Yesterday we were out with the girls and Hannah was doing such a great job with her walker, despite not having napped and being pretty tired. The last of our errands was at this kids' store near us and the girls were having so much fun playing with all of the toys, checking everything out, etc.
As Hannah was making her way around the store, this girl who was probably around 5 saw Hannah and called out to her mom, "Look at that poor girl, Mommy."
I was already tired from all the running around we had done and kind of under the weather. I felt my eyes well up and I just looked at the girl and said, "She's NOT a poor girl." Then I saw the girl's mom looking at me and I added, "She's actually really strong and smart and brave.
Right, Hannah?"
The mom smiled and said something affirmative like, "That's right, she is," sort of both to me and her daughter.
And that was the end of the interaction.
It wasn't that big of a deal but it totally tore me up. I felt really bad for being short with the girl and know that she's just a kid and doesn't know not to say things like that. But at the same time, I wonder how she got the message that pity was the right reaction to someone with a disability? I have to believe it came from her parents, and although I appreciated the mom's smile/nice words, I kind of wanted to say, "Sure, you agree with me now but maybe you should be
the one to nip those comments in the bud and explain to your kid why it's not okay.
Argh, I was just so upset and know it had to do with lots of different things going on with me as well, but it killed me that Hannah might hear someone refer to her as "that poor girl," when she would never think of herself as that way otherwise.
Some days are just hard.
1 comment:
Despite feeling emotional, I think your response was excellent for exactly the reasons you give - showing the other parent the way.
I truly believe incidents like that have less effect in the long term on the children than on the parents.
What your child will do is observe your response for modeling. If you can even fake not caring, Hannah will understand that what other's say does not have to break her emotionally.
Not that you asked, but that's what I think.
Barbara
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