Unfortunately.......

'your daughter was not successful in her audition to become a kitten as part of the Cats cast'.......... this was the letter I got in the mail yesterday after auditions in the weekend with Miss Millie (6 years) to become a kitten in the musical cats which is being performed during the school holidays in July. Needless to say I was at a complete crossroads as to what to do - tell her and break her wee heart or not mention it and hope she didn't remember (to be fair she hadn't mentioned it since the audition, but that's not to say she wouldn't have at some stage!!). In the end after discussing it with my own mother who is very wise and has always given me such good advice, we decided that we would tell her.
We all face disappointments in life, some little some big and each in its own way knocks us off course but with the help and support of friends and family eventually we hopefully learn, start to feel better and with time move on.
So we told her and she cried and inside I cried that she was upset - I know that there are so many issues in the world today that outweigh not being picked in a musical but as a mother I hate the fact that she was sad and I couldn't do a thing to make it better. But as Mum told me sometimes we need to feel disappointment so we can appreciate the successes so much more and she is right - Millie woke up this morning in a great mood, had a brilliant day at school, we are taking her to buy her own hockey stick this weekend as her hockey team starts playing next week and although the disappointment was severe to her, she has moved on and is looking forward to things she is involved in!!!

I found the following quote

'Age does not diminish the extreme disappointment of having a scoop of ice cream fall from the cone' Jim Fiebig

and how true it is!!!