Major Fail!

Ayden - Working on a school project - 11/29/2012

When I took the picture above I had no idea that just a few hours later the most horrific moment of my parenting career would occur.  If an award for crappiest parent alive existed I would be the undisputed champion.  Yes, I kid you not.  Let me tell you why.

Ayden was working on a painting for a book project.  She spent hours working on this project.  You see all the green on the canvas?  Those are blades of grass each meticulously drawn then carefully painted in with the smallest brush in the house.  Behind each blade of grass is blue sky.  I wondered what she was going to do with the white space but told myself, "Whatever she does or does not do with it is up to her.  Give her the creative freedom to do what she wants."  Proud of myself for having not said anything I left to Kuk Sool with Taylor.

Upon my return it was late.  Ayden should have been asleep but she came running down to show me her finish work.  The first thing I noticed was that she wrote the title of the book in the white space in beautiful cursive but it was illegible because she drew this thick black line under it and made some weird design around it.  Without thinking I asked her why she drew the line and proceeded to tell her my thoughts around it.  When she realized she had disappointed me she started to make up excuses about it and then the conversation went from bad to worse.  I said crappy things like, "If you are going to work so hard on something you should make it the best work you can do", "You need to think through your projects before you execute" and my favorite, "More is not better".  I also roped my poor husband in and yelled at him for not doing his job as a parent by not overseeing her work (which included a poorly written report about her community service work).

Then as nicely as he could, and in his broken Hmong as to protect my child's feelings, he proceed to tell me the following.

• She was so proud of her work that she couldn't sleep.
• Every time she heard a car door shut she thought it might be you and would spring out of bed.
• She was afraid she would fall asleep before you got home so she asked me to hide her painting so that you wouldn't see it.  She wanted to surprise you in the morning and in person.
• She was so excited about her painting that while in bed all she could do was wonder what you would think of it and if you would be proud of her.

As I listened and watched tears stream down my child's face I wanted to die. I had completely dismissed the fact that she spent over 3 hours on this painting, how beautiful the rest of her painting was, her use of colors (she mixed the colors herself to achieve the balance she was looking for), but most importantly I dismissed how much she values me and my opinion.

There was nothing I could do to take back what was said or repair her heart.  I asked her how my comments made her feel.  Then I validated her feelings, assured her that her painting was not ugly, that she is a good person, that I appreciate the hard work she puts into her homework and that I was wrong for the things I said.  I did my best to put the pieces back together but I know that that effort fell short.

She went to bed without tears but I know that she will never forget this incident.  Every time she has self doubt or thinks negatively about herself I will always wonder if this was the pivotal moment that she learned she is not good enough.  I guess I'll never know. 

I do have to also publicly apologize to my husband.  Although he has very little experience with overseeing the girls homework, he did the right thing.  He allowed her to do her work and accepted the outcome.  He did not judge, try to influence or correct her.  He let  her own her work. Thank you daddy.