30/05/2026
Recently, my daughter was struggling with a teamwork assignment at school.
She was assigned to work with two other boys, but they barely participated in the project at all.
She tried reaching out to them, messaging them, hoping they would contribute…
but most of the time, they stayed silent.
In the end, she had to complete almost the entire project by herself.
The difficult part was that all three students still had to stand in front of the class and present the slides she created.
Because she felt frustrated and emotionally upset while doing it, she rushed through some parts of the project.
And afterward, the teacher gave quite a lot of feedback about the content.
She took it very personally.
I could see she felt hurt and misunderstood, especially because she already carried the pressure of doing everything alone.
For a few days, she kept talking about it and replaying the situation in her mind.
And honestly, as a parent, my first instinct was to immediately jump in and help her feel better.
I wanted to protect her from feeling hurt 💔
But then I paused for a moment.
And I realized… maybe she didn’t actually need solutions right away.
Maybe she simply needed someone to listen.
Sometimes, being human means we need to fully experience disappointment, frustration, unfairness, and sadness too.
And maybe those emotions are not always something we must immediately “remove.”
Sometimes they are also part of growth.
A few days later, she talked about it with one of her friends, reflected on it herself, and slowly handled it in her own way.
Watching that reminded me of something important:
✅ Advice is only truly valuable when someone is ready to receive it.
And sometimes, the most meaningful support we can give the people we love is not immediately trying to fix them…
but creating a safe space where they feel heard, understood, and trusted enough to grow through the experience themselves 💛