The story of two children..

I want to tell the story of two children child A is now 22 years old and child B is 20. They both had very different upbringings. Child A was a bratty little kid and always got what he wanted by throwing tantrums and by calling his parents horrible names. Child B was also bratty at times but was raised by a single mom most of his life and she thought the bond between them was wonderful. He was very quiet at home but sometimes did have tantrums too. When child A was in his teen years, he had his own cell phone (paid for by his parents) and was allowed computer access. child B was not allowed a cell phone (parent did not see a need for one).Child B also had no computer access at home. Child A basically did what he wanted and parents just let him do whatever he wanted including driving him to many places just to ride his bike, some were over an hour away. I remember a couple of holiday get togethers where child A cussed his parents out calling them every name in the book and on that same day they were at his beck and call to take him places. Child B was taught to respect his parents and was not expected to talk back. Now come to where they are now. Child A and B are both in the Army, Child A when he comes home on leave wants his parents to pick him up at the airport and spend time with them. Child B gives orders to his Mom to not be at the airport or he won't come by and see her at all. Child A does well with his money and has enough to pay for his plane ticket home. Child B spends all of his money and more I don't know what on but he is always broke! Child B is supposed to come home at the end of July for a couple of weeks but he can't because he has no money for a ticket! He calls his mom because he knows how to make her feel guilty and explains that once again it is someone else's fault he has no money so he won't be coming home. He doesn't actually ask his mom to buy him a ticket but he knows her and she would do anything to see him, even though he had already called a few weeks back and let her know that he won't have much time to visit with her as he has too many friends he needs to visit. I am sure you have guessed by now that I am talking about my son Matthew and my Nephew. Child B is Matthew, even though I feel that I raised him well I guess I was a horrible mom and did not do a very good job at raising him. I look back at all the mistakes I made and I wish I could go back and do everything over again. I tried to raise him to be responsible and a man of God. But right now he is so far from that it just breaks my heart. I now question everything I did as a Mom and why did things turn out this way. My sister raised her son totally different from me and now it looks like I was the stupid one!! She let her son walk all over her and her husband and never made him work for anything and yet he grew up way more responsible than my son did. I am acutally embbarressed by the things he does sometimes. Like right now I am trying to decide what to do, we really don't have any extra money to send him a ticket home but that means I won't get to see him. On one hand I really want to get him a ticket so I can see him and then on the other hand it just makes me so mad that even if I do get him a ticket I may only see him for an hour or two. I have a big decision to make and it is not easy. If I don't buy the ticket I know he will be mad, but he only wants to come home to see his friends not me. I know one thing for sure and that is that if I don't buy his ticket and I don't see him and he does end up deploying I will never forgive myself for not seeing him before he leaves. I am having a hard time right now forgiving myself for the type of parent I was. I have so much guilt about the way I raised my children it is all I think about somedays.

Sorry for this long post but I just needed to vent for a while.
Blessings,Joann