
He was on Facebook when his 3-year-old son Knox came up to him, wanting his attention.
“He was trying to show me one of his cars,” Brad explains. “I didn’t even look up from my phone when I replied, ‘Wow mate that’s a cool one.’ He continued to stand in front of me. He started saying ‘Hi.’ I said ‘Hi’ back at him a few times but he didn’t stop. He got another toy and kept trying to get my attention.”
The little boy finally went away and played with his brother, but it didn’t take long for the reality of what just happened to hit Brad real hard.
“I hadn’t seen him in two days due to my work hours,” he shares. “He was bored and he missed me and he just wanted my attention. Yet there I was ‘too busy’ to even look up. And I dismissed him.”
He also reveals that he was being the type of dad he never wanted to be. So he put the phone down. And he asked his little boy to play with him.
The little guy’s “entire face lit up”, says Brad, and “he said ‘sure’ and scooched over to make room for me next to him,” he continues. “We played all day and I left my phone on the bench.”
You can read the full post below. Here’s to less phone-time and more positive parenting moments!
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