Building Character

Alyssa had the fun of spending some time with friends this weekend. She was invited to spend Saturday afternoon into Sunday morning with one of the sweetest girls I’ve ever met. I was thrilled when N called us to ask if A could come over to her house.

My mom dropped her off Saturday afternoon because Tom and I had to attend a funeral. Bummer, that.

O and I went to pick Alyssa up at 10:30 on Sunday morning.

When we got home, Alyssa asked Tom if she could be on the computer. I was not in the room when she asked this and so didn’t know she’d asked and received an answer in the negative.

So when she asked me the same question not two minutes later, I told her she could since she’d actually been away from any sort of screen for almost twenty four whole hours.

Tom laughed and said, “She just asked me that and I told her no.”

I looked at Alyssa, who was sheepish. I told her how wrong it was for her to do something like that. If her dad told her one thing, it wasn’t right for her to try to get the answer she wanted by asking me instead. She hung her head and decided to go spend time with Orville instead of time in front of the computer.

After lunch the same day, Alyssa again asked if she could be on the computer. I told her to go outside first and see if there was anything he needed her to do before we went to my mom’s to do a project for her.

Alyssa glared at me and headed outside.

I was amazed by the total lack of guilt in not giving in to her. I usually feel at least a twinge of something resembling guilt when I make my children do something they would rather not do.

But this time? Not so much. In fact, I felt good about the fact that I was helping her build character.

I told her that someday, she’ll have a job that she won’t necessarily like but she’ll have to go to work and do that job anyway. She might as well get used to delayed gratification because that’s life.

She huffed and sighed and went out to do some chores with her dad.

She didn’t end up getting computer time until just before dinner, which ended up being about twenty minutes for the day. Which, honestly, is more than enough if you ask me. And since I’m the mom, she does have to ask me and sometimes I’m a guilt-free mean mom. We’re building boatloads of character around here these days.