The end of the day nears, Mom works to get her two sons into bed snug as a bug in a rug so that they can fall into a deep state of slumber {for a few hours}. As soon as her sons fall asleep she goes upstairs to tend to her oldest, and only, daughter. This is their Mom/Daughter time, a cherished half hour together of reviewing homework, laughing and rambling about whatever. All that this daughter wants is her Mom to listen. Due to Mom’s great listening skills, her daughter tells her near everything about her life, school and the world.

Most recently Mom found out that during this age in her daughter’s life that the children at school think it weird that she tells her Mom so much. Apparently to have a close relationship with a parent is unacceptable and children just do not understand it. This daughter feels that she needs to sometimes be mean to her Mom in order to ‘fit in’ at school and as much as she hates to be mean, she does not want to be the weird kid who is close to her Mom either.

Completely understanding, Mom places her arms around her daughter and tells her that she knows why at times her daughter is mean and also reminds her that there will be many more years of them having their battles together. There may be a point where she absolutely hates her Mom {or so she thinks} and they are not as close for a period of time and that is okay because Mom loves her daughter unconditionally, forever and always. That is her job as Mom. Never would Mom hold a grudge against her child, for any reason. Never would Mom not love her daughter anymore because she was being hateful, spiteful or rude, that is not Mom’s job.

The fact that Mom completely understands not only the pressure put upon this child at this age in life but also the pressure she has outside of school seems to really strike a chord with the daughter. For half an hour the Mom listens to her daughter ramble about things that have been going on, she just needed to get it all out through tears and sobs of crying. All this daughter needed was for Mom to listen and say she understands. Once the daughter was done with her venting and Mom gave some words of wisdom and love, they both moved onto bedtime routine and quickly the daughter fell asleep.

Meanwhile the Mom was wide awake carrying not only the burden of her own troubles in life but that of her child’s, however, there isn’t one thing Mom would change about this because that is her job as a parent. As a parent, Mom or Dad, we carry the burden of our children so to allow them to be a child.