My Failure

Before I became Hope’s mom, I had a pretty firm idea of what kind of parent I would be. I thought about all the good things I learned from my parents and how I would build on that. Having always planned to pursue older child adoption, I thought, yeah, sure I would learn about trauma and how that impacted things but on the front end, that naively translated into me doing a few more “there, there” sayings and going to therapy.

Over these last 5 years, I’ve experienced a lot of cognitive dissonance between what I thought parenting would be and what it is. My life has been consumed by figuring out my way through the fun house that is parenting and the haunted house that is parenting through trauma. It’s nothing like what I thought it would be, which is something I’m sure everyone says, but for me, being overwhelmed and sometimes consumed by my daughter’s trauma has been a struggle. It’s been a struggle to parent, and honestly, it’s been a struggle to keep my wits about me to function personally.

I think I’ve been a good parent to Hope; I hope that one day she will reflect on our relationship and see more good than bad. That said, there are definitely times where I reflect and think to myself, “Well, you really effed that up.”

I think in my last post many readers thought I was saying that Hope failed by not being a better student or gaining entrance to her preferred school or that she needed to settle for community college. Alas, no, I was really pondering my own failures around this chapter of our lives together.

Yes, education is important to me, critical even, for reasons I’ve written about and largely have to do with race and class. For me, education is very much a part of my identity. As a parent, education is one of those non-negotiable value things. It’s just that important. Now that doesn’t necessarily mean that it has to be a 4 year school, followed by a masters degree, but well, yeah, I’d love it to.

When Hope first moved here, I considered holding her back a grade to give her time to mature and to find some “ease” in the school work that she would have had previous exposure to. I ended up not making that move so as not to devastate our new mother-daughter relationship. At the time, I fretted that she might never forgive me or attach if I took such a drastic move, even though the educator in me thought it might be the best decision for her academically. In retrospect, I still believe it would have been the right decision for her academically; I know that the extra year for her might have also given us more time to bond. Of course, I’ll never know, and it doesn’t really matter now.

Over the years, I made sure that Hope had access to tutors when necessary. I let her take the SAT really early just so she would have exposure to it early and regularly. I sent her to a learning center for tutoring and coaching for nearly a year. I insisted that she go to summer school last summer to help pull her grades up a little and maybe build some confidence since I know that school is challenging for her on numerous levels. Then the big decisions came; Hope decided she wanted to spend her senior year at this school. I supported it and ponied up.

Throughout these years, I wondered if she would be ready for a 4-year school when the time came, ie immediately following graduation. I wasn’t sure, especially since she is on the younger side of her class, her academic profile wasn’t particularly strong and maybe she needed more time. More than a year ago, Hope and I discussed her future; we agreed that it probably would be best if she planned to go to the local community college and eventually transfer. At the time she was heavy into her independent language study and one of the local campuses offered a course of study that would be a good fit for her interest in linguistics. The decision gave us a clear path and something realistic to focus on.

And then Hope went to the new school. I love the structure that it gives her; it’s a highly regimented military school. She didn’t have to worry about clothes since it’s all uniforms. She didn’t have to worry about bedtimes or food or some things she fretted about at her old school. As we slid into the fall, we found that the prep school had a 3-college application requirement.

This is where my current failure began.

Me: Required college applications? Huh, that makes sense…prep school and all. Wait, this means we actually should look at 4-year schools????

That was like giving me a hit of something ridiculously addictive and expecting me not to chase that damn high.

I was off and running. The guidance counselor and I kibitzed about size and school type, colleges were recommended, and we visited the first one. I. WAS. ALL. IN.

Hope was not all in, and I remember her initiating a conversation with me about this change in plan.

Me: Yeah, I know but look, you have to apply anyway? It’s a formality! Dream and who knows, maybe the plan is supposed to change!

And Hope, who despite her having found her voice and a bit of agency and autonomy, caved like a wobbly tent in a hurricane. I was the hurricane. Hope applied to three schools. Added a fourth, realized it was the wrong school and instead of withdrawing her application, simply added the correct school.

[Don’t even talk to me about application fees.]

After the applications were submitted, I completed the FAFSA and started to come off of my high. And when you come down, reality starts to smack you around.

Me: Oh ishtay! What if us [me] getting all into this was a really bad move? What if she doesn’t get in anywhere? What if she doesn’t want to do this? What have I done?

Yeah, but we’re in it now, and Hope has gotten invested.

And then things really went left. My conundrum really began.

Hope’s therapist and guidance counselors agree that it probably is best for Hope to come home and go to community college. This of course was what our intention was 8 months ago; then things changed. But now, we are betwix and between her being so invested in the remaining applications and having embraced the idea of going to a 4 year school like her peers at this school and my believing in my heart and with the professionals that she probably should be home for at least a year.

I broached it with her, reminding her that it wasn’t that long ago that community college was our plan.

Her: Yeah, I know but I got into that school. You said the goal is always to have more than one option—there are still two more options out there.

Me: Huh, so you listened to that message…. #shocked #parentingwin

We have to ride this out.

The thing is, there are countless times I have fought to the mat for her and what’s best for her. My failure this time was not fighting for her and for her wellbeing. In my daze to maybe get Hope’s path back into congruence with my idea of what it should be, I forgot about her as a person who needed me to get the school to see her needs and make some adjustments suited for her.

I failed. Not her, me.

No, it’s not a failure that will destroy everything as we know it

And sure *fail* may sound harsh, but given how many parenting fails there are….jeeesch. Failing is ubiquitous to parenting. They go together like PB & J. So, no worries, I’m good, just reflective and wishing I’d taken a different path.#thistooshallpass

So, now it’s about riding it out, studying Hope’s options and figuring out what is in her best interests. And this whole experience isn’t a waste; it just could be…different. I could and probably should have handled it all differently.

I don’t regret Hope having ambition; I want her to want big things for herself. I’m kind of glad that she became invested; what I regret is that I didn’t listen to her early on, that I didn’t ask for some accommodations and that I didn’t look at the big picture that centered her well-being.

Now, I do think that once we get through this and make some decisions that things will be fine. I also think that while I worry about my daughter’s emotional well-being always right now, that this will turn into a good learning experience about trying, stretching, success and choices. I know it will be ok; I just wish I had handled it differently during the thick of things.

It isn’t the end of the world. We will be visiting the school in a few days and visiting the community college next week.

Stay tuned!