Being a Parent. How do your children see you?

 Yesterday, I was honored to see my oldest son, Justin and his wife, Heather take the Herbalife stage as they advanced to the top 1% producers of this fantastic company. What I didn't expect was for him to acknowledge my presence. As parents, we usually stay in the shadows as we swell with pride on our children's accomplishments. That wasn't the case when he gave his acceptance speech and called me out. and stand in front of over a thousand people. Yes, I fought back tears. When I turned on facebook this morning, I was surprised to see there about fifteen notifications on a post I was tagged in. Wonder what it could be? Let just say, tears fell from my eyes as I read his post.

 

As a child you see your parents as superheroes. They can do anything and practically do no wrong. They are your first love and the first person God gives you to protect you. Now I know there are some that have not had or will ever know their biological parents and some have even harmed their own in terrible ways. I was blessed enough to have both my parents whom cared and loved me equally. Even had the privilege of having a step-parent whom loved me and my brother and sister equally Ben Paul thank you for showing me what it's like to love those that aren't biologically yours!

The man in this picture is my Dad Jeff Dawson, he is for sure my superman, batman, iron-man, hulking captain America. He did the absolute best he could for all of us. Owned his own company worked hard for those that worked for him and made sure we had food to eat and sports to be part of. Though his American dream wasn't probably what he imagined it to be he made it work.

When I was in 6th grade my parents had divorced and we got to live with Dad so we could stay in the same school with our friends and be part of our sports to have some normalcy to our new life. But during this school year things were not going well for the company he started. So my brother and sister by the semester would go to Kansas to live with my mom and step-dad on my grandparents farm. I wanted to stay with dad to finish up my school year with him.

I remember the night it was just he and I and we were cleaning out our rooms and that was the first time I had ever seen my dad cry. We both cried so hard and I knew it was because he felt like he failed us he was losing the house losing his kids and there wasn't anything immediate he could about it and that it was for our best interest that we leave him to be with mom. So being 12 years old and seeing your superhero breakdown was the hardest thing I could have ever seen but I'm glad that I was the one there go through that with him. For the person it made me to be and to always be looking for more than one opportunity to support my family.

I was so incredibly happy to have him there with us today to witness the applause and the cheering our Herbalife family showed us today. So the goal is to want to make your parents proud of what you have done. So I just hope what I am doing makes you proud of the person you have helped me to become.

Love you more than you can know.

 This is what it means to be a parent!