PARENTING AND KIDS ON A LEASH

Posted by Mike Foster: Melissa Catherine Smith-Means of Alabama was charged with a felony for dragging her child through a Verizon Wireless store.

YOU CAN CLICK HERE TO SEE THE VIDEO.

Melissa lost it. She screwed up and it didn't help having it all captured by a cell phone camera. Now millions of people have watched her be a bad Mom on YouTube. It is every parent's worst nightmare!

But as I watched the video and read the story I thought to myself...you know what...though I hate to admit it...I've lost it too.

If you are a parent (and you are honest) you're probably in this club. It is that moment where you go nuts and become some crazy whacked out parent.

You slip into the pissed-off-postal-I've-had-it-with-this-screaming-kid-of-mine-mode. It's never pretty.

I know as a parent I've been on the edge of doing something I would regret.

Am I saying it's cool to drag your kid through a Verizon wireless store? Nope. Is this a felony and classified as child abuse? I will leave that to the lawyers.

But do I understand that moment that Melissa found herself in? Yes I do!

The anger. The flood of emotions. The losing your cool. Oh, yes I can relate.

I use to get really ticked on airplanes when kids went into bratty kid mode. These little munchkins screamed so loud that even my Bose noise canceling headphones could not drown out their yelling.

I wondered why these parents couldn't shut their kids up and control them.

I thought all of this until...MIKE FOSTER BECAME A PARENT. Now when I'm on a plane I have more grace and understanding. Both for the child and the parent.

Perspective is a powerful tool for unleashing grace. At the very least it slows up our judgment.

No doubt Melissa will have face consequences for her actions.

But as People of the Second Chance let us always be straining and working hard to put ourselves in the perpetrators shoes.

Why? Because whether we admit it or not, all of us in some aspects of our own life have done the same heinous acts.