Drama Queen of Hearts

My daughter is a drama queen.  With a really big heart.  God has BIG plans for this little girl.  And so do I.

She has been having recurring nightmares about little kids burning in a house fire.  I don't know if it is because of that one night when we were driving down the road and actually saw a house with flames shooting out of the windows and around the roof even before the firetrucks arrived, or if she overheard Johnny and me talking a few days later about a different house fire where a little boy saw the flames and told his mom and they reached the house just in time to save the people inside, or if she learned about Hell at Sunday School (or maybe all of the above).

But her biggest fear right now is fire.  She flips out if I light a candle.  She starts crying at really random times of the day and asks me if I know of a little kid who got burned in a fire.

Well, of course I have had fire safety talks with her since this all started, and tried to calm her fears about my candles, telling her how super careful I am, and never leave them unattended or near anything that might catch on fire.  When that didn't work, and she was scared that I might burn myself, I even did the really cool magic trick where I ran my finger through the flame and proved to her that it didn't hurt because I am SuperMom.  I know, that's risky, but I was at my wit's end!  You don't know how many HOURS I stayed up with her, wiping away her tears!  I had to show her that her Daddy and I know how to handle little candles and we are super careful.

And she doesn't believe I'm SuperMom anyways.  She's never seen me fly.  And there was that one time, when she asked me a question and I said, "I don't know."  Her reply?  "Ha!  I thought you said you know EVERYTHING!  You don't know everything, do you?"

Pedestal destroyed by my five-year-old.

But, surprisingly, the magic trick worked.  She is no longer afraid that I will burst into flames if I go near a burning candle.  And since I told her that I do not personally know any children who have been burned in a fire, she has stopped asking that question.

So that's her greatest fear at the moment, temporarily subdued.  Her previous one?  That someone would come through her window and try to take her.  Her reasoning?  I told her she was the most beautiful little girl in the entire world (coupled with the first time she watched Rapunzel, where the mean Mother Gothel stole the baby and snuck out through the window).  After weeks of trying, unsuccessfully, to convince her that no one was going to steal her (because Mommy and Daddy would protect her, because there was furniture blocking her window, because she was too big, because she talks too much - I tried everything I could think of), I finally broke down and told her the one thing no parent EVER wants to tell their child.

I told her she was not, actually, the most beautiful girl in the entire world.  She is beautiful, and sweet, and smart, and precious.  But there will always be someone more beautiful, sweeter, smarter.  I almost cried when I told her that.

Sadly, it worked.  And succeeded in breaking my heart.  I'm a terrible mother.  In trying to help my child, I hurt her, although she won't realize that pain until later on in life.  At that moment, she was just relieved that no one would be trying to take her.  She no longer fears being kidnapped.

Now, she fears fire.  But not for herself, strangely enough.  She is afraid of fire for me and for other little children she does not know.  Random children.  Big heart.

And have I ever mentioned what her one wish would be?  We were talking about the Bible story of when God told King Solomon that he could have anything he wanted in the world, just name it.  He asked for wisdom.  And because he chose wisdom, and not riches and the life of his enemies, God gave him the wisdom, and the riches, and the lives of his enemies.  So, I asked Angelyn what she would say if God told her she could have anything in the world.

My daughter said she would ask that God give every person in the entire world their own house.  Because there are some little children who do not have a house and a family like she does.

I have never been more proud of my baby girl than at that moment.  And a little disappointed in myself.  I think I would have wished for a BIGGER house for myself.  Well, I know I would have.  Read my post about my dream home.  I wrote that just a few days before my Baby Girl made her wish.

Maybe, instead of my little girl trying to be like me, I should try to be like her.