Do you remember when Jordan shot me in the head with the airsoft gun?

Yeah I do.

Do you remember smashing the airsoft gun?

It’s one of those times where — I don’t know — I just had zero control of my reaction in that moment. I was in complete disbelief — just aghast. Thinking about all the conversations that we had had, that that would be an action that would ever happen around me. I was just completely flabbergasted by that.

And it certainly impacts me more than others, I’m sure. I probably had more anger at myself for that fact that it wasn’t clearly understood to my son that that was not ok. But ever since that moment I guarantee he understands.

You were really angry. The most angry I have ever seen you in my life.

Probably not my best parenting moment.

No, no, it’s fine.

It’s one of those times that I was glad that Uncle Charles was standing there. He was initially the one to have some conversation about how that kind of thing would...impact me differently than most. Like I said, not my best parenting moment.

You are human.

How can a child of mine not understand the seriousness that that could be? Even someone that it happened to — still to this day, I’m frustrated — because I did not communicte it well enough to my own children. What if that was a real gun rather than an airsoft gun? Which is what flashed in my head at the moment...and him thinking nothing of it...um, was crushing to me.