Digging a Pit

A scripture from the Book of Mormon has been running through my head all day.  (This scripture is talking about some false attitudes that are seen in religion).

And there shall also be many which shall say: ^aEat, drink, and be^bmerry; nevertheless, fear God—he will ^cjustify in committing a little ^dsin; yea, ^elie a little, take the advantage of one because of his words, dig a ^fpit for thy neighbor; there is ^gno harm in this; and do all these things, for tomorrow we die; and if it so be that we are guilty, God will beat us with a few stripes, and at last we shall be saved in the kingdom of God.

2 Nephi 28:8 

Today I dug a pit for my neighbor.  This particular neighbor happens to also be my 3-year old.  For weeks we've been prepping Claire to get rid of passies.  She gets them at night and according to the rules she is only supposed to have them in her bed at night.

When we got home from Utah she asked if we could have a water-table like grandma has {to be perfectly clear she also asked for a back yard and a pool and a trampoline but we latched onto the one item of all of those that might actually be possible}.  I told her I would love to get her one as soon as she is ready to give up passies.  She said, "maybe when I'm older."  

It's been back and forth like that.  She also wanted a scooter {when you give up passies} and we had a friend who got a stroller for her dolls when she gave up her passes.  We haven't tried to push it too much {mostly because when we do she says, "maybe when I'm 10"}.  Yesterday walking through Target Claire saw a $1 sparkly magic wand that she wanted.  She asked for it and I said, "you can have that when you're ready to give up your passies." 

She looked at me and clarified, "and the scooter and the water-table?"

"Yep," I said very cheerfully.

"Then," she said, "I'm ready."

I told her that when we got home we would have to cut up her passies and it would make her very sad.  She said that she knew but she had a blanket that she could cuddle or she could get a cuddle from her mom {like I said, we've been working on it.}  She also told me that she didn't think she'd be sad.  

I wish you could have heard her walking around Target collecting her goods.  She kept saying, "I am ready for this. I can do it.  I am good at doing hard things" under her breath while holding her sparkly wand.

Once we were home she cheerfully handed me her passies after taking one last suck.  I cut them up and put them in the garbage which is precisely when the gravity of her decision hit her.  She was devastated.  

In the end, I do think she was ready.  She cried for a little while last night and again for a few minutes this morning but it hasn't been too big of a deal. She slept all night with no problem.  She also oscillated between crying and being thrilled with her new purchases.  She would go straight from sobbing to cheerfully talking about how she was going to ride her scooter with our neighbor and tell her that she doesn't use passies anymore.

The trouble is that I am heartsick about it.  I would have thought that I would have been pleased that I got what I want {which, in the end is what I really believe is best for Claire} but I'm not.  I am sick that Claire knows that I let her make a decision that wasn't what she really wanted and that, truthfully, she didn't really understand. I dug a pit to trap my 3-year old using a $1 sparkly, pink wand from Target.