No tags yet.
My baby girl was in 1st grade. She was quiet, sweet, and gentle. She was loving and she was loyal. She developed a friendship that year with a girl named “Heather”. Heather was much more brash and outgoing than my daughter, and I guess their opposites attracted.
As the school year trudged along, I began to hear social stories from my daughter about her day. You know how kids casually tell you this or that as you are driving in the car, grocery shopping, or cooking dinner. Little by little I began to hear some not so good stories involving Heather. “Heather told me I’m no good at drawing.” “Heather said that my hair looked dumb today.” “Heather said she doesn’t like me.”
During this same time, Heather also invited my daughter to stay the night with her. Not only did I tell my daughter that she could not stay the night with her, I also encouraged her to tell Heather she doesn’t like it when she is rude to her and that she needed to find new friends to play with at recess. Heather asked her many times to stay the night, but we always declined.
You may think that what I remember the most about Heather was that she was mean to my baby girl, but it’s not. What I remember most about Heather was actually her mother. You see, we were several months into the school year when her mother came and sat by me in the stadium seats at a football game.
We made small talk as mothers of classmates do before she turned to me and spoke very softly. She said, “This year, my son told me that there were some kids in his class making fun of him. It really hurt him and it hurt me to see him go through that. I was so mad and frustrated that kids could be so mean. I want to tell you that I recently asked Heather why she thought your daughter could never stay the night. She told me that it was because she had been so mean to your daughter. I want you to know that I know how it feels to have someone be mean to your child, and I am so sorry that Heather was mean to yours. We are working on this with her, but I want you to know that I am sorry.”
Wow. I mean wow. No excuses, no theories, no exaggerated explanations. Just a mother acknowledging the hurt caused by her daughter and an apology. I don’t know many mothers that would respond like that. Most of us would bury our head in the sand, we would assume the other kid deserved it, or we would try to explain away why our kid really is a good kid and it’s not their fault. But not Heather’s mom, and that's why that moment in time is one I will never forget. She was brave enough to approach me and she was brave enough to admit that her daughter was wrong. Period.
Our kids are not perfect. They will make poor choices. The Good Lord knows how many poor choices we made growing up! Instead of finding every reason in the book to excuse away the negative behavior, let’s take a cue from Heather’s mom and have enough courage to accept it, face it, and be responsible for correcting it.
Father God, my first inclination as a mother is to find reasons why it’s somebody else’s fault my child made a bad choice or to find an excuse as to why it happened. I pray that You help me help my child take responsibility for their poor choices and show me how we can directly address the root of the problem. Thank You for Heather’s mom. She was brave enough to come to me and tell me sorry without making excuses for her daughter. Thank You for the example she was to me. I pray You help me be just as brave when I am faced with similar situations.