From http://www.free-
sermons.org/pdf/print.php?t=14967:
"In the book, the Christian Family, by Larry Christiansen, he wrote about the “meanest mother in the world.”
“I had the meanest mother in the world.
While other kids ate candy for breakfast, I had to have cereal, eggs or toast.
When other had Cokes and candy for lunch, I had to eat a sandwich.
As you can guess, my supper was different than other kids’ also.
But at least I wasn’t alone in my sufferings.
My sister and two brothers had the same mean mother I did.
My mother insisted upon knowing where we were at all times.
You’d think we were on a chain-gang.
She had to know who our friends were and what we were doing.
She insisted if we said we’d be gone an hour –
That we be gone one hour or less – not one hour and one minute.
I am nearly ashamed to admit it, but she actually struck us.
Not once, but each time we had a mind of our own and did as we pleased.
That poor belt was used more on our seats than it was to hold up Daddy’s pants.
Can you imagine someone actually hitting a child just because he disobeyed?
Now you can see how mean she really was.
We had to wear clean clothes and take a bath.
The other kids always wore their clothes for days.
We reached the height of insults because she made our clothes herself –Just to save money.
Why, oh why, did we have to have a mother
who made us feel different from our friends?
The worst is yet to come.
We had to be in bed by nine each night and up at eight the next morning.
We couldn’t sleep till noon like our friends.
So while they slept – my mother actually had the nerve
to break the child-labor law.
She made us work.
We had to wash dishes, make beds, and learn to cook and all sorts of cruel things.
I believe she lay awake at night thinking up mean things to do to us.
She always insisted upon our telling the truth
and nothing but the truth, even if it killed us – and it nearly did.
By the time we were teenagers, she was much wiser,
And our life became even more unbearable.
None of this, tooting the horn of a car, for us to come running.
She embarrassed us to no end by making our dates and friends come to the door to get us.
If I spent the night with a girl friend,
can you imagine she checked on me to see if I were really there?
I never had the chance to elope to Mexico –
that is, if I’d had a boyfriend to elope with.
I forgot to mention, while my friends were dating at the mature age of 12 and my old-fashioned mother refused to
let me date until the age of 15 and 16.
Fifteen, that is, if you dated only to go to a school function.
And that was maybe twice a year.
Through the years, things didn’t improve a bit.
We could not lie in bed, ‘sick,’ like our friends did, and miss school.
If our friends had a toe-ache, a hangnail or other serious ailment, they could stay home from school.
Our marks in school had to be up to par.
Our friends’ report cards had beautiful colors on them, black for passing, red for failing.
My mother, being as different as she was, would settle for nothing else than ugly black marks.
As the years rolled by, first one and then the other of us were put to shame.
We were graduated from high school.
With our mother behind us, talking, hitting, demanding respect, none of us were allowed the pleasure of being a
dropout.
My mother was a complete failure as a mother.
Out of four children, a couple of us attained some higher education.
None of us had ever been arrested, divorced, or has beaten his mate . . .
And whom, do we blame for the terrible way we turned out?
You’re right – our mean mother . . .
She forced us to grow up into God-fearing, educated, honest adults.
Using this background, I am trying to raise my three children.
I stand a little taller and I am filled with pride, when my children call me, “mean.”
Because, you see, I thank God, He gave me the meanest mother in the world."
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