The day that I had the urge to start journaling again was not such a good day. One of my children did not have such a positive afternoon....we'll get to that in a little bit. This was one of those moments where I just wanted to sit down and write down what was happening. I needed to get what was in my head out of my head. Writing is therapeutic for me.
As I said earlier, it wasn't such a good day. What I should have said, it was a good day until my darling daughter came home from school with tears streaming down her rosy-red cheeks. I always put things into perspective and I know there are families out there who are going through much worse than what this little experience is to us today. Honestly, the news stories today seem to be so much worse than when I was a "tween". Maybe I don't remember the stories, didn't recognize the words the reporters used (like child molestation, abandonment, starvation) but I just can't have the news on anymore. It can't be on because my children know what some of those words mean and the words they don't know, they ask about. Our children are filled with a natural need to help people and to take care of people, so they just don't understand how someone could hurt another human being. They just don't get it. So, this leads me into my story......oh, wait, you need a little bit more context.
We have three children. The Boy is about be 13, The Lady is almost 11, and The Little just turned 5. As I've mentioned, they all have these huge hearts. They have a love for animals, a love for nature, a strong love for God and Jesus, a love for their family that is limitless and a love for people. Their love for people doesn't dwindle based on race, gender, age or ability. Truly, they have the purest of hearts and I sure hope we are doing a good job at nurturing that character in them.
So when The Lady comes home from school in tears because she feels like someone she trusts has betrayed her, well, then I have lots to say. But what is the best way to approach it?
Let's get to know The Lady a bit more to give you that extra context. The Lady is simply amazing, but I'm her mom and I only see her as amazing. Oh, I'm not blind, she's not perfect, none of us are perfect. But when I describe her, she is damn-near close to perfect. She is sporty, yet LOVES her dresses. She has never been afraid to speak her mind and is very intelligent. From an early age, other kids followed her lead. I've always said she was going to grow up to be a CEO of some great company!! She just gets it. She's reads people very well and that can sometimes hurt.....she's just too young to understand why other people may react differently than what she would expect.
So here's what happened. She's had a great day so far. Choir practice before school, lunch with her friends, assisting some of the lower grades during their art, library, and gym classes. She's in 5th grade this year so she is one of the "upper classmen" and gets to help out other classes during her normal recess time. Her choice, she's a great leader! Then, she and some of her classmates were playing a game. She gets very upset when kids don't play by the rules, and some of the boys were not playing nice. After several attempts to get them to play correctly, she goes to the teacher. She's very upset at this point. He turns to the boys and tells them to play by the rules. He apparently asked the boys why they wanted to make a girl angry and then said, "Look at her, she's very upset." Well, now he's done it......
She doesn't see the teacher's actions as helping her at all. It just made it worse. Everyone was now looking at her and now she was embarrassed AND angry.
Of course this is her side of the story after she came home and unloaded this fun little tale to me with full tears running down her face. She just didn't understand why anyone would be so mean (the boys) or how a person she was supposed to trust (the teacher) would hurt her feelings like that in front of everyone.
No, I didn't call the teacher, nor will I. No, I didn't call the boys' parents, nor will I. Why? Because I truly believe that my job as a parent is to help her to solve problems like this on her own with a little coaching from me. I've read so many articles lately about how we should help our kids learn how to solve problems. One note to add at this point....if I thought that any of my children were being bullied in any way, you bet I'd be on the principle's calendar early the next day to discuss what had happened. But I do not believe this is what had happened. Using the "B" word is a serious thing!
So, we talked it out. We talked about how sometimes people won't be so nice or do what we think is the right thing to do. Was it okay to tell the teacher? Yes, she did the right thing after trying to work it out on her own first. Did the teacher mean to embarrass her? Probably not, I didn't think that was his intent. But I reassured her that her feelings were real and then we talked about how we deal with those feelings. We also talked about how she might handle this situation differently if it happens again. That last part was a little tricky, I had to convince her again that she did nothing wrong but that other actions may have had a different result. No, she shouldn't have punched the boys (as The Boy suggested), that would have had much worse results for her. But she was right to stick up for herself. We talked about that for a while and hugged it out and as I wiped those last tears away, she asked me for a snack......In the end, the tears dried up and we were back on track and she was back to doing handstands on the wall.
In closing, I want to make sure you understand that we absolutely adore our community and our amazing teachers. We don't know what we'd do without them.
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