We don’t do our children any favors when we try to protect them from experiencing sadness or failure. What we really want for them when they feel sad is to be able to endure disappointment and hurt feelings, not to hide behind defenses, angry acting-out and driven behavior in order to avoid emotional distress. Not, in other words, for them to become ADD adults. It takes a lot of loving to help a child accept sadness, to know that it can be endured, that sadness, like all other mind states, is evanescent. It will pass.
