Just before bedtime, with tears in my eyes, I say this to my daughters – “Do you know that there is nothing – not any bad thing – you could do that would make me not love you? No matter how badly you screw up on any given day, and you will screw up, I’ll be here to help you through it, and we’ll wake up the next day and move forward. God gives endless second chances. That’s why He created tomorrow.”
My girls nod, their full moon faces staring at me in the silence.
But, do they really get it? Their beautiful minds are still developing and making connections, and they don’t always make sense of things. They can’t see the big picture yet or understand how their actions
today will affect them tomorrow.
Here in my bedroom, above the whir of the ceiling fan, I’m talking to my girls about suicide. I’m answering questions about an eighth grader who ended his life this past weekend. This is the second teen suicide in our township in less than a month’s time. I didn’t know the families, but I am a parent. I am human. Bile is swirling in my belly, and my legs are numb.
“Why does this keep happening mom?” they ask, their eyes stretched wide as silver dollars.
I don’t know. I don’t understand. I never will.
My heart is too heavy to have this conversation, and yet I know I have to.
I talk to them about kindness, about how words can be weapons. As always, I tell them that it’s more important to be loving than it is to be the smartest, the strongest, or the prettiest. I don’t know if they hear me. Sometimes their actions don’t portray my guidance. Sometimes my actions don’t portray my guidance.
Later, after I tuck my girls in, I drop to my knees alone.
I pray for the parents. I pray for the boy. I pray for all of the families who have lost loved ones to suicide. I pray that this epidemic of darkness will be lifted from the shoulders of our children and be replaced by the undying light of goodness.
Because, no matter what they do or say or don’t do, they are good. No matter what anyone says or tweets or posts or favorites about them, they are good. No matter their report card grade or their role in the play or their position on the field or their number of Insta-likes, they are good. Even when they do bad stuff, THEY ARE GOOD.
They are loved.
And nothing that happens this side of Heaven can change what they are worth to me or to their Creator.
I want my children to hear my love above every scathing word they see on their lying little screens. I pray for God to plug their ears to what the world says and open their hearts to His unconditional love.
I say to them -
Be kind. You never know what kind of difficulties others are going through, and your words have the power to lighten their loads. If someone hurts you, be kind back to them. Talk to me. Talk to God. Talk to those who build you up. Stand firm on this, because kindness is the only thing that can ever make a difference in our broken world.
Mother Theresa knew that kindness is the most important thing we can teach our kids. She said - ~Go out into the world today and love the people you meet. Let your presence light new light in the hearts of others.~
These tragedies have to stop happening. I don’t have any answers. I have only questions and an immeasurable amount of sympathy for these children and their families and a continued hope that my children will both feel the light of love and shine it into someone else’s darkness.