Why Parents Really do Save or Destroy the World

Lately I have been trying to prepare myself for motherhood and what I thought would be the inevitable discouragement that would follow from not feeling like I was contributing to the world in any way. Last week changed my mind....and I will tell you why!

Last week we had a preliminary hearing in our courtroom for 5 separate cases and 50 total counts of aggravated sexual abuse of a child/sodomy upon a child. The perpetrator was a mild looking man in his mid-forties-- harmless looking. He had made friends with each one of these boys who had ranged in age from 10 to 15. Some of them were neighbors and some he had befriended while at the local rec center. He made friends with them, then offered them work, and then invited them over to his house for the night...

As each child testified I began to see a common theme. Most of them came from broken homes and some had already experienced some kind of child abuse in their lives. Most of them lived in trailers and were very poor (which in part explained why so many of them were willing to accept employment from this man). One boy had been kicked out of his own home by his stepfather when he didn't put up with the stepfather's abuse of the boy's mother. Some of these boys were now going to alternative high schools because they had failed so many classes or had been expelled from their regular school. Many of them were now into pornography.

One of the boys, during testimony stated "when I disobeyed my dad I got a beating, but thats like how all kids are...."

As sickened as it made me, I felt resolved toward my own changing status of a mother. I know that I can't control everything that happens to my children and I know that I cannot protect them from everything. But I know I can provide a good home for them and provide for their physical needs. I can help them to feel safe and secure within their own family. I can teach them what is right and provide love and encouragement. I can be the kind of parent where my children will not look outside of their own family for stability and structure and happiness.

I thought, "if these boys had first had a good home, and parents who were attentive...who knows what might have been avoided."

I now know that parents do change the world, in a way that is more far reaching than anything I have ever done in the law or through my education. I can save the world...for my children and any others I can reach!