A bit depressing...

I feel a bit bad about bringing anyone down but this has REALLY been playing on my mind this morning.

The paper this morning says that 32 people have been killed in another uni shooting in the US.

And then (and this is the one that got to me) a TWELVE year old girl was raped in Hastings. She snuck out, her parents thought she was safely tucked up in bed.

As a mum, these things play on my mind a lot. I wonder what kind of world I am bringing my kids into and what they will face. As parents, what can we do to keep our children safe? How can we keep them happy and healthy when this is what happens in the world? How do we teach our children to keep themselves safe?

I heard that on the news last night about the 12 year old girl and news this morning about the Uni in the USA.

In a perfect world (which I am sure we would all love to live in) these things just wouldn't happen.
Its so sad that it has and you think of the victims and family and what they must be going thru.

Bad things happen to good people, without rhyme or reason. My parents each had older siblings born while there was a world war (2) on, and yet my grandparents still had the hope that the world their children was born into would be a good one, made so by the contribution that their children made by being raised in a loving environment. I was born while the war in Vietnam was still being fought and young people around the world were being sent there. Sean was born during the first desert storm (Iraq) and Andrew and Connor have been born while one of my cousins has been serving in Iraq in the Aussie military. In the time that I've been writing this long winded reply, I'm sure that hundreds of people have died in the Sudan and more people still if I extend the category to 'victims of violent crime'. The way that I get through it all is by trying to live my life in a good way, raising children that are empathetic to the needs of others and wherever possible doing more good than harm to other people. And remember - for all of the horrible things that are happening, in the time that I've taken to write this too long reply, hundreds of new lives around the world would have started, and with them, new hope.

emeldee wrote: in the time that I've taken to write this too long reply, hundreds of new lives around the world would have started, and with them, new hope.

now that thought does help put it in perspective...

i worry about what kind of world am i bringing my kids up to live in too. i suppose all you can do is try your best to bring your kids up well and teach them the good stuff. sometimes i try and shut my eyes to it all and pretend it isnt all happening and concentrate on us and our little world - you know, getting up, playgroup, the library, having luch with friends.

i am very glad too tho that i live in NZ and not somewhere like iran, east timor, afghanistan, ethiopia, anywhere that death and famine and war are common place.

i guess too worrying about the everyday stuff is enough sometimes, like what if he ran out on the road or choked on something or had a reaction to a bee sting or fell in the bath or lost his sight...

too many things to stress about without the state of the world to add to it.

Edited by gandt

I guess the thing that really gets to me is that as a parent I can do everything possible to help my kids grow up to be good people, but they can be the best people in the world and still have something terrible happen to them. I guess you just have to hope?

I am going to donate eggs soon and one of them women I am hoping to donate to cannot conceive her own children as a result of a home invasion attack, how people can do things like that I just don't know? (the attack, not the lack of being able to conceive?!)

It probably doesn't help with my perceptions of NZ with Andy being a cop, needless to say he doesn't see the best of society of a regular basis!

Anyway, just rambling. It is just something that is upsetting me at the moment... (damn PMS!)