My Daughter the Doormat

Claire is a nice girl.

She is polite.

She is kind and generous.

But, she is a doormat.

I raised her with the first three lines of this post in mind. I wanted her to be a pleasure to be around; the kind of kid other parents want their children to hang out with. And, in this way, I was successful. She has many friends and their parents always remark on her manners and overall niceness.

The doormat issue, though, was an unforeseen consequence of all this kindness, friendliness and politeness that I drilled instilled in her. Now, she is a sitting duck for more aggressive, dominant personalities. These kids just roll right over my kid.

I've taken the classes and I know that society encourages this type of behavior in our girls but that was not my intent. I am not a doormat! I am a strong, opinionated woman who doesn't take any crap from anyone. So, when my firstborn popped out with a vajayjay I thought that I could have it both ways: a polite, kind, force of nature sort of daughter.

Well, apparently, I spent too much time on the politeness and not enough on the butt kicking part of my master plan. Because now my daughter is sensitive and easily hurt. Other kids are bossy and don't consider her opinions in decision making areas.

So, now I am left with a doormat and one who spends a lot of time feeling alienated and hurt. But, how do I change this? I have tried the "buck it up" way in which I was raised but to little avail. I have coached her on saying, "I don't like to be treated that way, please stop." That seems fairly effective but I want her to be the kid that says, "Fine, you think I'm ugly? Well, not as ugly as you!" and storm off proud of herself for coming up with a snarky comeback.

In my defense, my husband is also a doormat has tendencies of a doormat. He has parent issues that have festered since the moment I entered his life and they took an immediate and total dislike of me. He avoids confrontation and wants to make everyone happy at his own expense.

Because of her more quiet ways, I find myself wanting to jump in and fix some of the sticky situations with other kids but I know that I cannot and must not. I will not always be there to work things out for her or rescue her. And this is hard. So hard. It is certainly one of the hardest things I have encountered yet in parenting because, for so long, it has been my job to protect her from the hurts of this cold world and the jerks who inhabit it. But, parenting is as much about teaching a child to be a productive adult as it is setting rules and example. It takes all the restraint this hothead can muster to hold back and not do some butt kicking on Claire's behalf but I manage most of the time because she is going to have to learn to be her own best friend and hero and it is better to learn now when the hurts are relatively small and minor than later when they are not.


Man, this parenting gig is hard.