Setting Boundaries... by a 7-Year-Old!

About two months ago...

It was yet another one of those scorching hot, boiling summer days, and I was picking up my nephew (7) and niece (6) from their summer camp again. The kids were sweaty, overheated, but also incredibly happy to see me. We went home, and my nephew immediately plopped down on the couch to watch Netflix, while my niece—as usual!—started crafting. Normally, I just let my nephew watch TV in peace (well, "watch the laptop", since I don’t own a TV) and I join my niece in her crafts. But this time, I thought it would be fun to watch with him. So, I cozied up next to him on the couch and told him I wanted to watch TV together. His answer completely caught me off guard and amazed me. He said, "Tata, I would actually like to watch TV by myself..."
Me: "Really? I thought you’d love it if we watched together!"
V: "Honestly, I’m just super tired, and I can unwind better if I sit on the couch alone. Do you want to go back to crafting with my sister?"
Me: "It's so great that you're asking that. But... how do you handle that at home, with your mom, dad, and sister?"
V: "I can't ask them there, but I figured I could just ask you?

Wow! Wow, wow, wow!
I thought that was incredibly strong of him. What he did might seem obvious, but it really isn’t. Expressing your own needs to someone else is hard. Often, there’s this fear that the other person will feel rejected or hurt. Being able to be yourself and voice your needs requires a secure attachment and a safe environment, knowing that the other person won’t feel hurt (and therefore won't hurt you back). And that’s exactly what I told him—that this was incredibly brave of him. I told him that many adults still don’t dare to tell other adults what they need, so it’s truly amazing that he can do this as a 7-year-old with his adult aunt! I also encouraged him to keep doing that, to keep expressing his needs (respectfully, of course, just like he did here).


A month later...

I was crafting with my niece again and thought I’d join my nephew on the couch for just a minute to watch Netflix, just to be cozy. Once again, my nephew let me know that he’d rather watch Netflix alone because otherwise, he couldn’t really unwind after a full day of school. This time around, I reacted way less maturely than the first time. I feel ashamed admitting it now, but I reacted by fake-crying. I’m talking dramatic sob stories, like "boo-hoo-hoo!" (a bit like a sad clown in a circus—everyone could see and hear from a mile away that it's not real). Fake-crying like that, I walked over to my crafting niece and said, "I'm not allowed to watch TV with him, boo-hoo-hoo!" She wondered out loud if my tears were real or fake, and I told her they were fake, but that my heart was sad.
I kid you not... Why oh why do I do things like that?!


One week later...

During the week that followed, I felt genuinely guilty about my foolish behavior. That little guy has the courage to express his needs, and I act like I’m deeply offended. That is manipulation in its purest form, and really harmful to a child. I felt terrible about it, and it was really eating away at me. I promised myself that the very next Thursday I picked them up from school, I would talk to him about it and apologize. So, before we started on homework, I told him. I told him that I thought it was amazing how he could once again state what he needed without fearing that I’d feel rejected, but that I had reacted really stupidly. I apologized and promised him I’d make sure not to do it again, and that if I did, he could absolutely call me out on it. He was fine with it, accepted my apology, and we moved on. All good. His sister was sitting at the table, taking it all in silently.

An hour later, my niece wanted to get a piece of paper out of the printer but couldn't get it to work. Instead of asking me to do it for her, she commanded: "Get that paper out of the printer!" I didn’t appreciate her tone at all and instinctively replied, "Yes, sir!" while snapping my hand to my forehead like a sergeant. And then—AND I LOVED THIS!—she said, "Tata, I don’t like it when you act like that." I told her that I also don’t like it when she gives me orders, but that I indeed could have said that in a different, calmer way. I also told her that I thought it was very brave of her to speak up when my words hurt her.

I want to pause here for a moment and look at what happened. Because this conversation might seem very ordinary, but for many people (including myself), it isn’t. How often does someone say something to us that we find hurtful or annoying, yet we don’t dare to say anything? Personally, I tend to "pray it away". Others push it down deep inside as if they don't feel those hurt feelings, and still others hold a grudge until it makes them sick. But these children were able to tell me what they needed, without fear of rejection. Do I dare to do that with everyone? Ab-so-lute-ly not. I’m often afraid to tell others that their (often recurring) words or actions hurt me because I’m afraid of their reaction. Because if I were to hurt them with my honesty and they verbally lashed out at me, I’d be worse off than if I had just kept my mouth shut and dealt with it myself. And so we stay silent. Always staying silent. Until it makes us sick. It’s so recognizable to me, and to many, many others I know.

It takes a secure attachment, a safe "counterpart," to actually be able to do this. The fact that these kids view me as safe is a massive compliment, and it’s something I worked incredibly hard on for years in therapy. For me, everything came together in that moment: yes, my recovery is bearing fruit! The kids feel good here, and they are safe here. Yes, yes, yes!


A week ago...

"Tata, a while ago you put one of my sister's drawings on your website, right? Would you put one of my drawings on your website as well?"
"Of course, sweetheart, but I didn't just put her drawing up there for no reason. I put it up because I learned a lot from it and wanted to share that with other people."
Right then, I could see the gears turning in his head at a hundred miles an hour. He grabbed a piece of paper and a marker, handed me the same, and said, "I'm going to teach you how to draw a monster. First, you have to draw a scary body, then a scary mouth with sharp teeth, etc., etc."

COME ON. HOW CUTE CAN YOU GET?! Doing everything he could to teach me something just so his drawing could be on the blog. So incredibly sweet! But, as sweet as it was, I quickly realized that his monster tutorial wasn’t going to yield a blog post. Suddenly, I had another idea. I told him that a while ago he had done something I thought was incredibly strong—totally blog-post-worthy—but that I hadn't written about yet. I reminded him of the time he mentioned he’d rather watch TV alone, and the conversations we had about it afterward, and I asked him how he’d feel if I wrote about that? I swear, the child beamed. Proud as a peacock! Still, he asked if his drawing could still be included, just like his sister's. "Of course, buddy, your monster is seriously terrifying anyway, right?" I said. "Yeah, but it's not finished yet, I'm going to work on it more next week!"

Three days ago...

This past weekend, my sister let me know that the kids are no longer allowed to come to my house, and that I can't pick them up from school anymore. My heart is broken. Bro-ken. Into at least a million pieces. Those kids are everything to me, and I am having a really, really, really hard time with this. At the same time, I also know that God never, ever makes mistakes. Two children (or any human being, for that matter) shouldn’t be "everything" to me. God is the one who is everything to me, and He has given me many people with beautiful, open hearts. I should allow myself to be surrounded and loved by them, and be there for them in return. All of those people in my life should be my "everything," not just two specific people around whom my entire life is built. So, I know that this is right, healthy, and good. Still, it’s a grieving process I will have to go through. Picking the kids up from school every single week for three years and having them at my house, and then suddenly no longer being allowed to spend time with them—it hurts. To deny that and not fully feel the pain, to not endure the grieving process, would mean no recovery, and that wouldn’t be healthy. This needs to be felt and lived through, and that’s okay. At the same time, I know that when God closes one door, He opens another. This cannot help but give me opportunities to save energy, and because of that, have more social interactions, meet more people, go out more, and finally start being young again. He will guide me; I don’t doubt that for a single second.

BUT, because I want to keep the promise I made to my incredibly cute nephew, here is his blog post, including the drawing he unfortunately wasn't able to finish... I won't be able to show him that I put it online, but maybe in a few years? Only God knows... But now I let go and let Him. He truly knows what we all need, and that is what I truly trust in.