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Bad Manners and Brimstone
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#Post#: 55433--------------------------------------------------
Re: Honorary Flower Girl - Sorta?
By: vintagegal Date: July 31, 2020, 6:12 am
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one of my theories on kids is that every kid should have
something they can do better than 90% of the population. Whether
it is music, dance, sports, whatever. Maybe reading, cooking, or
caring for animals. The point is to find their niche and have
something they can be proud of. Not sure "princess play" or
being everyone's little girl would qualify.
Maybe tell her a story of a real princess, Alice of Battenberg,
to let her know it's not all fluffy dresses and tiaras. It's
more about what you do than how you look.
HTML https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Princess_Alice_of_Battenberg
Oh, and as for the wedding? Is it possible to let her anticipate
a big girl dance with her dad? Maybe something they can practice
together?
#Post#: 55434--------------------------------------------------
Re: Honorary Flower Girl - Sorta?
By: Rose Red Date: July 31, 2020, 6:53 am
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[quote author=Mary Sunshine Rain
link=topic=1799.msg55425#msg55425 date=1596176677]
And I agree with Nikko-chan--why would you give her downsides
about the boy playing violin or a girl singing?!
[/quote]
This. Don't put down others for their hard work, talent, or
luck. It's called sour grapes. It can turn into a lifelong habit
and she will never learn to appreciate or enjoy performances
(plays, concerts, etc.) due to jealousy. Give credit where
credit is due and the violin and singing kids deserves praise.
Does your daughter take any lessons? Taking lessons will show
her how long and hard it takes. Maybe she'll look at children
with brand new eyes and know how much work they do instead of
just the end results of being in the spotlight.
I give you credit for reading our posts and taking it to heart.
#Post#: 55437--------------------------------------------------
Re: Honorary Flower Girl - Sorta?
By: oogyda Date: July 31, 2020, 8:46 am
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[quote author=Rose Red link=topic=1799.msg55434#msg55434
date=1596196406]
[quote author=Mary Sunshine Rain
link=topic=1799.msg55425#msg55425 date=1596176677]
And I agree with Nikko-chan--why would you give her downsides
about the boy playing violin or a girl singing?!
[/quote]
This. Don't put down others for their hard work, talent, or
luck. It's called sour grapes. It can turn into a lifelong habit
and she will never learn to appreciate or enjoy performances
(plays, concerts, etc.) due to jealousy. Give credit where
credit is due and the violin and singing kids deserves praise.
Does your daughter take any lessons? Taking lessons will show
her how long and hard it takes. Maybe she'll look at children
with brand new eyes and know how much work they do instead of
just the end results of being in the spotlight.
I give you credit for reading our posts and taking it to heart.
[/quote]
I agree that you shouldn't diminish other's successes. One good
way to do this would be to talk with your daughter about how she
would like other children to react to her successes. You
know....the golden rule. Treat others how you would like to be
treated.
#Post#: 55439--------------------------------------------------
Re: Honorary Flower Girl - Sorta?
By: TootsNYC Date: July 31, 2020, 9:38 am
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I had a similar thought about denigrating something in order to
make her feel better.
It's so important for us all to like ourselves even though we're
not the star.
I'm an alto. I never get the melody; I seldom star.
I'm also a copyeditor--I never write the article, I never get a
byline, nobody knows my job even exists.
But I take phenomenal pleasure in contributing as an alto--take
a soprano solo, and it's incredibly lovely. Add an alto line,
and suddenly it's SO much richer, such a different effect.
Neither is better--but my contribution makes a difference, and
I'm proud of it.
I get great satisfaction in adding my grammatical and stylistic
corrections; I make other people's work better, I help readers
to understand articles without as much work. I preserve the
credibility of my publication.
As a guest at a wedding, I often have a mission--to add to the
flavor of the event. To make the host feel appreciated. (I
always make it a point to go to the parent of whichever guest of
honor--bride or groom--I am NOT related to and tell them how
much our family admires their child; if they're the host, I
thank them and tell them it's a lovely wedding).
Maybe get her invested in that part of the experience.
Help her get invested in the task of the listener to American
Idol--to pay attention, to spot the things that deserve to be
appreciated, like a particularly lovely or skilled passage.
I also wonder if a more long-lasting approach to her jealousy is
to help her appreciate the other PERSON. To turn them into
"people she cares about" instead of "people she is jealous of."
So help her to appreciate the PERSON inside the violinist, and
then to see the success of that person as a thing she is glad of
for their sake.
The world tells us so often that life is a zero-sum game. And
it's not. Helping her to see other people as real, as valued by
her, might be pretty powerful.
And then...would she like to play violin? is there a real-life
way she can scratch that itch?
#Post#: 55440--------------------------------------------------
Re: Honorary Flower Girl - Sorta?
By: TootsNYC Date: July 31, 2020, 9:39 am
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a couple of your examples made me wonder:
Is she frustrated by feeling competitive (with the performers on
TV), without having any way to compete?
And at the pageant, she felt competitive, but there WAS a way to
compete. And even if she didn't win, she got her chance to
compete.
#Post#: 55442--------------------------------------------------
Re: Honorary Flower Girl - Sorta?
By: oogyda Date: July 31, 2020, 9:42 am
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One thing that stood out to me was this statement of yours:
"In a way, I kinda don't want this wedding to happen so we can
avoid another meltdown."
With your update, it seems like she is overall a pleasant child
where maybe you haven't had to deal with many meltdowns so it
was easy to do what you could to avoid them. I think you may be
at the point now where you have to look to the future and the
type of *person* (not child) you would like to see her become.
Very often, the hardest part of being a parent is saying no.
Remember. Doing the right thing is most often not the easiest
thing.
#Post#: 55443--------------------------------------------------
Re: Honorary Flower Girl - Sorta?
By: Gellchom Date: July 31, 2020, 9:45 am
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I echo Rose Red's compliments to you on reading everyone's
comments with an open mind and taking them to heart. I think
that most of us who have been around here (and the previous
forum) for a long time have learned so much from others'
experience. It isn't always easy! But it can be so valuable.
No one is criticizing or judging; everyone just wants to help.
I agree that pointing out the down sides of others' experiences
is not a good choice.
Brielle seems to be putting far too much value on being the
center of attention, especially with regard to looking like and
being treated like a princess. You will be doing her a major
kindness in helping her unlearn that. And don't blame yourself,
by the way! It's hard not to think back on every princess
outfit you bought her and such, but kids are who they are. They
all need help in growing and maturing in one way or another. If
she didn't take to it naturally, you could have bought her a
hundred tiaras and wands, and they would just have collected
dust.
I don't mean that she should not develop some area in which she
can shine and get the applause. But as others have pointed out,
it's really important to learn that no one is the very best in
every area, and sometimes -- usually -- it is someone else's
turn in the spotlight.
I had to learn this lesson, too -- I suppose we all do. I was a
talented child, and I had to learn not to be jealous. So I do
understand how she feels, although if she has to leave the room
before bows, that's gotten pretty far, and she needs your help.
(Some people never learn. I know an actor who says he never
goes to see his friends' shows because "I know how it feels to
be up there, and I just feel so stressed for them." Bull! :-)
He just cannot stand to see someone else in the spotlight.
Don't let her grow up to be that guy!)
Even more important, it's a recipe for unhappiness to think that
nothing is worth doing unless you get attention and applause.
Even in the area where her natural or developed talents do
excel, it's important to learn that getting the prize/the A+/the
standing ovation, while lovely, aren't the most important thing.
Suppose she is a singer -- she needs to learn to get
satisfaction from being an artist, not just from being a
celebrity. If she takes up a sport, you can help her to learn
to value seeing herself improve, being a good team member, and
just feeling strong and energized -- not winning the trophy.
Toots posted while I was writing this, and she put it so well.
A corollary is that she will be much happier if she learns to
get joy from doing things in which she does NOT excel. There
are other satisfactions to be gotten from being part of a team,
from learning to challenge yourself, and from the simple
happiness of creating art or music or participating in a sport,
etc. My son, now grown, knew that most people wrote their
college applications essays about what they were great at. He
wrote instead about the opposite: about how there were things
that came really easily to him, that he could excel in even with
little effort -- but what he really loved was baseball. He was
small, especially when he was little, and it wasn't long before
he realized that no matter how hard he worked at it -- and boy,
did he -- he would never even be mediocre. But, he wrote, he
was so glad he stuck with it anyway instead of just doing the
things that came easily. He said that it helped him learn to be
a good leader and helper to people who struggled with the things
he was naturally good at, such as the quiz bowl team. More
important, he learned to do what he loved because he loved it,
not because he would be the star. "Playing baseball doesn't
come naturally to me," he concluded, "but loving it does." I
was very proud of him for learning that. (He became a baseball
sportscaster, by the way.)
Finally, I would try not to put emphasis on glamour and
prettiness. There is just way, way too much focus on appearance
for women. Teach her that it's fun to be pretty -- but it isn't
important. I'd avoid pageants (even watching them).
This sent me back to my old copy of Dr. Spock, recently pulled
out as I became a grandmother. In another context (baby talk),
he wrote about "the little girl with corkscrew curls and fancy
clothes who is the only child of a doting family. They are so
pleased with her as a plaything that they forget she has to grow
up. They ... show her that they love her best when she acts
babyish and 'cute.' You can't blame her for playing up to them.
But she will have a tough time when she gets around children
her own age, because they won't think she's cute; they'll think
she's awful." I'm not saying that this is Brielle! I'm sure
she has plenty of friends and the babyishness is not on point at
all from what you wrote. But you get the general idea: You
aren't raising a fairy princess. You are raising her to be a
happy, competent, confident woman, who is kind to and empathizes
with others and is loved by her friends and valued by her
community.
I think she's off to a very good start, in fact. She showed a
lot of self-awareness in saying what she did about wanting to be
the only child. Good for her for seeing that. No shame in her
feeling that way and wishing she could be a flower girl. She
just needs to learn a bit about how the world works, that she
can't be the only child or the only star -- and that's okay!
That's not what her family loves and values about her. You love
her just because she's her, even if she never wins a trophy or a
standing ovation.
Maybe it's time to invest in some books, toys, tools,
instruments, lessons, and equipment that will broaden her
horizons and get her to think of a wider range of things that
will interest her and give her joy, as well as allow her to get
to know and value others.
You and your spouse and family obviously love Brielle, want the
best for her, and are willing to devote the time and resources
for that. I'm sure this is all going to work out just fine.
#Post#: 55444--------------------------------------------------
Re: Honorary Flower Girl - Sorta?
By: SparklingIce Date: July 31, 2020, 9:46 am
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Simce some of you have mentioned talent - She has done a couple
of natural pagents (not a serious effort, more of a fun "you get
a sash and crown for winning in a category in the number of
varieties we have" - best hair, dress, photogenic, etc - she got
best Runway Walk) and been doing dance since she was 3 and a
half and competes in both solo and group. She has placed but
never won solo, but her troupe has won a couple of times. Sadly,
all these competitions have come to an indefinite halt due to
this virus thing. But she did plenty of performance when the
world was still normal.
I see what you guys mean about the whole downplaying of the
talents. It's simply a way to distract her from her jealous
moments, and we have a giggle through the tears thinking of ways
of not-fun elements - "i don't wana hear when she hit a bad note
screeeeeeech screeeeech!" We do not know any of those children
personally, and in the midst of a meltdown, we can't have that
"lets practice being a good audience for violin girl" talk as
the talent would be over when we would be back at our seats.
#Post#: 55445--------------------------------------------------
Re: Honorary Flower Girl - Sorta?
By: TootsNYC Date: July 31, 2020, 10:03 am
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[quote]I think she's off to a very good start, in fact. She
showed a lot of self-awareness in saying what she did about
wanting to be the only child. Good for her for seeing that. No
shame in her feeling that way and wishing she could be a flower
girl.
[/quote]
I want to echo this.
I think she shows some serious self-awareness, which is a great
strength to have.
Maybe ask HER what would be a better way to react, or to feel.
(and remind her that it's OK to be upset inside; the etiquette
of the situation comes when you don't burden other people with
your unfair or out-of-proportion feelings)
And then ask HER what she could do, what could she say to
herself, that would help her get to appropriate behavior, or
(even better), to be able to manage those emotions.
She sounds pretty self-aware; I bet she'd have some interesting
things to say.
Maybe instead of "imagine how he could mess up on his violin,"
try "imagine if he was your cousin or your friend, and you had
seen how much he practices; what would you want for him? Would
you root for him?"
#Post#: 55447--------------------------------------------------
Re: Honorary Flower Girl - Sorta?
By: Gellchom Date: July 31, 2020, 10:25 am
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I want to clarify that the thing about pageants and any other
kind of competition is that they teach the opposite of what she
seems to need right now. Life isn’t a competition, and needing
to be a winner at all costs is not healthy. COVID cancellations
may be doing her a favor.
Consider getting her involved in group activities, possibly team
sports, but even better things that are not competition at all.
Maybe she and a couple of friends can have a little garden or a
lemonade stand for a charity, or she could help teach a younger
child something.
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