To the One Who Challenges Me Most: An Open Letter to My Daughter.

Dear daughter,

Please forgive me.

There’s a fire in you that I fear. 🔥

It’s similar to one that I once had.

Before they told me to turn it down.

Before they said the heat was too much, too bright, too wild.

Back when it roared and crackled and glowed from my amber eyes…

Before, one by one, they came with their buckets, filled with water… reducing that fire to the smoky embers of this adulthood that I now live.

Forgive my shortcomings, dear daughter.

When you were first born, I proudly announced:

“She’s mischievous and curious! There’s a twinkle in her eye!”

When you were a toddler, I proudly gloated:

“She marches to the beat of her own drum! She’s a real spitfire!”

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When you were five, I caught you lost deep in thought and asked “What are you thinking about?”

Looking at me, our pupils locked in, you said, “There are kingdoms in my mind.”

I was floored.

And impressed.

And

I was scared.

Later that year, you graduated Kindergarten and danced down the aisle with your diploma.

“She’s a spicy one.” I posted on Facebook.

Then the years began to stack up on us. Both of us, daughter.

And naturally, your fire grew.

And you came home with stories…

Attempts made to dim your flame,

Requests that you just turn down the roar of it to a meer smolder.

And I grew more afraid of this attention.

“Maybe you can just contain it, daughter?”

“Maybe you just glow less while you’re in school?”

“Sit up straight. No elbows on the table.”

“Tell a teacher.”

“Stay out others’ business.”

“Don’t be a hero.”

“Fix your hair.”

“Smile more.”

“Be nice.”

And soon, I was the person in your life carrying not one, but two buckets of water. Frantic. Ready to extinguish the twinkling flame that I so proudly recognized the day you were born.

Forgive me, my girl. There is something in you that I could not handle myself.

And so I got scared.

Maya Angelou says. “When you know better, you do better.”

I know now, while you may carry a similar flame as I once did, you are more fierce than I ever was or ever will be.

And God chose you to handle this bright, wild power. And God chose me to support you through your discovery of it.

Not to protect you from it.

And certainly not to extinguish it.

(Or ask you just to glow on Saturdays)

Some parents helicopter their children externally. They follow them on the playground. They obsessively check their temperature. They safety proof every nook of their home.

We’ve been different. Haven’t we?

The two introverts. The empaths. The intuitive feelers with the sassy mouths and this damn refusal to accept anything but the best in people.

How do you safety proof a mind?

…You know better, you do better,

and I am here to say:

There is nothing wrong with wanting to own every atom of the power that you possess, and there’s nothing g wrong with asking the same of others, Queen Lydia. I accept all of the kingdoms in your mind. No more helicopter. No more dimming the glow. No more fear.

Last year, I told God: I’m letting go, so I can fly.

Today, I say the same to Him:

God, I’m letting go, so she can fly 🦅

I love you, my mischievous, curious, spitfire, twinkling, roaring, girl.

Thank you for all you’ve taught me.

Xo Mom