The Ugly Truth

If I were a kid, a teenager I would describe tonight as an Epic Fail, but I am not a teenager, so I am just going to say that tonight sucked.  I totally screwed up.  It wasn't pretty, I'll admit it.  It was every shade of bad you can imagine.  All she ( I say she, because I am not sure I want all of the great wide Internet and beyond to know details about my kids, although I may change my stance on that later)  wanted to do was write a report for some extra credit. She wants to make sure to keep her all A average, although I am pretty sure she is in no danger of losing it.  However, her report has turned into a bit of a book.  Mind you that she is in 4th grade and doing a biography on Walt Disney out of her own free will. So far this report is 3 pages typed and she hasn't even hit his adulthood or his career yet. She is still talking about his childhood.  Why this bothered me so much, I don't know.  Maybe I wanted to be upset about something. Maybe I was looking to pick a fight.  I'm still not sure why it bothered me so much.  I suggested that she trim it down, take out some details.  She was very defensive, it made me mad.  Like I said, it was an epic fail kind of night.  It all ended in yelling and tears on both sides.  What was a very cool thing my kid was doing on her own turned into something awful.  I made it awful.  Why?  I wish I knew.  But, that's why I am here, that's why I'm blogging.  Sometimes in writing or in my case typing out how things happened, you gain clarity.  In this case I have gained none.  Other than I failed.  I let my kid think her work wasn't good enough, when in fact it was too good.  Sometimes I forget her age, I wonder why she didn't do something or why she did, she should know better.  The truth is she shouldn't know better.  She hasn't learned that yet.  Its my job to teach her, but all I taught her tonight was it is okay to take out your frustrations on the ones you love.  I will say that we talked at length and I told her how sorry I was, and I am, but its out there.  I can't erase her memory of tonight or her hurt feelings with I'm sorry, mommy messed up.   As much as I want to, and that is the real ugly truth.