Blindsided

I knew it was just a matter of time.

 

And yet, I didn’t see it coming.

 

I knew it would happen one day, and it is something I haven’t yet planned for because, well, I didn’t actually want to think about it.

 

The day that my kid would be targeted as the odd one out. The day that they notice – the other kids I mean. And the day that they not only notice, but act and react to my son’s differences in a way that is just not cool.

 

I knew it was coming.

 

And yet, when it happened the first time I reasoned it away – oh, just typical kids fighting, playing rough, nothing a little bit of guidance (or a time out) can’t fix. The second time was disturbing, like I was in a dream and I couldn’t run away from the monster chasing me, slow motion heart beat in my ears kind of thing. Immediate punishment with time outs was ordered, and there I thought I had nipped it in the bud.

 

The third time (and please note that this has all happened in a matter of an afternoon) I am dumbstruck. Just dumbstruck. And hurt, yes. And hot headed. And confused. And scared. And angry. And pathetically trying to plead with them to include my son – trying not to sound desperate.

 

And to top it off, one of the perpetrators of the nastiness is Harlan. I cannot believe it, I thought that we had a good thing going with the boys, I thought that Harlan would always stand up for his brother, I thought that they had something special. And here Harlan throws Malakai under the bus, in a way that is cruel and mean… I stand for Malakai with a fierceness that was born the day he was, a fierceness that says that I will do anything for my son, and there I stand facing my 3.5 year old son and wonder how he could have taken part in this shaming of his brother?

 

It is so difficult to keep calm and level headed, guide and speak and empower when all I want to do is grab these tiny terrors and slap them. But I have to keep a level head about this, what I do now will matter greatly in the way in which our family goes forward – so there is no time for my pain, my fear, my anger and my sadness… 

 

I knew the day would come – I just didn’t know that it would be this complicated.