cgwarr

Being A Child

yaswaterworld

Dear Emily

You’re good at so many things. You draw, you read, you write beautifully. You love dancing and you’re so good at it too. Same with swimming. And you’d like to do a few other things too (ice-hockey was your latest request).

The problem is there just aren’t enough hours in the day, or days in the week. I seem permanently torn between exposing you to the new experiences that come with all the extra-curricular activities you ask for … and letting you just be a child.

We spend our weeks rushing to school, back from school, to this dance class, then that dance class, this or that other thing, back home, then the TV goes on because you’re too tired to do anything else (I’m not that no screen-time parent by any means) and I need to prepare dinner. Next year your school day will be even longer and there’ll be homework to do.

There’s never any time to just be. No time for spontaneity. No time for me to hold you (if you’d only sit still for a moment) to breathe you in. No time for you to just be five.

I keep wondering what you’d think of it if I cut everything out, except maybe one activity of your choice. Would you resent me for it later on? I will tell you then, of course, that there was just never any time for you to be a child, that you also needed time to play and that you were always just so tired.

And yet I wonder which way I’ll decide to go. Because just two months ago I had a mental debate with myself about this very issue and how we needed to cut down on extra-curricular activities, and a week later I went and signed you up for the ballet show in June. I know it’s good for you to be exposed  to different things, and you were so excited about being in the show.

But here we are again, no time to breathe, no time to play, no time to be spontaneous. And so I keep on wondering and wondering.

 

Edit: I wrote this last night, and as I wrote that last line, I told myself not to worry, I’ll figure it out: Something will happen to help me figure it out.

This morning, something did. Funny old world.

2 comments

  1. Hope that something has helped, you are an amazing Mummy and I am sure you are making the right choices xx

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  2. Xxxx I know the feeling. Always a dilemma The year I decided to stop everything for them- Denise got pregnant- ( not because of it of course) but then regretted it. Steffe never went back to masquerade after that.

    As we always say- a Balance is always best xx

    And you’ll never get it right- don’t expect to.

    As long as you do your best you have nothing to worry about.

    You’re better than you think you are- always Remember that.

    Learn to encourage and affirm yourself when you don’t get it from anyone ( a priest told me that in confession once – wise words)

    Love you xxxx Sent from my iPhone

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