Indulge me while I republish this essay I wrote for a group blog sometime ago. I was just clearing out my archives when I noticed this file. I searched this blog to see if I had published it here previously, but I didn’t find it. So let me share this little story with you of how I learned to always expect the best from my daughters. Parenting is a learning process and I admit I learn something new from them everyday.
Expectations, high and low
I want my girls to grow up not necessarily into the person they are expected to be but the people they are meant to be. Part of me believes that we are born with the people we are to become already inside of us but as a mom another part of me can’t help thinking I can fashion my children into the people I believe they should be. I fall into the trap of wanting for them what I wanted for myself. This is one of the lessons I learned from my eldest daughter: we cannot live their lives for them and sometimes we must let them fall so they can learn to get up again.
I am reminded of this lesson everyday, but the very first time I realized this was when my daughter was in the third grade.
From the moment she stepped into kindergarten, resist as I might, I couldn’t help but expect her to excel. What was I thinking! She is my daughter, raised to be an individual and she wasn’t about to walk the path I cleared for her. That sharp mind of hers prompted her to instead hack through the jungle along the road less traveled.
She is very bright. She is gifted but she didn’t excel academically as I expected. She floundered every step of the way causing her teachers to wonder if she has a learning disability or attention deficit. Hard as it was for me, I had to admit that maybe my expectations were higher than her capacity to achieve. I grudgingly lowered the bar I had set for her.
Then one day, she came home from school and announced that she had made it to the final round of the school’s spelling bee. I was proud that she had made it this far and told her so, almost condescendingly. To save her from disappointment, I also told her that no matter how far in the contest she advanced we were extremely pleased how well she had done and are extremely proud of her. My bar for her had been set so low that I didn’t want to see her disappointed. I didn’t want to be disappointed.
On the day of the spelling bee, we sat in the audience and with every word she spelled correctly, I breathed a sigh of relief for another hurdle cleared. Then it was down to three contestants and I remember thinking, “Thank you, Lord, she has a chance for third place! She will at least get a ribbon.” With every letter uttered thereafter, I held my breath. Then it came down to two contestants and she was still up there with the boy who had the highest average in their grade level. I thought with elation, “My baby is in second place!” and I was truly exhilarated and happy for her. My heart was beating so fast I may as well have been the one on stage.
I looked at my eldest child and there she stood, cool as a cucumber and pretty as can be. I didn’t think I could be prouder.
I had lost track of the four final words in that enduring last round. I may have blacked out from holding my breath for too long. Because when the auditorium exploded in applause and I saw my daughter beaming with pride, it took another couple of seconds to dawn on me that she had done it. She won the spelling bee!
I was stunned. I was ashamed of myself, that I even doubted she is capable of winning. I was ashamed that I listened to others instead of listening to what I know my heart to be true, that my daughter, all my daughters, are exceptional and I should not have expected anything less. I, her mother should have known all along the champion that she is.
As I wiped the tears from my eyes, I also wiped away my worries that she will be all right. She is her own person and she has an inner clock all her own. I learned she will do things according to her own terms and schedule; and that is all, as a mother, I could hope for.
She is now in her sophomore year in high school. No, not much has changed with her academics. It is still a struggle to get her to be more organized, to turn her homework in on time, to study subjects that do not interest her. I still get notes from her teachers when she has fallen behind in class. She is not, by far, a straight A student that I wish she were. But I’ve learned to exhale and trust in her ability. As exasperating as it is, she always manages to come through her classes, and always doing it her way and on her own time.
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I think I remember this post over at PMN.
The joys of parenthood certainly has itss and downs. And what a high to see our kids do great things.
ay, alam mo, jeanette, allow me to be on the other side of the rope. I was pressured by my mom to excel. I didn’t always have honors in school but it was important for her that I would always be in the “pilot” class.
in a way, bad trip yun for me. kasi minsan scared akong magpakita ng test results ko sa kanya tapos medyo palpak. and my mom can be soooooo strict talaga. her method made me learn a lot in school pero i didn’t really enjoy school. kasi kailangan kong mag-aral mabuti. nung mag-college ako, dun ako naging medyo nag-rebelde. kung kelan pa college saka ako hindi nag-aaral mabuti. eh yun ang pinaka-importante sa lahat.
pero ang feeling ko pa rin, until now, competitive pa rin ako. and the older i get the harder i am on myself na dapat laging maganda, tama, outstanding or exceptional ang outcome ng ginagawa ko. (that part, i think you’ve seen in me na
hehehehehe… hay naku, mamaya sabihin mo, i need to see a shrink
An A+ for that essay!
i think as parents we tend to expect too much from our kids, part of it probably is from our upbringing. My parents pushed us kids to excel and as a result I was doing the same thing to my kids … until just like you, realized that they have to make their own paths, their own terms and capability. That being said, i am lucky that so far, our kids are growing up to be what we wanted them to be and hope that they will stay that way.
Beautifully written. I would say I grew in a family not directly putting pressure on me. But substance over form, being the eldest among the cousins, I was set it to exemplify the best as much as possible. Gladly it worked, so far.