Q. Drama Drama: My teenage daughter told me she is quitting high school drama because she found out a local youth pastor is going to be helping out. Apparently, the pastor has creeped her out for years. She says he always comes to the girl’s basketball games, never the boys, and delivers ice cream to the school on the girls’ birthdays, but never the boys’. He has never done anything unseemly to her personally and never to anyone else as far as she knows. My daughter has never said anything like this about anyone else, but I don’t want to cast suspicion on someone who could be perfectly nice. Should I just let her quit and not say anything to the drama coach or should I say something? If I say something, what should I say?
A: This is tricky. You daughter may indeed be reacting to something real, and creepy, about the youth minister. However, your probing has revealed that it’s nothing more than an uneasy feeling—he’s never done anything to her, and she’s not reporting that she’s heard first hand accounts, or even rumors, that he’s been inappropriate with anyone else. On the basis of that, if she truly was looking forward to being in the drama club, tell her you want her to think about sacrificing her participation in it because she has an aversion to this man. Let her know that there will always be other people around and ask if she would be able to limit her contact with him. But I think you should probe a little more deeply about what bothers her. Does he stare, stand too close, talk too intimately about the girls’ lives? Tell her that you don’t want to influence her to say yes to anything that’s not the case. Explain that since she’s never felt this way about anyone else, you want to get a better handle on what’s going on. You want to validate her feelings, and also explain that in the absence of something actionable, there’s really nothing you can do. Then if she insists she would rather give up drama that deal with him, encourage her to find another outlet for her creativity.
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The Principle of Least Interest: He who cares least about a relationship, controls it.
How does she know exactly everything this Pastor does? Does she stalk him to watch all of his extracurricular activites and does she keep a log of exactly how he allots his time and to whom?
What a drama queen for real. She needs to worry about herself.
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Was it a bad day?
Or was it a bad five minutes that you milked all day?
I'd first discuss the positives and negatives of dropping the class, such as would it affect her graduation. Then I'd discuss ways she could protect herself by never, ever being alone with the man. But at the end of the day, I'd probably let her drop the class. I believe in "gut feelings".
Years ago, I read a book I believe entitled, The Gift of Fear. It addressed listening to your gut instincts.
How does she know exactly everything this Pastor does? Does she stalk him to watch all of his extracurricular activites and does she keep a log of exactly how he allots his time and to whom?
What a drama queen for real. She needs to worry about herself.
If she does this a lot, with other people, then she might have a problem.
But if she's s3ensing a problem with this one guy, she should listen to her gut.
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The Principle of Least Interest: He who cares least about a relationship, controls it.
Yes he's a pastor and people will automatically want to defend him..lol
However she should trust her gut and use precaution.
But no I wouldn't allow her to quit our drop her class. When on earth will she be alone with this man?
That's silly
I wasn't defending him because he's a pastor (if that's what you're referring to) I'm defending him because her accusations seem really unfounded and immature. That's the kind of crap girls do to get men in trouble.
__________________
Was it a bad day?
Or was it a bad five minutes that you milked all day?
