Day 3,838 —Adventures in Parenting #287 —

 

All the other kids were already outside, but I didn’t see my daughter yet, so I got out of my car. She was walking towards me sobbing.

     “Sophia! My best friend! They!” She started to tell me what happened but I couldn’t understand what she was saying, but I could tell someone hurt her in a way she had never experienced before.

     I told her whatever happened that I wanted to hear all about it, so she got in the car and we started to drive home.

She was still crying, and I asked her if we should get a sugar-free smoothie, and she said she guessed so. She told me that her best friend sat her down and told her she wanted to play with Sophia instead. This all happened in PE class.

She has told me about her best friend before who she only sees in PE class and likes to play with, so she was flummoxed with trying to process why her best friend would do this to her.

After I bought her a cold sugar-free drink she wanted to get some of the vegan recess, so I bought her some of those too. This isn’t the way I always respond when she is upset, but I was upset too, and I needed to do something that seemed useful.

At bedtime, I talked with her about it more and we talked about different ways she could handle it today. She could see if they all would want to play together, but if that doesn’t work she can play with someone else. I told her so many times that she would always be loved and there would always be people who wanted to be her friend.

She remembered that Charlie had even offered it yesterday when the other kids told her that they didn’t want to play with her, so she said she would play with Charlie if they didn’t want to play with her.

She felt better, but all I could think about was all the other times that she was going to come to me upset, and what will I say then?

I was still thinking about this during my run and now I am wondering who will greet me when I pick her up at 3:30? I hope maybe just for one day they all played together.