Snakes in the House: Parenting through Fear

First off, I loathe snakes, real ones and figurative ones. The figurative ones don’t scare me, but I am terrified of actual snakes. I don’t know if it started with my Irish Catholic upbringing and that damn talking snake that ruined it for everyone, or my friend who had a pet snake and loved taking it out to scare us. Either way, I have had an intense fear (ophidiophobia) of them for as long as I can remember.

What does that have to do with parenting? Well, my son got hurt yesterday. He broke a permanent front tooth in half playing on the monkey bars and it required an immediate trip to the dentist. She fixed him up and you can’t see any traces of the break, it is amazing what they can do. He is fine and all things considered it could have been much worse, but it hit me hard. I had just dropped him off and was walking into work when they called, how could he have gotten hurt that fast? It was a stark reminder that things can change in an instant, and I am not going to be able to protect him from the uncertainty of each moment. I am admittedly a helicopter parent, I can’t help it. I understand they have to learn to think for themselves, but why not have another set of eyes if you can.

Now, I am no philosopher and I may be looking too deep, but last night I had another one of my dreams about snakes. I have had these forever and the obvious explanation is that I am so obsessed with them that my subconscious spends my resting hours processing how much I hate them. Last night they were in my house, everywhere. I was trying to protect my family, but I couldn’t. I would grab one, which was disgusting even in a dream, and two more would slither out of nowhere and go into the kids room. I woke up legitimately shaken, this was more than just a dream to me. This was about my fears, helplessness, and being a father. I have been intrigued by snakes in dreams forever, and it is thought they could represent threats and loss of control. The timing on this one could not be chalked up to my mind playing tricks on me again. Whether it meant that or not, or if dreams mean anything at all is irrelevant, what matters is that’s how I interpreted it.

There is no manual for this parenting deal, every day is a new test that I didn’t study for. I come from a long line of worriers, it’s in my dna, it’s exhausting but I am who I am. I worry about people I don’t even know, so my family is always going to be on my mind. I see the snake that I couldn’t kill in my dream as my fear, fear of not being able to protect them from everything. But maybe the goal isn’t to eliminate fear, it’s learning how to use it, Tommy Fear is my friend. Rocky reference, sorry. Fear can keep us sharp. I am equally terrified of garter snakes and will scream at the same pitch as I would for a rattler. I am not a fearless tough guy, I’m just a regular dude that loves his family to pieces.  I would gladly sit in a room full of snakes if it meant my kids would never experience pain. I certainly don’t have this parenting thing figured out, and some days that is very apparent. What I do know is that my purpose on this earth is to raise these two little rug rats and keep them safe at all cost. There ain’t a rattlesnake, or copperhead, or black mamba that could scare me away from my mission. The snakes will always be there, but so will I, every damn day, so I hope they packed lunch.