You Are Not Wanted.

So yesterday everything came to a head. All of the constant running around, things going on every night and no time to decompress and be with my family. There was an incident at church, a small misunderstanding, really, but it made me feel ugly inside. I was hurt, and for a brief moment I hated, but then I took a breath and slowly worked on becoming me again.

I don't want to say too much, because I know sometimes my local friends read this blog. But at church yesterday, I was basically told that Niko was unwelcome to a place that he had always been welcome to. There are new people there now who don't know and understand him, and want him elsewhere because he's distracting. Which he IS, and I know it! And after thinking about it, I know that these decisions were made in the best interest of everybody. I wish I had been involved in the decision making, of course, so that I knew not to bring him to that room, but I know these decisions were not made out of unkindness. These are sweet people who are balancing a lot of responsibility, and are working tirelessly to do good things. I'm not angry anymore, and probably wouldn't have been angry at all if things had been communicated properly beforehand. Sometimes we just get too busy.

But as it was, I had the joy of standing in a room with my weeping child and being told, as gently as possible, that he was no longer welcome there, that he was too difficult to deal with. I was blindsided, and stood there in shock while Niko wrapped his arms around my neck and cried. And I cried, too. I cried twice in church, and then I came home and cried. Then my friend June called me, and I cried harder than I had cried in a long time, the kind of crying where you can't stop long enough to catch your breath. Then I cried when I went to bed, and today when somebody asked about it, and I'm crying now. This is what I have to say.

You touched on my greatest fear. I'm afraid when Niko plays on the playground with mean kids that knock him down. I'm afraid when little girls back away from him when he's screaming. I'm afraid when the kids poke him with sticks through the fence when he's playing in his own backyard. The phrases "You are not wanted" and "You don't belong here" and "You are too different" are the most cruel things that you can say to somebody, and they don't always need to be said with words. You are kind, wonderful people, and I'm sure that if I knew you, I'd really enjoy you. I know you have to worry about kids other than my sweet boy. But the way this went down was terrible and humiliating, and my son and I were left feeling like we had violated your space by existing. You became the very thing that I am most afraid of. You became my monster.