Hi everyone,
I don't know if this is the correct forum for this, but I'm looking for parenting book suggestions. Here is my case:
I (mid-20s M) have a 10-going-on-11-year-old brother. I have lived over 2,000 miles away for 4 years now, and do not get the opportunity to visit very often. When I used to live in the same city as him, he would sometimes stay over, but most of his life has been spent apart from me since we have different mothers. Consequently, he does not know me on a deeply personal level.
Once I moved away and started my career, I made an effort to reconnect with him more. I got him a cell phone and currently have him on my phone plan, but admittedly, I have not called him as much as I should. This is something that I'm making an effort to change, but I'm realizing that I don't know how to talk to him.
I am a deeply serious person and I never learned how to be silly; I was already raising a different sibling while being a child myself. I also had to become an anchor for my family very early on because I'm the eldest child in a non-English speaking immigrant family and as such, I did not get the opportunity to truly embrace being a child.
My rhetorical choice in general is not the best, but speaking to a 10-year-old made me realize just how bad it is because he is so impressionable and takes my words at face value. He has a very internet-forward sense of humor (I am not on social media or on the internet much) and is chronically online, to the point where the side of the internet he is on feeds him blatant misinformation. I have a hard time communicating with him, but I especially have a hard time trying to "parent" him regarding serious topics without being blunt, using unfamiliar words for him, or outright undermining other adults in his life.
For context, our father is not completely absent from his life, but he is not very present and tends to make promises that do not come to fruition. A flagrant liar at the worst, unreliable at best. His mother loves him but isn't the best at parenting (she has adult children who aren't exactly the best influences). Ultimately, he does not have positive figures in his life other than myself, church leaders, and teachers. We are from the inner-city and I have since "made it out the hood" but this isn't without my own personal trauma and stunted emotional growth. Because of my own experience, I know how difficult his life is and know just how difficult it is to escape poverty and not be swayed by negative influences in the community. He is expressing interest in science and making an impact in the world, but I do not know how to foster his interests/curiosities.
I want to do right by him, but I feel like I'm failing him. Can you please suggest parenting books that address long-distance parenting, embracing child-like wonder, parenting your own sibling, mentoring a child, or something similar? Thank you.
by One-Departure3696