Yeah, she's the Princess

Mansie, as you all may be aware by now, lives in a world of her own. In that world she is the Princess who can do no wrong and is actually the numero uno. Her word is the last word and lesser mortals like me, Manish, Aleena and her friends are all her subjects. Yeah, we give her this freedom up to a point. We play along in this charade with her to make her feel good though we keep it within limits. Fortunately for us, her teachers are not in that domain much to the dismay of our Princess.

Recently there was a competition organized in her school to select kids for a dance show on TV. Quite naturally Mansie was enthused and in her own wisdom she had nominated herself as a sure shot winner. She prepared for it sincerely and continuously for more than a week. She also came up with the idea of using the hoopla in her dance which I thought was quite ingenuous. To be candid she was pretty okay in her preparation and I thought that she would make it. As far as she was concerned her selection was a foregone conclusion.

On the day of the selection she was very excited. She went to the school quite happily. She gave her trial with lot of gusto, as you can see in the pictures. I too went to the school to give her moral support. If you ask me she was quite okay for her age. But when the results were announced to my surprise and to Mansie’s horror her name was not there. It was as if the skies had befallen on the little girl. She was inconsolable to say the very least. Actually all the kids who were selected were of sixth grade and beyond whereas Mansie is only in third. And there’s no doubt that they were much better than her. But according to my Princess that’s no excuse for not selecting her. I tried to console her but it did not make much of a difference.

The hoopla act was indeed good.

I asked her teachers to excuse her for the day and I took her to Pizza Hut to cheer her up. Once we reached inside her mood changed. Once her favorite chicken grilled pizza came her mood brightened. And she remained like that for exactly 30 minutes. After that it was back to square one. She started crying all over again. And I was getting pissed off to put it mildly. But I somehow kept my cool. I didn’t want to lose my cool on her as she was already pretty upset.

We came home and the entire afternoon I kept consoling her to the best of my abilities. I tried to explain to her that she should try more next time. But Princess that she thinks she is, it was rather difficult for her to come to terms with her failure. All this made me realize something very harsh. All the Princess stuff has actually gone to her head and she thinks her to be above the rest of the guys. Well, she will have to be brought down to mother earth now. I’ll try and be as gentle as I can but no more Princess act for her at all. Parents like me are guilty of treating our children with kid gloves and in the bargain they are not exactly ready for the harsh realities of life. The kids need to be prepared to accept failure and I have failed in preparing my child for this. Well, not anymore. It’s not going to be very pleasant for her but so be it. Being sorry at home is much better than being sorry outside.

What do you guys have to say? Would you like to give any suggestions to me? Do you guys also treat your kids like Prince and Princesses? I’d welcome your advice. Go ahead and give me one.

Related Post

Did I prepare Mansie for the wrong exam?

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Posted on August 30th, 2009 AUTHOR'S DIARY • Tags: child, competition, daughter, Princess, school, TV. • RSS 2.0 feed • Leave a response, or trackback