What’s the best advice from your mom?

Mom and me in the early 90s.

“The Best Parenting Advice My Mom Gave Me” from the HuffPost and written by Taylor Pittman has nine quotes from staff members about what they learned from their moms, like “Never say, ‘My child will/would never do that.’”

Here are three more quotes from the article:

“The sink won’t remember if you cleaned it every night before bed. The laundry won’t mind staying unfolded for several days. The kids will remember time with Mom. Your husband will appreciate the 10 minutes you spend together.” ― Valeria Nijm

“Be willing to admit when you’ve made a mistake to your kids, and apologize.” ― Jen Hall

“This nugget came from my mom, who got it from her mother. If something bad happened, my grandmother would say, ‘Oh, well!’ She’s right, you just have to roll with the punches and move on from things.” ― Wendy Pitoniak

This article made me reflect on advice from my own mom. One of the best thing she’d stress to me was that she didn’t care about my grades, probably because she had so much pressure to be perfect and valedictorian.

The other thing she would say was that it was a parent’s job to let go and let your children fly out of the nest. She believed in a mostly hands-off approach and she said if she did a good job as my mother, her job would be over. Her goal was to be out of a job as the parent.

My parents were never overly involved but gave us plenty of real-life experience with chores and responsibilities. We suffered consequences for our own actions. I was highly motivated to do well in school and would set my alarm early before anyone would wake up, make myself coffee and study Chemistry every morning before school. Each day we would have a quiz and I would literally memorize my textbook so I would be guaranteed a seat near the top of the class. (The teacher came up with a new seating chart daily based on our cumulative scores.) My mom did nothing to make me do this. It was my own motivation.

She made sure I was prepared for adulting. I knew how to do the laundry, change a tire, check my oil, bank, grocery shop and cook. I never liked cleaning and my room was usually a disaster, but my parents didn’t care, so long as I kept the mess confined to my own room and shut the door. I had to keep the rest of the house clean and trade off vacuuming and cleaning the rest of the house with my brother.