Stuff they don't write about in the parenting books!

Home Depot can get to a girl!  Especially if you are a sensitive nine year old girl! 

Big C and I went to the Depot this week for a quick paint pick-up.  No biggie right?  A particular advertisement got to her in a way I could not understand.   There was a sign suggesting you, the consumer, not throw your money away and showcased a toppling cute white piggy bank. The bank never hit the floor, in fact there wasn't even a floor in the ad.  Big C broke into tears and told me she found the ad upsetting but could not expand on why.  So here I am, trying to get my shopping done at the Depot, all the while attempting to avoid the aisle with the offensive ad, and dodging the Home Depot guys asking if I needed help finding anything.  How do you explain "Can you help me recall which aisle has the piggy bank ad because we need to go around that aisle?" 

These are the tricky parts of parenting.  Do you push your child through the uncomfortable feeling they are experiencing?  Life is full of them and you won't always be able to walk around them.   Do you force your child to express what's unsettling to them and hope you can find some sort of resolution so they can move on?   Or do you just honor their 'uniqueness' and skip around the Depot, running down each aisle ahead of your child, looking for that darn pig, protecting her from feelings that may be too big for her to understand?