Misunderstood Moments

“Real isn’t how you're made,” said the Skin Horse. “It’s a thing that happens to you. When a child loves you for a long, long time, not just to play with, but really loves you, then you become Real.”
“Does it hurt?” asked the Rabbit.
“Sometimes,” said the Skin Horse, for he was always truthful. “When you are Real, you don’t mind being hurt.”
“Does it happen all at once like being wound up,” he asked, “or bit by bit?”
“It doesn’t happen all at once,” said the Skin Horse. “You become. It takes a long time. That’s why it doesn’t often happen to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out, and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don’t matter at all, because once you are Real, you can’t be ugly, except to people who don’t understand.” ~ The Velveteen Rabbit by Margery Williams

A blond-haired little girl stood in the middle of the sidewalk a few houses ahead gawking at the three of us; Caleb, Alisha, and me, as we walked home from Caleb’s school. Her family had moved in over the winter months hiding us all from one another. The spring warmth opened doors for us to get a glimpse of each other.
We walked closer to the little girl who continued to stand and stare. About a house length away, she saw us clearer.
“ICK, She's ugly,” she blurted and grimaced. Her mother, who we had not noticed, jumped out from the side of their car to swoop her daughter up.
Caleb and I walked in silence both thinking the same thing. Had we really heard what we thought we heard?  As we stepped in front of their house we saw the mother crouched down behind her daughter with one arm wrapped around her waist and a hand covering her daughter’s mouth. The mother said a quick, embarrassed “hi” to us.
You can't cover misunderstanding.
“Mom, that was mean of that girl,” Caleb quietly spoke, both of us realizing we really had heard what we thought we heard.
“Yes, it was mean but some people have never seen a person with disabilities. They don’t know Alisha and don’t understand anything about her. That little girl does not know to not fear what she doesn't understand. I think if she spent time with Alisha she would see how adorable she is. Don't you think?" He quietly nodded and I ached for the hardness of it all.
If the same encounter had happened years before, I would have desperately wanted to scream my pain at the mother and her little girl. I would have felt shame as if they were standing in front of me and my children ridiculing our being less than them.  I would have wanted like I had many times before, to run after them, to make them understand Alisha, our family, our life.
Forcing understanding doesn’t make someone understanding.
One time, Alisha and I were grocery shopping when a young girl stood at the end of an aisle staring at us. The little girl, about eight, disappeared.  I had a lot to get done and didn’t pay too much attention until I heard and saw her mother now standing next to her. They both stood at the end of the aisle looking our way.
“Yes, you are right. She is way too big to be in that seat,” the mother loudly affirmed her daughter’s observation. With a ‘tsk, tsk’ they vanished.
I looked around to see who and what they were talking about. No one was in the aisle but Alisha and me. I glanced at my two-year-old, bundled in her snow suit lying in the baby seat. She looked like a happy bundle of fluff. Yes, she clearly did not traditionally “fit” in the infant seat, legs dangling far past the edge of the seat.
”THEY WERE TALKING ABOUT US,” it registered.
Fury filled me as I decided to hunt them down to physically hurt them make them understand. I squealed the tires on the grocery cart in my quest to educate and enlighten.  I indignantly thought as I hunted, “Who would shove a preschooler in one of these infant carriers unless it was necessary? What child would tolerate it unless they needed to use it?" These were the questions I wished the mother would have thought of before passing judgment on us. I got angrier, I would make them understand I used the infant carrier because Alisha has cerebral palsy and can’t sit up. I would make them understand it’s hard to push a stroller and a grocery cart through the store let alone in the snowy parking lot, so making things easier on myself, I opted for only the grocery cart. And I would make them understand although Alisha may look too big for the infant seat, it really did “fit” her.
Disappointed I could not find them, I carried on with my grocery shopping.Shame seeped in.
Misunderstood moments can do that, shame you, if you let them.
Over the years I have had more "misunderstood moments"than I'd like to recall . I suppose these encounters bit by bit could have flattened me, making me hostage to their perception of "good" or "right". But I refused to accept the false perceptions of others as Real and freed myself from having to carry the weight of making others understand.
Helping my kids practise these same truths is more my focus these days. It's painful to witness my son's own "misunderstood moments" but I know he will grow through the hurt because he lives with Alisha and knows...
Spending time with Alisha is what makes her understood and that is what's Real.

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