Good Morning All!
I'm just having a little sad moment this morning...
I know that I shouldn't compare my child to anyone else, but sometimes--there it is, right in front of your face.
As you may remember, I have posted about taking my kids to the neighbor's farm to help with chores for a few hours here and there....and how it is always a challenge to ensure that difficult child is behaving appropriately (that she is not grabbing the cats and scaring the horses and sitting on the dogs, etc etc).
Well, my neighbor recently hired a full-time assistant--a lovely woman, who as it turns out, has a 13 year old daughter who attends school with difficult child. So this woman begins to ask about my child to see whether her daughter might know her. Her daughter? Honor student, 4-H club, plays soccer--is my daughter involved in any of those? What teachers does she have?
Meanwhile, I am dying a little inside because I know that her daughter would know EXACTLY who difficult child is if I said "O, she's the girl that threatened to kill herself at school...". But of course, I don't say that...and I just answer vaguely about how my child isn't too into sports, etc. etc.
Today, I finally got to meet this woman's daughter in person....and there she was--a 13 year old girl, pony-tail, braces, smiling, eager to do farm chores in exchange for the chance to maybe have a few riding lessons.
And as I watched her interacting with her mother and the horses and the cats and the dogs...it was all, well, just, so normal....
And so I am a little bit sad...in a way that only other parents with difficult children can understand.
{{sigh}}
Thanks for "listening"...
--DaisyF
I'm just having a little sad moment this morning...
I know that I shouldn't compare my child to anyone else, but sometimes--there it is, right in front of your face.
As you may remember, I have posted about taking my kids to the neighbor's farm to help with chores for a few hours here and there....and how it is always a challenge to ensure that difficult child is behaving appropriately (that she is not grabbing the cats and scaring the horses and sitting on the dogs, etc etc).
Well, my neighbor recently hired a full-time assistant--a lovely woman, who as it turns out, has a 13 year old daughter who attends school with difficult child. So this woman begins to ask about my child to see whether her daughter might know her. Her daughter? Honor student, 4-H club, plays soccer--is my daughter involved in any of those? What teachers does she have?
Meanwhile, I am dying a little inside because I know that her daughter would know EXACTLY who difficult child is if I said "O, she's the girl that threatened to kill herself at school...". But of course, I don't say that...and I just answer vaguely about how my child isn't too into sports, etc. etc.
Today, I finally got to meet this woman's daughter in person....and there she was--a 13 year old girl, pony-tail, braces, smiling, eager to do farm chores in exchange for the chance to maybe have a few riding lessons.
And as I watched her interacting with her mother and the horses and the cats and the dogs...it was all, well, just, so normal....
And so I am a little bit sad...in a way that only other parents with difficult children can understand.
{{sigh}}
Thanks for "listening"...
--DaisyF