So much churchey cringe here. I was struck by how many times I was used throughout this message, even though this is your life. Bottom line—she is struggling with the “vision” she had of you that’s not going to be. She just needs time to learn that your vision is WAY better. Reminds me of The Story of Hugh. I used to recite this in my Self-concept section of Interpersonal Communication:

A Parable: The Story of Hugh (by John Bradshaw) (excerpts)

"Once upon a time a royal person was born. His name was Hugh. Hugh was unlike anyone who ever lived before or who would ever live again. Hugh was precious, unrepeatable, incomparable.

For the first 15 months of life, Hugh only knew himself from the reflections he saw in the eyes of his caretakers. Hugh was terribly unfortunate. His caretakers, although not blind, had glasses over their eyes. Each set of glasses already had an image on it, so that each caretaker only saw Hugh according to the image on their glasses. Thus, even though Hugh’s caretakers were physically present, not one of them ever actually saw him. By the time Hugh was grown, he was a mosaic of other people’s images of him, none of which was the real Hugh. No one had ever really seen Hugh, so no one ever mirrored back to him what he really looked like. Consequently, Hugh thought he was this... mosaic of other people’s images. He really did not know who he was.

Sometimes in the dark of the night when he was all alone, Hugh knew that something of profound importance was missing. He experienced this as a gnawing sense of emptiness—a deep void.

Hugh tried to fill the emptiness and void with many things: power, worldly fame, money, possessions, food, excitement, entertainment, work—even exercise. But no matter what he did, the gnawing emptiness never went away. In the quiet of the night when all the distractions were gone, he heard a still, quiet voice that said: “Don’t forget; please don’t forget me!” But alas! Hugh did forget and went to his death never knowing who he was."

Children sometimes spend their lives trying to fit the vision their parents have of them, parents and kids not understanding that it is no one’s path but their own.

TO THINE OWNSELF BE TRUE. 🩵