How do you teach your child to be kind to everyone, but also protect themselves? How do you teach your child to defend themselves, but be an example? How do you instill in your child the confidence to stand up for themselves, but in a nice way? How do you stress to your child they deserve to be treated with the utmost respect?
Savannah is a sensitive lil' thing. She was destined to be this way, because Paul and I are both sensitive. Savannah wants to be friends with everyone, even if they aren't being nice to her. I watch Savannah, and see myself in her. At age 27 I am just now learning how to stand up for myself when someone hurts my feelings. I hope to help Savannah learn this younger, but how?!
In Primary I watch one little girl in particular be rude to Savannah. Savannah takes it, and keeps taking it. She cries, gets over it, and cries again. It is hard to sit back, and not want to be the over protective Mother that I am. This little girl tells Savannah how she doesn't want to be friends, won't let other little girls talk to her, and tells Savannah she can't do the same things that she can. I didn't know that at age 4 this is already happening, and especially at church.
Tonight at the playground at Chick-Fil-A I found Savannah in tears. There was a little boy about 7 or so that had beatin' up on her. Are you kidding me? His Father actually made him come up and apologize to not only Savannah, but to me. Is it right for me to tell Savannah next time that happens to punch back?
Does anyone else have these same problems? Does anyone else have this inner battle of what is really right? Help!
7 comments:
This is such a hard thing... Will is very sensitive too.. but he can dish it at times as well... So I've been trying to work on respect with him, that he HAS to respect mom and dad and himself. That we treat others how we want to be treated and that we can't control what other people say, think, or feel but we can control how we react to others. His teacher at school was dealing with some mean girls so she made a heart made of foil and said that words can crumple our heart (and she crumpled it) and that saying sorry, uncrumpled it, helps our hearts heal but that when we are mean to others the crumple will get harder to heal.... Talking to the other kids parents helps too...
Oh man.. I could go on about this for days. Mason is the exact same way, the gets picked on so much at school, yes.. I think that it is in your right to teach her to defend herself.
gosh...if that happened when she was with me, I would have a hard time not punching that kid! That is so sad...she is sooooo nice, and I hate hearing others taking advantage of that! Tell her i Love her!
We had this same problem at McDonald's. Someone hit Emm, I told her to punch them in the face! Sometimes nice doesn't cut it ya know? Maybe I am wrong. Eeek, I hope not. I have the same feelings as you, I am very sensitive and let people walk all over me all the time. I want my kids to be strong and to stand up for themselves. Ug...hopefully our kids turn out strong huh?
DO NOT TELL HER TO PUNCH BACK!!! It will cause so many more problems for her in the future...I know because I am the one getting all over those who fight back at school. I know you want to keep her safe....the best thing is to help her realize to get out of situations immediately and find someone to help. Savannah will totally take the crap...she does from my son all the time. (sorry about that. we are working on it!) She really needs to learn to stand up for herself. And you learning to do it for yourself will be the best tool for that. Sorry, I have very strong feelings here.
That really is so sad. I don't know what to tell you because I don't have kids and I haven't ever had to deal with that. But I would tell her to punch back. hahaha. My dad always told me. I don't care if you get in a fight. But do not do a thing unless they hit you first. Once that happens... DON'T stop punching! haha:]
The only reason they are mean is because they are jealous of her. She is a little cutie and they don't want to be around that.
aww so sad, this is why i dont want abby to even get one year older :( i would totally talk to the parents of that girl at church. but i guess at some point you can't do that huh? but she is only 4 so it might still be ok :)
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