Dear “14 year old girl”…
… I’m sorry “14 year old girl” (you’re the one who we, the Flynt family, met while swimming the other day at the community pool) for you having to stand there while your mom gave unsolicited parenting advice and used you as the bad example.
… I’m sorry “14 year old girl” that you didn’t have anywhere to run and hide as your mom said she should have disciplined/trained you like a horse when you were little.
… I’m sorry “14 year old girl” that your mom is taking out her own junk on you.
… I’m sorry “14 year old girl” that this probably was mild compared to what normally happens to you at home.
… I’m sorry “14 year old girl” that we couldn’t steer the conversation off your mom’s topic of choice fast enough to keep you from obviously feeling abused and humiliated.
… I’m sorry “14 year old girl” that I didn’t even learn your name, but I promise to pray for you and your family.
… I’m sorry “14 year old girl” that you aren’t alone in living in abusive situations that probably will go unreported.
… I’m sorry “14 year old girl” that I didn’t man-up and tell your mom what I was really thinking.
God, please protect that beautiful girl while she is in that home. Please radically reverse her mother’s heart and ways of treating her children. Please let us run into that girl again at the pool so I can stand up for her.
I have had the same experience as you had with “14 year old girl”, my little girl’s mother called her “little twit”. This precious child is now 22yrs old and has had to totally distance herself from from the parents she loves. I too am so guilty for not “standing in the gap” for her when she was young and mistreated. I’ve reach out to her now ,but she is so wounded that she trusts nothing least of all herself. I share in your prayers and have to trust that her LOVING FATHER is there in the mist of