This is a glimpse into how play therapy works. A good play therapist will let the child lead, help guide the child gently, and never lose sight of the purpose of the child’s therapy. This child needed to find her own sense of courage. She needed to trust the adults in her life. She needed to say the things she feared so she could learn how to overcome them. 

Are you listening to your child’s art? As they tell you about the boy and girl fox on the hill, maybe you could ask, “What is that fox thinking?” They might tell you he is in love with the girl fox, because she has long eyelashes. And then you’ll know your ten-year-old is beginning to feel like a girl. And you can tell her that her eyelashes are as pretty as the foxes. Because that is likely what she was hoping.

Last night I stood at the bedside of a little first-grade boy whose mother knelt down beside him with his hand in hers. His pale face was peaceful, and only the absence of red on his lips hinted that it had been over an hour since he’d passed away. He was beautiful, and I cannot tell you why… except maybe it was that his long battle with sickness was over now.

Tradition is not the worship of ashes, but the preservation of fire.

-Gustav Mahler