Dealing with Disappointment

[jen3kids]

My dd was not accepted to the high school program that she applied for. She completely bombed the assessment essays and didn't qualify. And, since it is a writing program, the essays were 90% of the assessment. She truly is a great writer and dh and I both think she was too nervous to write during the assessment. Writing is her passion.

 

When she read the letter yesterday, she cried and then holed up in her room for a few hours. Dh and I went to offer encouragement and cuddles and she came down to watch movies and have dinner with us. She didn't tell any of her friends - many of whom were asking her. She ignored their texts and emails. She'll see 2 friends tonight at lacrosse who applied to the same school but different programs; I know one got into her program, but I don't know about the other. They will definitely ask her about it.

 

I realize that some people don't like to talk through disappointments (dh is totally like this and it drives me nuts), but I want to help her. Dh would say that I over-talk things and that drives him nuts!

 

So, how do I help her? Do I leave her alone and let her deal with it internally. She knows I'm here for her, but it kills me that she won't talk about it.

 

So, maybe this is more of a how do I respect her wishes not to talk about it?

 

Please help me not to overwhelm her!!!

 

Thanks.

[jen3kids]

I know, but it is so hard.

 

I want to make it all better, and I can't!

[Guest submarines]

You are "making it better" by following and respecting her cues. :grouphug:

[Remudamom]

Leave her be. She knows where you are.

[jen3kids]

You are "making it better" by following and respecting her cues. :grouphug:

 

I know, but I feel so useless. I hate it.

 

Yeah I know, I hate seeing my kids disappointed! It's more painful to me than my own disappointments.

 

Definitely.

[Guest submarines]

I know, but I feel so useless. I hate it.

 

 

I'm the same way--I'm a talker, and DH and DD aren't. So I can really relate. You are now making a big effort not to talk to her about it--if you are making an effort, you aren't "useless". ;) How she's coping is not necessarily unhealthy or inefficient. The important thing is to be there for her if she decides to open up. For my DD it could be months later. :grouphug:

[jen3kids]

Thanks everyone. She knows I'm available. I made sure to tuck her in last night and give her an extra cuddle. She's in the stage where she doesn't always want that, but she didn't make a fuss about it.

 

She tends to cry pretty easily, so putting it out of her mind is a coping mechanism for her. Otherwise, she'd breakdown in tears constantly.

 

We did discover that we can appeal the decision, so she asked me to write the letter for that. I'm not sure if it will do any good, but she wants to try. Perhaps we'll include a couple of her writing assignments.....

[Wildiris]

I went through this last year with DD in a similar situation. My DD had a month of rejections and disappointments. It was hard on her and me. After the initial wave of disappontments passed and she was ready to talk again, we moved on to plan "B" a quickly as possible. For us that meant applying to a private online high school with a gifted program. Now at more than half way through the school year, this program seems a very good fit for DD. She decided not to apply again to the school that rejected her last spring. Her disappointments last spring also meant finding a summer program at the last minuet. And finally, it meant evaluating her time and what she was willing to devote to piano study.

 

DD has had more disappoints since last spring, but she continues to put herself out there and applying to different activities or academic programs. The more she tries, the better her chance are of getting into something. These experiences have made her more resillient. She has made some hard choices that reflect a maturing mind.

 

My advice: Discuss what happened and why to prepare for the next step; do not to dwell on mistakes so much as to use the experience as a stepping stone to future applications. Without her in the loop, find several alternative programs to apply to, then present the alternatives. Get her moving to her future. If she is a writer, she can submit her work to publications. Daily writing is a must. A writer must slog through those uninspired moments, days, weeks, or years honing their craft. The muse does not catch you, you must catch the muse. Writers write. They don't talk about it. Perhaps daily writing would have put her in a more comfortable place to write her assessment essay. The most crucial question she needs to answer for her self with total honesty--you don't need to know the answer--is "Was I really prepared?" I remind my DD all the time that she is competeing against kids who spend a lot of time being prepared for exams or applications, and no you cannot think that just because you're smart that you don't need to prepare. Her most recent bomb was the AMC math exam (Much more challenging than she thought), but she got into a popular summer CTY program.

 

About the letter of appeal-Don't. I called last year to the school that rejected DD. It didn't do any good, and in the end it made me feel like a helicopter parent expecting and exception be made for brilliant DD. The hard cold fact is: DD didn't make the cut for a reason.

Good Luck :001_smile:

[jen3kids]

I went through this last year with DD in a similar situation. My DD had a month of rejections and disappointments. It was hard on her and me. After the initial wave of disappontments passed and she was ready to talk again, we moved on to plan "B" a quickly as possible. For us that meant applying to a private online high school with a gifted program. Now at more than half way through the school year, this program seems a very good fit for DD. She decided not to apply again to the school that rejected her last spring. Her disappointments last spring also meant finding a summer program at the last minuet. And finally, it meant evaluating her time and what she was willing to devote to piano study.

 

DD has had more disappoints since last spring, but she continues to put herself out there and applying to different activities or academic programs. The more she tries, the better her chance are of getting into something. These experiences have made her more resillient. She has made some hard choices that reflect a maturing mind.

 

My advice: Discuss what happened and why to prepare for the next step; do not to dwell on mistakes so much as to use the experience as a stepping stone to future applications. Without her in the loop, find several alternative programs to apply to, then present the alternatives. Get her moving to her future. If she is a writer, she can submit her work to publications. Daily writing is a must. A writer must slog through those uninspired moments, days, weeks, or years honing their craft. The muse does not catch you, you must catch the muse. Writers write. They don't talk about it. Perhaps daily writing would have put her in a more comfortable place to write her assessment essay. The most crucial question she needs to answer for her self with total honesty--you don't need to know the answer--is "Was I really prepared?" I remind my DD all the time that she is competeing against kids who spend a lot of time being prepared for exams or applications, and no you cannot think that just because you're smart that you don't need to prepare. Her most recent bomb was the AMC math exam (Much more challenging than she thought), but she got into a popular summer CTY program.

 

About the letter of appeal-Don't. I called last year to the school that rejected DD. It didn't do any good, and in the end it made me feel like a helicopter parent expecting and exception be made for brilliant DD. The hard cold fact is: DD make the cut for a reason.

Good Luck :001_smile:

 

 

 

Thank you for sharing your dd's experiences. It really helps knowing how others have dealt with a rejection like this.

 

Dd does not want to do high school at home, at least I don't think she does; I'll have to ask her again. Her other choice for high school is the local one, which is a good school, but it doesn't offer all the special writing programs.

 

I did talk to dd about the positives about not getting in - she won't have to get up as early (she is not a morning person), she already knows the field hockey coach, she can take more art classes (the specialty school only allows the one basic class because other electives are taken up by the extra writing classes), etc. It may actually open more doors for her....

 

To be honest, I don't know if she did fully prepare herself. She knew what one essay would be, but I don't think she pre-wrote it. She had a general idea of the other 2, but couldn't pre-write either of them. She does write pretty much everyday - nothing I see, but she says she does, and I believe her.

 

As for the appeal... dh and I have mixed feelings. We don't know if it will help. There were no mitigating circumstances other than she was nervous. We are certainly not helicopter parents; we are definitely the more free-range type! Everyone who is rejected is allowed to appeal, so it wouldn't be out of the ordinary to do it. I will call the office to find out what they look at in the appeal. If they do not have someone re-mark her essays, then I'm sure the appeal will be pointless; she wasn't even close to the cut-off.

[Belacqua]

Maybe I'm just wildly rationalizing, but I try to remember that we actually want our kids to experience disappointment while they're still at home and we can fluff the nest a little. I worry especially about kids for whom everything seems to come so easily; I'd hate to see a kid not experience any kind of failure until she's in college and doesn't have anybody to bake her brownies and remind her that it isn't the end of the world. Sounds like you're doing great with that.

 

As Wildiris says, recovering from disappointment and seeing that those awful feelings do fade with time makes our kids more resilient. Doesn't make it any easier, though, does it? Hope your daughter is feeling a little better.

[jen3kids]

Maybe I'm just wildly rationalizing, but I try to remember that we actually want our kids to experience disappointment while they're still at home and we can fluff the nest a little. I worry especially about kids for whom everything seems to come so easily; I'd hate to see a kid not experience any kind of failure until she's in college and doesn't have anybody to bake her brownies and remind her that it isn't the end of the world. Sounds like you're doing great with that.

 

As Wildiris says, recovering from disappointment and seeing that those awful feelings do fade with time makes our kids more resilient. Doesn't make it any easier, though, does it? Hope your daughter is feeling a little better.

 

 

Nope, you're right.

 

It is ok to deal with disappointment. We all have. It is not the end of the world, even though it feels like it right now.

 

Thank you.

[Jenny in Florida]

This is a timely thread for me, since I'm already preparing myself, mentally and emotionally, to handle the fall-out if my daughter does not get the internship she wants for next year. (She's already graduated from an early entrance college program and is just now old enough to apply/audition for this.) She's been told to expect results of her audition on Monday, and I suspect it will hit her pretty hard if she is not offered a slot in the program.

 

What I tell my kids is that, in my vast life experience (because they like to remind me of how terribly old I am), things usually work out. When bad stuff happens, usually just about five minutes after I feel like I'm completely at the end of my rope, something gives way, opening up a path I often didn't even know existed or making possible something on which I'd already given up hope. With a few rare exceptions, once I have the benefit of hindsight, it is clear to me that not getting what I thought I wanted actually turned out for the best. After many years of observing this pattern, I've finally learned to allow myself a few hours to cry my tears and wallow but then start looking around to see what's coming my way. I've learned to trust that God/the universe/karma/whatever almost always comes through for me.

 

Some here may remember how devastated my daughter was when she didn't get the part she had wanted so badly in a community theatre production. She had skipped other auditions, turned down other shows just to make sure her calendar was clear to do that one and had worked really, really hard to prepare for the audition. The show was being directred by someone she knew and had done a show with before, a director she knew liked her. She went in the first night, got called back for the part she wanted, went back the second night and genuinely thought she had done well. Not only did she not get the featured role she wanted, she wasn't even offered a place in the ensemble. And, to add insult to injury, her little brother (who was in theory too young to even audition) was cast in the show. It hit her very, very hard. She's done a lot of theatre. She has a degree in performance/directing. She's been turned down many times before, but that one felt different. It shook her confidence greatly and seemed to her almost like there had to be some underlying reason. She had a rough time getting over it enough to show up for the next audition on her calendar.

 

She did show up, though, and ended up with a lead role in a very challenging, adult play. She knocked that one out of the park, got reviewed in local newspapers that said wonderful things about her performance, and ended up meeting people who are active in the professional theatre community. The connections she made doing that show have made a huge difference to her. As a result of doing that show, she was invited to join an acting class run by a well-thought-of local director, who has taken her under his wing, cast her in another show and begun recommending her to other directors in town.

 

Had she done the community theatre musical, she would not have been available for the other show. And, despite the fact that my son was in it, I can say honestly that the musical wasn't a terrifically good production.

 

Maybe others will have their own stories to share of similar experiences. And maybe your daughter will take some comfort in knowing that this disappointment doesn't have to be the end of the road. It may well just be a bend that leads her to a better experience than she would have had if she'd been accepted to the program?