Reply To: Going off the Derech

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MDG-wow! You seem incredibly perceptive, you might have just touched on something. I do remember years ago, my husband would complain about my son not staying in the shul for all the tefillah, or not praying, or not sitting near him. I told him to just focus on the positive, and forget anything negative. It got to the point where my son didn’t want to daven in his Shul anymore. Then sometimes, they’d argue about it at home. Do you think this could be part of the problem? But my husband is not really the demanding type. I think he just expected that my son should do what other kids his age were doing. He’s always been loving to the kids.

I agree with you that he doesn’t feel he can accomplish, and has poor self esteem. But this doesn’t blend with the fact that we have always believed in our son, recognizing his amazing talents, intelligence etc. We have always been so verbal about how great we think he is, and it’s sincere. How come he didn’t hear it?

msseeker-as much as I would never want to endanger my other children, chas v’shalom, I’m sure that throwing my son out of the house would guarantee that he would never come back to the derech. I’m still hoping that he feels that we love him and believe in him. We may very well be his only positive connection to yiddishkeit, and by throwing him out, I’m afraid it would be severed.