I’m just going to come out and say it.  This week was a tough one from a mom’s perspective….but a great one from the little guy’s perspective.  During soccer practice, we had a little incident. A much smaller boy started throwing his ball against the little guy’s head when they were circled around the coach. I started to get annoyed until finally the boy’s mother made him stop. And I thought, that should be the end of that. But, the boy went right back after him and grabbed the little guy’s shirt from behind and attempted to rip it. After the mom did nothing, that’s when I had it.  I ran over and told the boy to stop, to which he pointed his finger at me…   I would never tell a parent how to parent. But never in a thousand years would I allow the little guy to act that way.

To his credit, the little guy did not react. He didn’t say anything to him, didn’t shove him.  I was so proud of him.  As I told the little guy it’s a hard balance between standing your ground and not engaging in that behavior.  So we agreed, next time to tell the coach. (I didn’t know it, but the kid did the same thing last week).  And I will be addressing that with the coach.  As I said to him after it happened, my grandmother taught me you treat others as you want to be treated.

The funny part is that we started karate again this week.  And one of their mantras is discipline, not starting fights, but knowing how to defend.   It’s hard thing to teach a child to be strong but know when to defend, but we’ll keep working on it.

So for sure this was a teachable moment.  But I smiled on the way home when he said, you treat people good mommy. Yep, buddy you do.  That goodness in the little guy’s heart was bright as ever.