Welcome back to the Simplicity Diaries with me, Kem Jon Paine. This is our last reading in this special series on how to help your child be more socially and emotionally resilient. And this is the fourth reading in the series after the introduction, which I guess would make it the fifth, but technically the fourth.
And we've so far, we've seen Sophie go through really quite a revelation, quite an understanding that it was life itself that was bullying her, that it was life itself that was overwhelming her and that was causing so much reactivity. And for her to become targeted for teasing and exclusion. And we saw in this last episode how when Sophie visited her nana's house and had a whole quieter way of life, that how much that was able to reset things for her, reset her nervous system, help her feel better and just had someone there to listen to her.
Now, in this last reading of this, of this story, we see Sophie back at school, actually, and we just see how she does when she enters back into that, that environment that was causing her issues before the holidays, before the holiday season came. All right. So let's begin the reading.
The power, excuse me, the power of less. Nana was right. When I returned to school in January, I felt different, so much more relaxed and confident.
Sammy and Jennifer noticed too. Did you cut your hair? Sammy asked before homeroom on our first day back. No, I said.
Well, you look different, though, Jennifer said. What do you mean? I asked. Oh, I don't know.
You just look good. Yeah, said Sammy. Really pretty.
Did you guys go to get some sort of spa resort thingy or something? Jennifer asked. You look so refreshed. No, I stayed with my grandma.
We had such a great time together. What did you guys do? Asked Sammy. Kind of nothing.
Nothing? Yeah, nothing. And it was great. I felt like everything had shifted and it really had.
Mom and I had a long talk about what I wanted to do that spring, and we decided that that plunging back into the fast paced, overcommitted, stressful daily routine that had consumed me in the last few years wouldn't be the best thing for me. I didn't want to give up soccer altogether, but I needed to cut back a bit. Mom spoke to my coaches and they agreed I could skip one of our weekly practices for the rest of the season.
And she told me that she and dad wanted me to take next summer off too, in that way I'd have a three month break from organized sports. Mom also said to my subject teachers at school that they arranged to cut back on the amount of nightly homework they'd assign me. They set me up on something called a time-based study.
That meant that I should study each subject for a certain amount of time and then stop, even if I hadn't completely finished the work. That way I wouldn't spend hours and hours on a subject and fall and fall totally behind on everything else. And I wouldn't stay up late trying to fit everything in.
They knew I acted, I guess, honorably about the work, and I did because I'd always been a trustworthy student. For the first time in forever, I had more downtime because I signed up for fewer activities, my stomach aches disappeared, and I stopped getting that nagging cold headache, and I slept much more soundly. Amanda was even nicer to me, and dad switched with mom sometimes so that he could spend one-to-one time with me.
He even drove me to a tournament and saw me score my first goal, well actually my only goal of the whole season. At school, things got a bit better socially too. Oddly enough, I realized that Miranda wasn't all that bad.
In fact, she could be really funny in her own kind of quirky, unique way. When I thought back to the barbs and the zingers that stung me so deeply, I wondered how much being exhausted and on edge had played into my reactions about her comments. Like the Little Miss World cup line, that was kind of funny when I thought it over.
For the one thing, I sort of deserved it because I'd gotten in a habit of bragging a bit about my soccer exploits and how good our team was. Maybe Miranda had felt a little intimidated herself because she didn't look all that comfortable playing any kind of sport. What's more, nothing she'd said had been all the way nasty, or I guess it wasn't a really big deal.
She was definitely not the sort of out-of-control bully. If I'd ignored her comments or just laughed at them and played along, they wouldn't have meant anything to me or anyone. Back in the fall, I definitely felt like a victim.
Life had been moving too fast for me, and I guess that's why I became so hurt and reactive when I thought Miranda was picking on me. But spending time with Grandma, away from everyone and everything, had helped me see things in a different light. I'd blame others, but in fact, it was my hectic life that had been bullying me.
I promised myself to never let that happen again. So, this story was about, I guess it was about just four, just sort of a handful of essential things. It was about, obviously, doing too much and feeling overwhelmed.
That came out really clearly, right? It was also about trying too hard to live up to everyone's expectations. That was more back at the beginning of the story, and it came up again just at the end now, didn't it, where those expectations were dialed back a bit. It also highlighted giving yourself permission to dial things back.
And that's so not easy, because when Sophie looked around, kind of everyone else was doing the same sort of thing. And, you know, many kids have said to me over the years, it was normal, so I guess I had to do it. But when you speak to the other kids, they're feeling stressed too.
So it's not normal at all. And I guess it was also about becoming centered and calm and connected to family and to friends to some extent too. But it was about finding, for Sophie, it was about finding her center again.
You know, Sophie found the pace of modern life overwhelming. That's clear, right? When she dialed things back, she discovered that she stopped overreacting, she felt calmer, and she started connecting up with her friends again. And in this way, she's kind of got a new, almost like a reset on life.
But in this story, what you might have noticed, and what particularly was important, is that her family moved in closer to her. They had been, in some sense, going in different directions. They'd been disconnected.
And that also led to Sophie feeling a bit unprotected, really, that she was just in the world without much to protect her. So when a kid is feeling vulnerable in that way, by dialing things back, we also achieve something crucial. It's not just the dialing back, because the decision to do that is also all about getting closer, just getting more connected, and giving a child a safe family base from which they can launch out into the fairly demanding life that they lead at school and with friends and such.
So I hope this story has been hopeful. I hope this whole series, this special series, has also been helpful as well. Okay, bye-bye for now.
