From Resilience to Triumph: What I’ve Learned About Parenting Since October 7

If you’re Jewish and you care about Israel, everything has been a little more difficult since October 7. Even parenting has become more challenging. Many of us are on edge because we constantly have the hostages and the war in Gaza in the back of our minds, and that can affect how we parent and how we deal with challenges our kids may face in school or with friends.

Not that it’s ever easy, but something about the last ten months has made it even harder. This fall, my son is starting his second year of middle school—the most notoriously difficult time of many people’s lives. I don’t know one person who has good memories of that time period. I certainly don’t, except for the year I had a pair of red suede boots with a matching red suede jacket. I still remember the thrill of walking across the cafeteria in that ensemble, almost but not entirely oblivious to the giggles coming from one table of my peers.

Being on the other side of the middle school experience, as a parent, has been surreal. These kids are in the trenches, and one of the hardest decisions we make as parents is when to get into the trenches with them and when to look them in the eye and say, “You’ve got this. You can handle this on your own.”

Last year school was a real emotional warzone. A few children taunted my son with anti-Israel slogans or told him that October 7 is a hoax; others made blatantly anti-Jewish statements. One child, who I’ll call the rumor mill, regularly makes up stories about other kids that spread like wild fire and are never fully extinguished. He’s like a less murderous version of Little Finger in “Game of Thrones,” planting stories in different groups and trying to appear helpful but leaving flames in his wake. It was only a matter of time before my son got to star in one of these fictional stories. And then there are the most painful challenges: betrayals by friends. Most of us remember the sting of being betrayed by a friend at this age. It’s just a really disappointing time.

And then there are the difficult conversations (or non-conversations) with other parents—sometimes those are worse than whatever incident with your child prompted the conversation. Add to all this the group WhatsApp or other messaging threads, video game and TikTok obsessions, and social media flirtations and it’s the perfect storm. It goes without saying that for many of us, the summer break was a necessary escape from many of these challenges. But as summer is winding down and many schools are already back in session, it’s important to revisit the struggles of the last school year and think about how we can move from what I call “the year of resilience” to the “year of triumph.”

Learn How to Own Up to Your Mistakes

Kids are going to make mistakes over and over again, even the “good” kids, and especially in middle school, which means it’s early enough that we have a lot of opportunities to teach and guide them. One big mistake I’ve seen kids make repeatedly is sending messages with inappropriate text, images, or sounds. I’ve heard of more than one instance where a child sends a sexually explicit message, audio recording, or image to another child. Some parents blame the influence of other kids or dismiss the behavior because the kids are still young and don’t intend to act on anything; other parents argue that the kids don’t really know what it means so it’s not a big deal. “It’s not like they’re 16 years old,” I heard one parent say.

But, as one of my friends recently pointed out, this is exactly why it’s so important that parents treat these instances very seriously. Kids need to understand that while it may not seem like a big deal at this age, sending explicit messages as an older teenager (or as an 18-year-old to a 17-year-old) can bring life-changing repercussions. Now is the time to help children become accountable for the messages and content they put into the world—not just because there are repercussions, but also because, especially as Jews, we value the idea of responsibility. At a moment when Jews everywhere are dealing with elevated antisemitism, we want to teach our children to put things that are meaningful into the world.

Most parents are invested in their child’s success and happiness. I’ve observed that it can be hard for a parent to admit when their child isn’t being a good friend or is making bad choices. But these acknowledgments are extremely important at the middle school age because once kids hit high school they are more inclined to model their behavior on the actions of their friends than their parents. Accepting that your child has made a mistake and showing them what it looks like to take responsibility is modeling the kind of behavior that you want them to take into personal and professional relationships in the future.

When your child makes a mistake, own it. I can’t think of anything more important when it comes to setting up your child up for success. It also goes for dealing with difficult parents. Always ask yourself: Am I contributing to the problem or is there something I could have done differently to experience a more positive outcome? Teach your kids to do the same. And at the end of the day, don’t hold grudges. Teach your children to work toward repair rather than revenge when it comes to friendships. Everyone is deserving of kindness.

It’s Okay to Create a Few Boundaries

Working toward repair is always ideal, but not every friendship needs to last. Sometimes a friendship can’t be fully repaired, but making a gesture toward repair will go a long way. And if your gesture is spurned, you know you’ve done your best. Every once in a while you will encounter someone with toxic behavior. Teach your children that it is healthy to create boundaries between themselves and these people. But also teach them that even once a boundary is created, kids may change for the better and come back around. It’s okay for kids to give former friends who may have hurt them another chance. After all, they’re still growing and learning and changing. This, too, is part of understanding how to establish healthy boundaries. Cutting friends off when they make a mistake, especially if there is an apology, is not always the best course of action.

Don’t Be Afraid to Meddle

When my son started a new school last year, one student was antagonistic for no reason. We talked about it at home, and my husband and I did our best to arm our son with strategies to get through it. The trick was helping him to find the balance between not allowing others to treat him disrespectfully and not turning into a jerk himself. There were many times I wanted to call the school or reach out to the parents. But I didn’t. I knew in my gut that this was something he was going to have to work through himself. “There are jerks everywhere you go in life,” I said, “and this is the year you figure out how to deal with them.”

It took a while, but by the end of the year the two had become friendly. One day the other child was blown away by my son’s 21-second 3×3 cube solve and that opened the door to a friendship. Had I gotten involved or requested that my son be moved from classes with this child, I don’t know that it would’ve ended as well. Learning that people can change for the better is important. And knowing that someone who seemed unkind at first can end up turning things around and becoming a friend is even more important.

We should teach kids that it’s imperative to stand up for themselves, but it’s equally critical to help them understand that sometimes it’s okay to give a little grace. We don’t know what every child is going through. It goes for parents as well. Sometimes people are going through difficult times that make it hard for them to parent in the way they should, much to our frustration. But understanding and identifying this will help us manage our own expectations and feel less frustrated with parents who aren’t dealing appropriately with their children’s behavior.

But not every negative interaction between children can be solved without parent intervention. Sometimes you have to meddle a bit. In one instance last year we were forced to intervene by reaching out to a parent because our son received a pornographic audio message from another child. This was after months of unkind behavior, and when we realized our son was in constant distress because of this, we reached out to the other parents. It was important that our son see how seriously we take inappropriate behavior online. It was important that he understand that it won’t be tolerated by us and that he shouldn’t tolerate it either. Another parent suggested that we were “meddling,” and that we should stay out of it, but when it comes to this kind of behavior at this age, you have to get involved.

Hard Parenting

Don’t be afraid to parent hard, and don’t be afraid to take screens away from kids. In his new book “The Anxious Generation” Jonathan Haidt shows us how drastic the effects of smartphone and social media usage on children’s mental health have been. Add to this the fact that much of the school bullying now takes place on messaging threads and the threat is real. And kids who play Fortnite—which is a lot of middle school age kids, especially boys—have demonstrated extremely troubling behavior as a result of the game. We limited screen time for our son quite a bit this year and the difference was profound. He even began to notice the negative effects on some of his friends who spend a lot of time online, on smartphones, or playing Fortnite. As he observed this, he articulated on his own that he doesn’t want to be like that and has consequently learned how to limit some of these activities on his own. Unfortunately, he also learned that especially since October 7 the amount of antisemitism on threads, social media, and gaming spaces has grown exponentially. So limiting screen time may also mean limiting exposure to antisemitism.

Most of the lessons I’ve learned have nothing to do with being Jewish. They apply to everyone. But everything has been heightened the past ten months because we are in a constant state of urgency. It feels like fight-or-flight on steroids. So when my son tells me that someone at school said something horrible to him I feel a rage creep up inside me that isn’t connected entirely to what he’s telling me. It’s connected to the pain and fear and anger that I have felt every day since October 7. I’m not Israeli. I don’t live in Israel. But my heart is there every second of every day. I can’t help but think of a group of family members of hostages who recently went to the border of Gaza to scream their loved ones’ names over a loudspeaker. I listen to mothers Shira Elbag, whose daughter Liri is still held hostage in Gaza, and Rachel Goldberg-Polin, whose son Hersh, a hostage who was murdered by Hamas, scream their children’s names. “It’s Mama, Hersh,” says Goldberg-Polin. We now know that Hersh was likely alive at this time, only to be brutally executed shortly after: The pain of longing and not knowing if your child is alive or hungry or being tortured becomes the pain of loss, the knowledge that you will now carry the heavy stone of his absence forever. I listen to the pain in these voices; I see the agony on their faces. Whatever challenges my son faces in middle school pale in comparison to what these mothers are going through, and what their children have gone through.

We share in the pain of the parents whose days are measured in moments of wondering if their children are alive and if they are suffering, of wondering when they will see them again. We also share in the suffering of parents whose children have been tortured and murdered. We are angry on their behalf, but also because we know that the same people who brutalized and stole these children would do the same to ours if they had the chance. National borders and boundaries mean little when the hatred of Jews is what drives their murderous impulses. I am angry. I am in mourning. And yet I feel guilty because, just this morning, I had the gift of sending my smiling Jewish son off to his first day of seventh grade.

We should be angry. We should grieve and mourn. But we must also remember that we have an imperative to live. Unlike the terrorists that try to torture, torment, and kill us, we value life. As a people, Jews value responsibility, and we have a responsibility to put good into the world even as we acknowledge and fight back against the darkness. This, too, is a lesson I have learned in the past ten months. And it’s a lesson we must also teach our children. We can’t shield our older children from the horrors of the past year. All we can do is help them understand that this violence is both useless and senseless, but that it is our burden to bear. This, too, is what it means to be Jewish. And perhaps by guiding them through the darkness, they will be better equipped to see the light.

This fall, we—both parents and children—carry an immense burden with us into the school year. I don’t want to lead with that anger when it comes to parenting my son. I want to lead with compassion and grace rather than being defensive and angry, always ready for a fight. When we do this, we bring love and light into a world that is very dark right now. Our children feel this darkness and this stress. But if we can try to counter it with strength and love, we can be a light unto the nations. This school year may still require a bit of resilience building, but if we can temper it in this way, we can make it a year of triumph.

Monica Osborne is a former professor of literature, critical theory, and Jewish studies. She is Editor at Large at The Jewish Journal and is author of “The Midrashic Impulse.” X @DrMonicaOsborne