Encouraging our children to follow their dreams is one of the most valuable ways we can be effective parents. One of my daughters was planning to be a medical doctor for a while, she was very excited and in my excitement, I made a few fatal mistakes:
I announced it on Facebook, telling everyone in our family and circle of friends that she was planning to become a doctor. Like any 15 yr old girl really wants to be locked into a lifelong career choice? She can't even decide what color hair she wants, why would I latch onto a career decision? It would have been smarter for me to buy her a set of medical scrubs so she could just get used to the way it felt to look and dress like a medical person, right? Even just getting her a nursing uniform for a halloween costume would have been more effective. The scrub store has lab coats and kid sized scrubs, too- so I'm thinking it might have been wiser to allow her to embrace the decision instead of turning it into a high-pressure thing. Oh well, live and learn. I'm sure by the time our youngest is this age we'll have it all figured out, right?
I announced it on Facebook, telling everyone in our family and circle of friends that she was planning to become a doctor. Like any 15 yr old girl really wants to be locked into a lifelong career choice? She can't even decide what color hair she wants, why would I latch onto a career decision? It would have been smarter for me to buy her a set of medical scrubs so she could just get used to the way it felt to look and dress like a medical person, right? Even just getting her a nursing uniform for a halloween costume would have been more effective. The scrub store has lab coats and kid sized scrubs, too- so I'm thinking it might have been wiser to allow her to embrace the decision instead of turning it into a high-pressure thing. Oh well, live and learn. I'm sure by the time our youngest is this age we'll have it all figured out, right?
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