This week something wonderful happened. A little girl had a donut for the very first time. She is three years old. It was a happy day.
You see — she usually can’t eat donuts. They’re filled with allergens that could cause a life-threatening reaction. She has severe food allergies.
Many of us take basic things like eating a donut for granted. Yet for a child with allergies, every ingredient must be analyzed before they eat anything. The EpiPen must be nearby at all times. It’s very stressful.
What a wonderful thing it was when her Mom found a donut recipe that had safe ingredients for her to eat. The little girl was overjoyed as she helped stir the batter. She spent a fun day making donuts and decorating them with her family.
This reminds me of another little girl who loved donuts. My daughter was 7 years old and the youngest of four children. Things were busy at our house, and she could barely get a word in. Her older siblings were busy with homework and numerous school activities. No one was listening to her that day when she tried to interrupt. So she decided to take matters into her own hands.
I was running around helping her siblings with various activities when the exhaustion set in. I came into the kitchen and flopped down at the table to rest. I glanced up and took a double-take. Someone had drawn on the white wall with crayons. I examined the scribble on the wall. It looked like a circle.
“Who drew a circle on the wall?”
“Not me,” said the oldest.
“Not me,” said the two older sisters. They all stared down at the youngest.
“It was her.”
She looked up at us with huge brown eyes and shrugged her shoulders.
“You should never draw on the wall,” I scolded her, “Only on paper. For that, you are going to the time out chair.”
We brought her to the comfortable pink chair in the living room where the children were sent for a time out. Even though it was a comfortable chair, my children hated to sit still, so time out was usually effective.
“You sit here alone and think about what you’ve done,” I said.
Then I had an idea. I brought her a sheet of paper and a pen. “I want you to promise me you’ll never do it again, and write down why you wrote on the wall.”
I left her alone with the paper.
About a half-hour later her older sister brought the paper to me. “She’s done.”
Dear Mom,
I really wanted a donut. And no one would take me to get one. So I drew a donut on the wall.
Katie
This brings me to our conclusion. Some children will do anything for a donut.
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This post was previously published on Medium.
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Photo credit: Rod Long on Unsplash