My Proudest Moment as a Mother

As a mother, there are many times in the lives of my children that I am proud. Really, the moments are endless. Kids do great things all the time. However, there are some times when the pride is just tremendous. When you almost burst from it. As your children get older, these moments seem to come closer together. At least for me they do.

My 14 year old daughter has been making me proud on a regular basis for years. She also makes me crazy, but that is another story! Whether it is straight As, writing a book or having a tender heart, she never ceases to amaze me and make me proud. However, I think my proudest moment as a mom came last year when my daughter was a freshman in high school.

She was in a class with a teacher that was.... not the best in the world. In fact, he was pretty bad. I determined that she was going to deal with this without my intervention because she needed to learn how. In college, mom won't be there to complain for her! Well, she dealt with it. She complained to me and then did her work. And then one day, she came home and told me a story that almost made me swallow my tongue I was so angry! Once I calmed down, she told me the rest of the story and I thought my heart was going to burst right out of my chest from pride.

Long story short, this teacher had called one of the students in his class "stupid". He then refused to apologize. When my daughter told him that was not right and that he should never call a student names, he told her that he would just call them all ignorant from then on. Well, my daughter refused to accept that and proceeded to call the anonymous tip line at the school and tell the story. She also gave the number to all of her classmates and encouraged them to call as well. The teacher did not return to work at that school this year.

The pride that I felt for my daughter was that she did not let this "authority" figure treat her, or her classmates, as inferior. She stood up for herself and her peers. She did not let him intimidate her into backing down. She made a difference. And that is an amazing thing in a teenager or even an adult.