Little Mini-Me

Taking Ella to school today, she reminded me a lot of me, or at least the memories I have of me when I was her age. We have a drop off "procedure" at school (and man, if you don't follow it to the T - they bust you!). As she bounces up to the school, she's got her little pink backpack on and her ponytail (she wears one almost everyday - doesn't want anything else) flipping around and bee-bops into school. I just sat there for a moment watching her walk in, wondering what she thinks about as she starts her day and wondering what I thought about back then.

Sometimes it's almost like watching myself. There is a counseling technique that is used to help folks that have some kind of trauma, abuse, abandonment issues from their childhood. I've used it both as the counselor and the counseled. You have the person close their eyes and think back to a time or times when they experienced as a child something (the trauma/neglect/abuse, etc) that has had this negative impact on their lives (could be depression, anxiety, erratic behavior, who knows...). You have that person then imagine that the child (them) is now being comforted by themselves as an adult. You walk them through that - how do you make this child feel better? secure? loved? What do you say to this child? Do you hug him/her? With the idea being that the person learns to comfort the child within...

When I did this visual imagery (this was long before I had kids) what I imagined was me, right around Ella's age and of course, I looked just like she does now (or pretty darn close). Odd...very odd to have it all intermingled like that.

I wonder if her being a little mini-me is going to be a good thing or a bad thing during the "turbulent years" - will I understand her more or try to direct her too much because I think that I understand her more...I don't worry about this kind of stuff with the boys!