This morning I hung out with my daughter and a few of her classmates as they waited to walk into school. I greeted two of her friends and one looked completely miserable. I thought I'd take a moment to help her change her mood. She began to vent. But she didn't seem to feel better. As I tried to think of what to say to her next, the other child started going into what was wrong about her morning. Wow! It became clear to me they weren't interested in a grown-up trying to smooth it over, patch them up or fix it. They wanted to commiserate and unload - and just have their moment of grumpiness. And hey, we adults need that too, don't we? I was glad to be reminded of this lesson by a couple of 6 year olds this morning!
My kids know, sing and dance to the "Despicable Me" song. I like it as a diversion when we hit a rough patch. But for when that doesn't work, I want to hold onto this reminder that kids sometimes need to stay in their miserable moments too.
No comments:
Post a Comment