My Mirror, My Child

As I tapped my laptop keyboard after 10:00 last night, Hailey approached me in the half light glow of my computer screen. "Mom, can we talk?" she asked, her small voice breaking.

Truthfully, I was annoyed. It was after 10:00, time for all kids to be tucked in. Time for me, dammit. I'm sure that, in her heightened state of self-consciousness, Hailey sensed my poorly-masked aggravation. "We can talk another time," she offered, tears running down her cheeks.

"No. Let me shut down my computer."

She didn't wait. All day she had been on the verge of a dizzy spell. If it continued to worsen, she would miss our trip to Silver Dollar City on Friday (tomorrow), so I expected she wanted to talk about her worries, her fear that she'd miss the fun.

As my computer slowly went to stand-by, Hailey said, "Sometimes I feel like...." She paused. I vacillated between annoyance at the interruption for her ill-proportioned fear and shame at my own lack of compassion for my distraught daughter. She continued, "...I feel like...like I'm...bad."

What?

She launched into a litany of her faults, faults that had nothing to do with her dizzy spells. As I listened, looking into her tearful eyes, her face transformed to my face. She became my mirror.

My own soul wept for my child. Wept because, at almost forty, I sometimes have the same irrational emotions and poorly proportioned self-analyzation. I despise that part of me, try to stuff it away somewhere or poke fun at it before anyone else. Yet here in the mirror that was my child it stood bare, exposed, raw.

God, how do I advise her when I haven't yet learned how to advise myself?

As my ten-year-old described her feelings of awkwardness, of feeling "different than," of feeling like the only child in the world with atypical migraines and dizzy spells, I listened. I listened as my own thoughts found voice in my child. I knew I had a choice to make, a choice that--in the current morning light--looks large and life-altering. I had to choose between answering her with the Inner Critic to whom I have listened for years, or answering her with love and acceptance.

Acceptance that we fret while Carl and Katie flow through life with ease. Acceptance that, as intellectuals, we analyze things that others barely notice. Acceptance that we have illnesses that limit our physical abilities, but not our abilities to desire.

But I also pointed out our blessings: both of us love to learn and learn easily. School is easy for us, yet it brings Katie to tears. We both excel at all things musical. While we both hate to miss out on anything because of sickness, we have opportunities and blessings if we only look for them as we lay on the couch.

Hailey and I visited for nearly an hour, laughing at points, near tears in others. Something happened between us, something mystical and bonding, something we will always remember in spirit if not in detail. That something, which I have yet to name (any suggestions out there?), is now the foundation for future relationship as the teen years loom ahead.

I love you my mirror, my child.