Well, D16 came home this evening and told me about her presentation and how disappointed she was at only getting a B+ after staying up till 3:00 am working on it. I looked at her, walked over, put my arms around her and she burst into tears. We just stood there holding each other. I said "I'm sorry, it must be very frustrating for you after all that work" after a few minutes I said "it must have been even harder trying to study and having your mean father yelling at you, I'm sorry" She said "that's OK, it's just I try so hard to please this teacher and I feel like I'm never good enough" Whew! I said "I know that's how you feel right now but that teacher is just one person, his opinion does not make you "good" or "bad". Maybe you could sit down with him and ask what it is you could do to improve your performance in his class, sometimes we concentrate on one thing while the teacher is looking for another. It might help to talk to him about it." Anyway, she dried her tears and all was well for the rest of the night. She works so hard and I told her how proud I was of her, no matter what the mark she got! Personally, a B+ would have put me into orbit with joy when I went to school but my kid is more her mom than me sometimes!
