We will both survive middle school...I hope

Raising a middle-schooler means raising your parenting game up a notch.  Not only does she not need me anymore in the way that my 5 year old does, she often makes it difficult to be around her.  Lucky for her, I actually remember quite a bit of my tween years, so I truly do understand what she is going through.  I read a book recently that kept saying, "Remember, no matter how hard it is on you, it is always harder on your daughter."  And, I believe it.  I can see the internal struggle going on inside of her.  Part of her wants to be independent, cool, nonchalant, in-control and oh, so cool.  But the other part of her is scared to death to grow up and wants to just latch on to me and beg me not to make her grow up. 

Obviously, the part of her that wants to grow up has the stronger hold on her, or we would be in trouble.  She has to get up everyday, ride the bus with highschoolers, navigate herself around a huge school, keep track of her block scheduling, keep up with her homework, study constantly for quizzes and tests and maintain a healthy social life.  And, one false move can send that social life straight down the drain.  It is a lot of stress.  Abigale right this very minute thinks she is the only girl in school that doesn't have a pair of Uggs.  She wants a pair so bad, but she knows that as a one-income household, we don't usually drop $140 on a pair of shoes that she is going to grow out of within a year.  But on the other hand, I can remember when Guess jeans came on the scene and I absolutely had to have a pair.  I really do understand what it is like to be where she is in her life.  Unfortunately, for both of us, she doesn't have a clue what it is like to be the parent and no matter how much I want to teach her the lesson that name brands don't make the person and 20 years from now it won't matter if she had Uggs or not, she has to learn it for herself.  She has to go through the agony of trying to fit in and please all the caddy girls that shouldn't even matter to her, but do.

You can bet that some how, some way, Abigale will have a pair of Uggs on Christmas morning and some how, some way, we will get through middle school together.  I hope.

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