I could tell from the moment my daughter threw her backpack in the car, something was bothering her. On the ride home she began to tell me a story familiar to every mother of a middle school girl. A classmate had said something and my daughter felt rejected. Her words swerved from hurt, to anger, to confusion and sounded like me at her age. I couldn't help myself; as my foot pressed a little harder on the gas pedal, my voice rose and the words of wisdom poured out, "Who cares what she says? Who cares what she thinks? Its not your problem. It's her problem. Why do you want what that girl says to ruin your day? You know what she said isn't true. You can't let people make you feel bad about who you are." And in the middle of my diatribe, my daughter cut me off, "Why can't you just let me be sad? You always do this! I want to tell you how bad I feel - can't you just listen to me? It hurts!"
After the initial shock, I was tempted to pull off the road, raise the moon-roof and give a standing ovation. How did this 12-year-old have the insight to say the words that took years of therapy to form with my own mouth? She gave me something to think about (in addition to the guilt of being a heartless mother).
What was I trying to do? I'll tell you. All those messages I heard for years, the same ones I had just repeated to my daughter, I never really believed myself until a few years ago. That others' expectations do not define who I am, that put-downs come from low self-esteem, that we all struggle with our own insecurities, some of us just hide it better. The problem, as I explained to my tweener later that day, is that I want her to buy something because I say so, something which took forty years to travel from my own head to my heart.
Mommy wants to spare you the time and the tears it takes to learn how to love yourself.
After that day I lecture less, I listen more, I try to respect that this is her journey and like me, she will be okay, perhaps wiser. As we travel her teenage years ahead, I'm sure there will be more occasions where I will be tempted to cut to the chase of life's lessons. I'll want to tell her not to worry so much if the boy wants to be with her but rather if she really wants to be with that boy, that friendships only last with honesty and forgiveness, that 99% of the good stuff in life involves long-term effort rather than immediate gratification, that she'll be much happier (and safer) with creamy skin at 40 than a tan at 18, that she is the only person in the world with the power to hold her back from being who God created her to be, so she needs to be a good friend to herself.
Oh how I'd love to give my little girl the eyes to see the beautiful, talented, amazing creature she is, and skip the wasted years of worrying "Am I good enough?"
But that isn't the way life works. There are no fast-passes for this ride.
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