How My Son Healed the Child in Me

When I look back on my childhood, I’m reminded of its quiet simplicity. We didn’t have fancy vacations, the latest toys, or closets full of new clothes. What we had was something harder to wrap in a bow but infinitely more lasting: love. 

My world was shaped by church pews, Sunday dinners, and the closeness of family. I have four siblings who were my first friends, and cousins who turned every visit into a celebration. Those nights of laughter that stretched too long, the games that no one wanted to end, the comfort of falling asleep knowing you were surrounded by people who saw you and loved you, that was our version of adventure. It wasn’t lavish, but it was enough. In truth, it was everything. 

Years later, when my son was small, I found myself standing at a crossroads between what I had known and what I had longed for. I wanted to give him pieces of the world I didn’t have access to, road trips, flights, new places, experiences that expanded the edges of childhood wonder. But I also wanted him to feel the same steady roots that grounded me: the warmth of family, the safety of love, the assurance that home was always there waiting for him. 

In raising him, something unexpected happened. His laughter didn’t just fill our home; it echoed into the corners of my own childhood, waking memories I thought I had tucked away. His questions reminded me of the curiosity I once had. His joy became my healing, a chance to rewrite the gaps in my own story, not by erasing them, but by blending them with something new. 

Now that he is grown, I see the beauty in the balance we created. He carries both the rootedness of love and the wide-open wings of experience. And in that, I realize parenting is not just about guiding our children. It’s also about being transformed by them. Through my son, I was able to live my childhood twice: once in the quiet ways of my youth, and again in the brighter colors of his. 

Maybe that’s the hidden gift of parenthood, that our children don’t just inherit our stories, they soften them, expand them, and sometimes even complete them.