My wife and I have five children, all born in quick succession. I grew up with two brothers and three sisters, and I thought I knew what it meant to be a parent: loving your children, trying to guide them, and showing them what is meaningful and precious in life.

One of them, however, was already trying to get away with as much as he could by the age of four. I managed to keep him under control and everything went well until he turned 15. Parents of teenagers will understand me. While at secondary school, he started getting into trouble with the wrong crowd. He began taking drugs and staying out late at night. I would always wait for him to come home to give him a good telling-off, but it seemed as though my words just went in one ear and out the other. He was very stubborn, so I took his keys away and went out to meet him every evening. However, the more I tried to correct him, the more our dialogue faded away.

As time went on, things got worse: he started talking back to me and his other siblings. I was heartbroken and didn’t know what to do. Talking it over with my wife gave me a new perspective: ‘You’re judging him. Stop doing that!’

At first I told myself: ‘I’m not judging him. I love him and that’s why I’m trying to help him.’ But I trusted my wife and realised there was some truth in her words. Together we realised that the right approach might be to treat him with the same respect and dignity as his brothers.

So I made a conscious effort to put aside all the disappointment and pain that had begun to build up inside me, to start afresh with him and see him in a new light – as a young man navigating uncharted waters. I set aside my own expectations and began to listen to him deeply, to welcome his ideas and concerns. Unexpectedly, he surprised me by saying he wanted to go to university – he who never did his homework.

He sat the entrance exam for the University of Illinois and scored well above average: simply by sitting in class at secondary school, he had learnt it all. At the time I was working in Chicago, so I could drop him off at university at 7 am and pick him up after work. During our daily journeys we had long chats and, after a short while, he began asking me for advice – something that hadn’t happened since he was ten!

One evening I heard him talking to his brothers: he was saying they had to stick together and help one another. I couldn’t believe it! I’d thought he only cared about himself, but instead he was showing a different side to himself. Our relationship continued to grow, and I felt that he had more and more respect for me, just as I did for him.

After that, my wife and I decided to move to New York with our two youngest children, leaving the three eldest in Chicago. The son I once thought was the worst turned out to be the one who looked after his brothers and sisters and cared for them just as a mother or father would have done.

My wife’s wisdom has helped me a great deal. With our other children too, I’ve realised that I need to set aside judgement and try to understand them when they do things differently from what I expect. I’ve found that, in this way, respect becomes mutual and lays the foundations for a deeper sharing of what’s happening in our lives.

(Source: From Family in Action – Città Nuova – 2022)

• Questions for family discussions
• What is one thing my child would like me to understand today?
• When I feel tempted to judge, what can I do to stop myself?
• What small gesture can I make this week to show trust?