“I’m not sure I understand or agree with this,” my mother said to me last Tuesday. She was watching my daughter negotiate her own bedtime.
In my mother’s world, children don’t negotiate. Parents decide, children obey, and the structure keeps everyone safe. She raised me that way in Soviet Ukraine, where obedience wasn’t a parenting style, it was a survival strategy.
In the world Jerome and I built over twelve years in San Francisco and are now continuing in Paris, our children are encouraged to question, to advocate for themselves, to push back respectfully. We want them to practice having a voice before the world asks them to use it.
My mother thinks this is dangerous. I think her way would silence them. We are both operating from love, and we are both certain the other is wrong.
Most evenings when we’re not traveling, three generations sit down at one table. My Ukrainian parents, who moved countries four times in their lives and are now living with us in Paris. My French husband Jerome, who grew up with his own set of family rules and cultural expectations. Our three children, who switch between French, English, and Russian without thinking about it, navigating four cultural worlds before they finish their homework.
My parents carry traditional values. Clear hierarchies, established roles, respect for convention. Jerome and I felt most at home in San Francisco, where people question everything from religion to parenting. Our kids are growing up between these two approaches, watching their grandparents’ certainty meet their parents’ constant questioning.
My father thinks Jerome is too permissive. Jerome thinks my father underestimates the kids. My mother worries I travel too much. I worry she worries too much. The children absorb all of it, and sometimes they play one generation against another with a sophistication that impresses and terrifies me.
Last Tuesday, the bedtime negotiation started during dinner. My daughter had a test the next day and wanted to study, but also wanted extra reading time. She presented her case: if she went to bed thirty minutes later, she could review her notes and still read a chapter of her book.
My mother’s face tightened. I could see her jaw set. In her world, bedtime is bedtime – not a debate topic.
I felt the familiar heat in my chest. The urge to defend my parenting, to explain why letting her negotiate is actually teaching her critical thinking and self-advocacy. My hands tensed around my fork.
Jerome caught my eye across the table. A tiny shake of his head. Not now.
I took a breath.
My daughter kept going, undeterred by her grandmother’s expression. She listed her reasons, asked if we could compromise, suggested fifteen extra minutes instead of thirty.
My mother’s face tightened. I could see her jaw set. In her world, bedtime is bedtime – not a debate topic.
I felt the familiar heat in my chest. The urge to defend my parenting, to explain why letting her negotiate is actually teaching her critical thinking and self-advocacy. My hands tensed around my fork.
Jerome caught my eye across the table. A tiny shake of his head. Not now.
I took a breath.
My daughter kept going, undeterred by her grandmother’s expression. She listed her reasons, asked if we could compromise, suggested fifteen extra minutes instead of thirty.
My mother stood up and started clearing plates, moving a bit more quietly than usual. She was listening, even if she wasn’t commenting.
After the kids went upstairs – my daughter with her fifteen extra minutes and her satisfied smile – my mother and I sat together in the kitchen with our tea.
“In Ukraine, children respected their parents,” she said, not as a criticism but as an observation.
“She does respect us,” I said. “She just also knows how to speak up.”
My mother nodded slowly, turning her cup in her hands. “I know. I see it. I just worry sometimes.”
“What do you worry about?”
She paused, looking down at her tea. “That she will think she can negotiate with everyone, and the world will not always let her.”
“Maybe. But she’ll know how to try. She’ll know her voice matters.”
My mother looked up at me. “You are teaching her to be brave. I taught you to be careful. Both can be right.”
“Both can be right,” I agreed.
I’ve been asking people for years whether you can stay connected to someone you deeply disagree with on fundamental values. The answer lives in my own kitchen.
The same conversations happen again and again. I bite my tongue more often than feels comfortable. I sometimes lie awake wondering if I’m doing it right – too permissive, not permissive enough, confusing my kids by giving them mixed messages from two generations.
In Loving Conflict, I write about the Rule of Us – the idea that in any relationship worth keeping, there is something larger than any individual’s position. In our house, that “something larger” is the family itself. It doesn’t require my parents to agree with my parenting or Jerome to agree with my father’s worldview.
Every evening we’re home, we sit together at the same table. My father tells stories about the world. My mother insists everyone eat more. Jerome makes dinner. The kids argue about something in French that none of the grandparents fully understand. It is chaotic and loud and imperfect.
We stay.
My mother still worries about different things than I do. I still make choices she wouldn’t make. Last Tuesday, after the bedtime negotiation and the kitchen conversation, we drank tea together and she told me about a phone call with her sister in California.
The disagreement doesn’t disappear. But neither does the closeness.
This story is included in my book Loving Conflict: Creating Collaboration Where Others See Division, launching March 31. If you want to support the launch, you can pre-order now at annalecat.com/book and leave a review when it comes out. Every review helps get this work into more hands.