Perfect Parenting Gone Completely Wrong...

I try and I try and I try.  I want to be the perfect parent.  And all that I have learned - is that I am completely imperfect.  My kids are my world.  All three of them.  And it's so bizarre to me - that although they are all mine - they are sooooo different.  So, it's not like - once you get through a stage with one - you can just repeat for the next kid.  So not true.

In my life, I have made choices - some stellar - some not so much.  Some have affected my kids.  Some haven't.  I am sure that I have hurt them by some of my choices, and helped them with others.  But although, I have always had their best interests at heart - often times, I have failed in epic proportions
.  There is no user manual provided with these people.  I have just been winging it for 16 years now.

But yesterday - I  went to battle for my middle child.  She is an amazing little girl.  Smart, funny, beautiful, and the most amazing heart.  She mother's her baby brother.  She wakes up every morning - way before she has to - just to kiss me before work.  She is my snuggle bunny.  My nail polish partner.  My text buddy.  Anyway, she had been treated quite unfairly - in in some aspects - I had allowed it to happen.  When she told me what was going on, I thought she was just being a bit dramatic.  I felt like it was regular pre-teen angst.  Disliking certain teachers, hating school, the regular stuff.  But then - I realized that wasn't the case at all.  And I didn't realize it until I saw it in black and white before my own eyes.  That awoke a venomous and spiteful creature that lived deep within me - one that I had no idea that existed.

Many emails, phone calls, and meetings later - I had my day of reckoning.  I was able to meet, confront, and explain what I had been made aware of.  And I had success.  I should have been walking out with "We are The Champions" playing in the background.  But that isn't what happened.  I felt great for about 30 minutes. Until the brevity of what happened set in.  I realized, in a way - I had ignored my child's plea for help- and just assumed that a teacher was in the right, and she was in the wrong.  What a horrible feeling that must have been for her.  Not being able to get through to her own mother.  All I could think about was the person who is wrongfully accused, and then set free a few years later.  Yeah, you are grateful you are free - but you still don't forget the prison sentence.  I cried at the drop of a hat, all day yesterday.  Every time I thought about it - I got choked up, my chin started quivering, and my eyes started pouring.  I couldn't stop.  I couldn't wait for her to get home from school.  I needed to talk to her.

She called me a squeaky and happy.  She told me all her teachers loved me and were bragging on me.  She was so proud of her momma.  And that made my heart hurt just a little more.  And I apologized to her like I had never done before.  And all she kept saying was - "It's okay, mommy!  I am so happy they got to meet you!"  I don't know if she will ever understand how much I feel like I failed her.  How sorry I truly am.  And how happy I am she is mine.  When I got home - She hugged me tight - and just kept telling me how cool it was that her teachers got to meet with me.  She loves me unconditionally right now.  I pray that never, ever changes.

So, to sum up - I try to be the perfect parent.  I make my children say their "mam's and sirs".  I try to make them be responsible little people.  But I am not perfect.  I might be perfectly imperfect, if that is a thing.  But what is perfect?  They don't expect me to be perfect.  Just to love them.  And put up a fight when need be - and they got that all day long.