Common Sense Parenting

By Paul Mullen

Human beings have been raising children for over 30,000 years. For all but a fraction of those years, they did this without resorting to childcare specialists, parenting classes, Dr. Phil or Oprah. How did they do it? The same way that you will. By using common sense.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Lulu.com
• Release date: Apr 25, 2016
• ISBN: 9781365024634

Book preview

Common Sense Parenting

Copyright © 2007 by Paul J. Mullen

All rights reserved.  No part of this publication may be reproduced or distributed in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

First Edition: 2007

Second Edition: 2016

ISBN: 978-1-365-02463-4

Front Cover:  1995 family vacation at Sequoia National Park.  Photo by Charles A Wills III.

Back Cover:  Homage to Thomas Paine, circa 1776.  I’m sure he would have written something just like this if not for two childless marriages.

There are four people that must be acknowledged right out of the gate for their contributions to this book.  You’ll see their names and come to learn more about them as you make your way through this book, so I might as well introduce them to you right now. 

First and foremost is Marilynn, my wife of 30 years (and counting!) and the mother of our three children.  Many of the common sense guidelines within this book are either her ideas or are guidelines that were inspired by her.  Marilynn graduated from college magna cum laude with a Bachelors of Science degree in Mathematics.  Immediately after our marriage, she landed a job as a Computer Scientist at Lockheed Electronics with a salary that was 40% higher than my salary at Prudential Insurance.  And this was back in 1977 when a woman made only about 60% of what her male counterparts made!  In short, Marilynn had an extremely bright future at Lockheed and in the computer industry in general.  My future, on the other hand, was not nearly as promising. 

When we decided to have children, Marilynn and I were in total agreement on one key point: one of us should stay at home with the kids.  Not all prospective parents reach this same conclusion, but both Marilynn and I believed that the constant presence of at least one parent was extremely important for the development of our children.  Money being a factor, I volunteered to be Mr. Mom years before the movie by the same name hit the screen.    Marilynn, showing the common sense that would guide many of our joint decisions, overruled me.  Although she had the better paying job, she also had all of the skills necessary to turn our house into a home.  She was a tremendous cook, she was skilled at sewing (she actually took a tailoring course and made me two three-piece suits!), and she had a host of other homemaking skills that I could only dream of acquiring.  So she stayed at home and I fought the corporate fight.  Years later, Marilynn rejoined the workforce, but only after our children were well out of their formative years.

The other three people that I have to acknowledge are my children:  Sara, Andy, and Dave. 

Sara was the perfect first child.  She was almost 4 years old when Andy was born and almost 6 years old when Dave was born.  Even though she no longer received all of our attention, there was never a jealous bone in Sara’s body.  In fact, she reacted in the exact opposite manner, becoming a third parent in many ways.  Here is a classic example of Sara’s early maturity:  In the summer of 1986, Marilynn and I decided to spend three weeks in Europe visiting my brother, Tom, in Paris.  At the time, Sara was almost 7, Andy was 3, and Dave was 1.  We left all three kids with their 69 year old Grandmom in New Hampshire!  How could we possibly do this??  Only because of our total faith that Sara would act as a quasi-parent and provide her Grandmom with all of the help needed to keep the boys in line. 

Andy and Dave are pretty close in age – only two years apart.  Sometimes, this closeness in age can be a problem, especially early on.  My brother, Tom, and I were about a year and a half apart and there were times where he definitely resented his little brother hanging around with his friends.  Dave and Andy never had that problem.  From the get-go, they were best friends and had similar interests:  soccer, lacrosse, Boy Scouts and, of course, video games.  Every now and then their wrestling in the family room would get out of control and tempers would rise, but those occasions were rare. 

All of our kids are grown and have gone their separate ways, but all of them keep in constant touch and enjoy each other’s company tremendously. 

There are a couple of other quick acknowledgements that must be made.  The extended Mullen family – brothers, sisters, aunts, uncles, cousins and all of their families – have been very important to the raising of our children.  We Mullens are a fairly tight-knit bunch and gather together a number of times each year.  The way that we interact has not been lost on our children.  They have grown up with a strong sense of family.

Marilynn’s side of the family, the Goedeckes, contributed as well.  Their solid New Hampshire morals and unparalleled work ethic provided our children with excellent role models.

And finally, I must acknowledge my parents. Neither one of them took care of themselves and both died way too early.  Mom smoked herself to death at age 60 and Dad drank himself to death at age 64.  Times weren’t always easy growing up in the Mullen household in Poughkeepsie.  Money was tight and the stress level was often high when my father was battling alcohol and manic depression.  Dad had trouble keeping a job and Mom had to work the third shift at St. Francis hospital in order to pay the