YOU AND YOUR PARENTS.

how things actually work...

As a child, whether you came to your family by birth or adoption, you discover what a family is through the experiences of family life. As a new-born infant, you have no way of knowing which of the faces that hover above you belongs to your parents. You have no way of knowing what a parent is. You only know that you're comfortable or uncomfortable, hungry or satisfied.

Gradually, as the months go by, you begin to know who brings comfort when you're uncomfortable and food when you're hungry. You come to know through feel of the arm that holds you close when you eat and holds you safe in your bath. You know the voice that soothes you and sings to you.

You grow to know who responds to your needs when you cry out. This is the special person in the whole strange new world who belongs specially to you. This is your first recognition of a parent.

Your mother and father who care for you, who listen for your voice and try to interpret what you mean, who comfort you, feed you and play with you discover for the first time what it is to be parents. They do not become parents by virtue of conception and birth alone. They grow to be parents just as you as an infant grows to recognize them as such.

They come to know the developing personality of you, their child in a way that no other person really can. They recognize whether you're a lusty eater or a nibbler, vivacious or reserved, adventurous or cautious. By observing your intellectual and physical abilities, they also get to know what you may become in future, although that is mainly reserved for Allah. They're concerned with meeting your needs and wants; (except of course, irresponsible parents) and fostering your growth to maturity.

At times, because of their responsibility to you, their child, parents have to do unpleasant things. They have, for instance, to take you for injections. You as a child or infant can have no choice about taking medicine when you're ill. You must learn quickly and not necessarily at your own pace, that fire is not a play-thing (lol). In the intimacies of daily living, you the child and your parents learn the bitter and the sweet of family relations. It is through the experiences of family life that you as a child and your parents grow to be a family.

Therefore, For every parent, be it biological or adoptive, it is the daily loving care of the child and his responsiveness that build up the parents' feelings. For every child, it is being loved and being cared for that produces family closeness.

May God help us to respect, love and adore our parents for whoever they are, In Shaa Allaah. Aameen.