Another one of our kids currently has his driver’s permit, so I’ve started contriving opportunities for him to get behind the wheel and chip away at the required practice hours. Often these means are practical, like when he chauffeured us to his own dentist appointment thirty miles away yesterday afternoon, and other times, not so much, like when I had him drive me out of town earlier in the day to my favorite coffee shop—literally for muffins and a yummy drink.
Cruising along Illinois Route 336, the RoadReady app opened up on my phone in order to track my son’s time, we were heading back home, an iced latte perched in the nearby cupholder, when the DJ on the radio began talking about motherhood. He theorized that moms in the 1980’s arguably faced more trials than parents during other points in history. It’s the sort of foolhardy opinion I tend to take with a grain of salt, but it did cause me to stop and think.
Certainly, my mom and dad—parents of kids born in 1983, ’84, and ‘85—encountered plenty of circumstances unique to their generation. As that morning’s radio host pointed out, this particular era of parenthood had moms and dads traversing the world with only paper maps, not GPS, and they didn’t have any kind of resources to track their kids’ whereabouts—no cell phones, no fancy apps. For that matter, they watched movies from plastic rectangles that had to be rewound before being returned to the local Family Video, and waited weeks to find out if they’d actually captured anything worthwhile on their 35mm cameras.
But I’d say those of us raising families in 2026 face some fairly complex plights, too—wouldn’t you agree, fellow NeeDoh and “viral mystery dumpling”-era moms and dads?
In the early 1990’s, you would likely have found me poring over TaleSpin reruns on a Saturday morning, or episodes of Chip ‘N Dale, while today’s youth are caught up watching the latest videos from Youtubers and ogling with intense admiration how many millions of subscribers they have. Anyone can film anything anywhere, and just like that, with a couple of clicks, our kids are susceptible to all of it. (The only home movies I grew up with access to were the ones submitted to Bob Saget for America’s Funniest Home Videos.) Even electronic games pose a threat to our kids, furnishing them with online chat rooms, and what about Snapchat, and this unspoken addiction that our youth seem to have to their phones?
Wouldn’t it be fairer to say that this parenting job (and life itself) is challenging no matter which decade you find yourself in? Whether a person’s kids grew up years ago, washing their clothes in galvanized tubs and posing stone-faced for black-and-white photographs, or they’re presently obsessed with recording themselves performing the latest TikTok trends in order to attract followers, parenthood brims nonetheless with oh-so-very-many hard things. Not one of us has it easier than others.
We keep going, though, because there’s something compelling us to; I think it’s God-given, this determination to protect and love our children.
When I was a teen, first learning how to drive, we logged our behind-the-wheel hours with a pen and a wrinkly, easily misplaced sheet of paper. As my son and I finally arrived back home after getting in some driving time, I saved his progress in my phone with a simple click—grateful for the technology available to me as a mom today.
A resident of McDonough County, Erin Eddy lives in Macomb with her husband, Mike, their five boys, and two zealous Australian Shepherds. She aspires to uplift readers, penning stories of encouragement and everyday life. Her work has been featured on the influential website Her View From Home, as well as the book series Chicken Soup for the Soul. Contact [email protected].
