It makes me worried when Alycia loses her appetite. She's had headaches and tummy aches. She's only ten. From our conversations I can tell it's stress. Alycia finds it hard to go to school. She loves her teacher. She's working at-level in class. I believe her stress is something I call social stress. Have you ever watched Mean Girls? Well, it's not nearly that bad in her 5th grade class, but when you are intuitive and sensitive, any level of mean is too mean.

We have some strategies to help remove the sting, and a day off once in a while to sleep in and hang out with mom is a part of that. Am I too indulgent? I don't think so. I never want to underestimate her stress, nor write it off as childishness. The pain of being ostracized in school is sometimes unbearable and evidenced in our society by the frequency of childhood depression and even suicide.

My daughter Amanda was also traumatized in elementary school, however, not by students but by teachers.

 During one summer holiday after a particularly difficult year in class, she would wake up in the middle of the night, having had nightmares of running out of paper ( true story!) and she would see her teacher hovering threateningly over her in the dark. That same summer she obsessed in June and July to make sure I bought her enough paper - and the exact correct brand of paper - for the 1st day of school on August 15th. "Mom, you have to buy my school supplies. When will you buy my school supplies?" She also worried that her little sister would end up with the same teacher and made me promise repeatedly - almost daily - that I would not let that happen.

So do I feel guilty for letting my girls stay home once in a while for the sake of their health? Not for one second! Am I spoiling them and sabotaging those life-isn't-always-fair teaching opportunities? Ha, hardly! There will be plenty of those. My girls will know, just as my sons do, that I will help protect them in battles that may threaten to overwhelm them.

I believe in zero-tolerance when it comes to bullying at school. That's why I've gone toe-to-toe with Ms. Trunchbull in the form of a boarding school headmaster who needed to apologize, a homeroom teacher's over-stuffed ego, an abusive math teacher's vicious drawl, an illogical science teacher's wrong grading formula and a nightmare-inducing elementary teacher's nay-saying.

Thanks to my new day-off option, I'm optimistic that my visits to the principal's office are over.

toodles

When Winning is actually Losing:



1-The Bachelor/Bachelorette; all that fake kissing... (I don't know it's sort of like Justin Timberlake says, "What goes 'round comes back around"! You get that perfect guy/gal but they must have a load of questions at the end of the day.)

2-getting to throw that conversation-ending insult, getting the last word that no one can top ( There's a scene in You've Got Mail where Kathleen Kelly insults Joe Fox in the cafe, but can't believe her instant remorse)



3-anything that has to go to family court; I know sometimes it's necessary, and if you've been there I'm so sorry for your pain... it's just always sad, dividing assets, custody of kids, suing Uncle Insertnamehere (almost all court shows on TV make me sad, but nothing like watching relatives fight)




5-religious debates; "Oh ya, like, I converted because I,like, lost this really heated argument, with this, like, really arrogant fanatic, like..." Dude?



When losing is actually winning:
1- when dads let their little sons win at arm wrestling
2- when grown sons let their dads win at arm wrestling
3- when moms let their little girls win at Dutch Blitz
4- when big sisters loan/lose clothes to little sisters
5- when losing the battle means winning the war
6-letting others go ahead even if you have to be last

So here's the winning-losing deal in the Timeless Words
"Self-sacrifice is the way, my way, to finding yourself, your true self. What kind of deal is it to get everything you want but lose yourself? What could you ever trade your soul for? (Jesus)

again, my humble opinion (backed up by Jesus' words),

toodles

I've been having a lot of marriage conversations lately. Here's an article I read that discusses the book Guyland:The Perilous World Where Boys Become Men. It seems to uphold some of my humble thoughts on the topic.
( http://www.newsweek.com/id/156372/page/2 ).

The author says that there are a lot of bad attitudes getting into the heads and hearts of young men concerning marriage. The Married Guy is quite scarce in today's popular culture. "When he does show up on TV, he's usually shown as freakish, fuddy-duddy and frequently religious: an uptight Boy Scout in a Peter Pan culture. "Today's prime-time television," the PTC says, "seems to be actively seeking to undermine marriage by consistently painting it in a negative light."

Who ever would have thought that "Today's guys are perhaps the first downwardly mobile—and endlessly adolescent—generation of men in U.S. history. They're also among the most distraught—men between the ages of 16 and 26 have the highest suicide rate for any group except men above 70—and socially isolated, despite their image as a band of backslapping buddies."?
 
I have three sons in their 20's and it makes me sad to think that young men might be experiencing a certain angst that was usually distinct only when they reached middle age.

"...Once the preserve of whacked-out teens and college slackers, this testosterone-filled landscape is the new normal for American males until what used to be considered creeping middle age, according to the sociologist Michael Kimmel. In his new book, "Guyland," the State University of New York at Stony Brook professor notes that the traditional markers of manhood—leaving home, getting an education, finding a partner, starting work and becoming a father—have moved downfield as the passage from adolescence to adulthood has evolved from "a transitional moment to a whole new stage of life...What used to be regressive weekends are now whole years in the lives of some guys...Actually, it's more like all the old ways—drinking, smoking, kidding, carousing—turned up a notch in a world where adolescent demonstrations of manhood have replaced the real thing: responsibility."

Guys should know how 'hot' it is when a dad does the faithful husband part and the dad thing really well! I was chatting with some young women who totally vouch for this... it's called 'p--- for girls', where the sight of a dad playing with his kids is really hot. But more than that, studies prove that "married men are happier, more sexually satisfied and less likely to end up in the emergency room than their unmarried counterparts. They also earn more, are promoted ahead of their single counterparts and are more likely to own a home."

GUYLAND NEEDS HELP! So... that is where women come in. The way I see it, I believe God created humanity. He created woman as a 'helper' for man. Somewhere along the way, that has become a condescending position, a sort of consolation position beside a superior gender. But think about it... you would not ask for help from people unless you were convinced they could actually help you. You wouldn't hire a tutor to help your kid in math unless you knew the tutor was better in math than your kid is. I'm not saying that women are better, I'm not saying that men are better, not for a second. It never has to get to that discussion with me. I am saying that men need help, and women can be that helper.

"Men benefit from just being married, regardless of the quality of the relationship. It makes them healthier, wealthier and more generous with their relatives," says Scott Coltrane, author of "Gender and Families" and dean of the University of Oregon College of Arts and Science. It accelerates men's journey toward stability and security. "In general, those are the things that lead to happiness," he adds."

this is, as always, my humble opinion...

toodles