Conversations

Just a few minutes ago I was talking to my daughter because she was constantly screaming at her yaya for no apparent reason. If this happened months ago, I would already be berserk with anger and would be screaming at Nike too, but something in me changed over the last month that made me realize I have been slipping into becoming a bad mother, so I changed my ways.

So today when Nike was being mean to her yaya, I went to her asked her to go inside our room, she was already expecting the worse and started crying, I closed the door sat down on the bed and asked her to sit down beside me. She bawled like there was no tomorrow, I wiped her tears and said calmly to her, Why are shouting at ate Nalen? Do you want Ate Nalen to leave? To this she replied, No, then why are you shouting at Ate Nalen, she tried explaining it to me by saying, “because butchi is going out the gate” (ofcourse her answer wasn’t in pure english - she’s only 3 and is raised in a bi-lingual environment) So I asked her, so if butchi was going out the gate why did you shout at ate Nalen? Do you want mommy to let her go home, do you want ate Nalen to leave us? Maybe Mommy should just let ate Nalen leave? then she cried again, she said No, I don’t want ate Nalen to leave. Then I explained to her, If you don’t want ate Nalen to leave then you should be good to ate Nalen, because if you don’t then she will leave us. Our conversation went longer because being a 3 year old kid, Nike had the tendency to repeat her questions over and over, so I answered her questions patiently and explained the situation to her over and over.

After our conversation, I left the room to grab a glass of water and I heard Nike leave the room and knock on her yaya’s door and she said “Ate Nalen, Sorry, Huwag ka aalis ha?” (translation: Ate Nalen, Sorry, don’t leave me ok?). I am so proud of my daughter for realizing the mistakes she made and so touched that she took the initiative to say sorry without me asking her to do so.

I also learned that by being calm, my daughter understands more of the consequences of her actions and tends to follow the emotions that I have as well. I guess Nike only learned to shout because I used to shout, and now that I have changed, I guess Nike will also change for the better.