Breaking Point

Well... on my 37th birthday I broke my first piece of wood in Tae Kwon Do Class :) And I also managed to break the heart of my precious little boy :( :( :(

For WEEKS before my birthday, the kids all started asking me what I wanted for my birthday. Truthfully, "gifts" is WAY down the list on my "love language" list. So, I told Madison that I wanted a "coupon book" for back massages, I told Lauren that I wanted her to sing a song for me in church (that is still to come), and I told Tyler that I wanted him to "TRY" to break a board in TaeKwonDo. I emphasized the word "try" because he is SUCH a perfectionist that I didn't want him to feel bad if he was unable to break it.

There were several problems with Ty being able to break a board - 1. He has NO fat anywhere on his body, including on the sides of his hands where most people have a little padding. 2. He is SUCH a perfectionist, that he worried about it SO much and could not overcome the mental challenge. And 3. he is much shorter than the rest of us, and had to hit the board without as much follow through as the rest of us. All this resulted in him trying about 3 or 4 times, and not breaking the board. That resulted in a meltdown in class. When I looked at his hands he had marks on the side of his hand from it hitting the board :(

I spent the rest of the night telling him that he gave me what I wanted... he "tried". But in his eyes, he failed me on my birthday. That broke my heart into pieces!!!! Then I beat myself up for asking him to do that to begin with!!! I should have known better! It ended up with me explaining to him that what I wanted more than anything was for him to be happy. And that it didn't matter to me if he ever broke a board or not - I want him to have fun trying; and I want him to be happy. I let him stay up late with me, and that helped a little bit. I think he is over it now, thank goodness!!

So... I put the pics on here of Tyler trying his hardest for mommy. I also put the pics on here of Madi breaking a board, me breaking a board, and Matt breaking CONCRETE!!!! The pics of me are horrible - just because I looked horrible that night. I almost cropped out all but the board breaking, but I wanted to prove that "I" broke it ;) Oh, and as you can see... I almost fell on my face - lol. 1. I didn't really expect it to break so easily and 2. I didn't go down on my knee like I was supposed to.