A Three Year Old and a Fish

Posted March 13th, 2008 by Jen in family life, religion

Too much fish food The crime scene, exactly as I found it. The three-year-old coveted his six- year-old sister’s fish. He knows he is too little to feed the fish. We’ve warned him about putting foreign objects in the fish tank. And never is he to use the fish net and attempt to catch the fish.

But it was all just too much. As you can see, that’s enough food for several schools. I happened upon the bathroom today, and the betta fish was lying on her side (my daughter just knows it’s a girl), and only the faintest twitch told me she was still alive, but quickly approaching her final moments. The boy had found his opportunity. He was soundly disciplined and we await the moment when “your father gets home.”

The real details emerged from my four-year-old daughter. I thought the curious child just really wanted to feed the fish. But, he must have spilled his guts to his other sister, because she tattled confided to me the terrible truth. “He was trying to catch the fish, and he couldn’t, so he got mad and dumped in the food and some soap.” Oh, how my heart sank. Not just an innocent mistake, but acting in anger.

We’ll be having some earnest discussions over here, dealing with controlling our anger, true repentance, forgiveness, and asking God to change our hearts. What a wonderful, terrible, teachable moment.

In the meantime, my precious, mourning daughter had me record her memories:

It was a betta fish that had no twins that matched to it. And I saw other twin fish at PetSmart but that one was the only betta fish that was rainbow colored. She had one really shiny scale by her gills. Her name was Glory. She had almost all of the colors in the rainbow. I loved my fish the first time I got her. She made me laugh when she did funny things. I hope she’s been fine when I’ve been gone. I want to let her go when she’s better. I hope she has a happy life when I set her free into the river. [Oh, sweetie, your fish isn’t just sick, she’s dead.]

Technorati Tags: betta fish, children, fish, fish food, death of pet, teachable moment

14 Responses

Jane March 13th, 2008 at 6:36 pm
Oh, what a sweet, sad note. You are right, there are teachable moments here- for your son and your grieving little girl as well. One day… this will be included in the repetoire of family stories. Right now, I am sure it is not too amusing.
heather March 13th, 2008 at 7:12 pm
Ah. My younger child killed my older child’s fish which was in the end a good thing–I hate caring for fishtanks and fish.

I love how yours responded, poor thing.
mrs darling March 13th, 2008 at 7:59 pm
Oh oh oh! How heartrending! But oh my the lesson that will be taught from this! My how hard parenting is!
Kathleen March 13th, 2008 at 8:25 pm
Oh dear. Rest in peace sweet fishy.
e-Mom March 13th, 2008 at 8:36 pm
I’m sort of chuckling and sort of sad. It happens. :~D
Renae March 13th, 2008 at 8:53 pm
Oh, no! I remember when my son’s beta died. We were trying to be stealth and get him another one, but little Bug caught the very end of his dad flushing Willie. He screamed, and cried because he thought Dad killed his fish. After we explained what happened, he prayed, “God, please help Willie-Fin as he goes through the pipes.” Being honest and burying the poor creature might have been a better option. :(
Dana March 14th, 2008 at 9:24 am
Oh my! Your daughter’s little eulogy is precious. : )
SJ March 15th, 2008 at 2:32 pm
That is so sad, but it sounds like your on top of it. My youngest has had a few moments like that over the years and it is hard as a mom I questioned what I was doing wrong. After much personal assesment, I’ve decided it’s just one of those life lessons he’s been sent here to learn and I’m the lucky person chosen to help him learn it. Now I just need the manual on how to do that.
Rob at Kintropy March 16th, 2008 at 3:53 am
Sorry to hear about your daughter’s fish. I love how she dealt with it, though, even if the whole asleep vs. dead is a little murky to her at the moment. Hope the “teachable moment” went well when Dad arrived home?
Jen March 16th, 2008 at 12:29 pm
Jane, yes, this will definitely show up in the family storybook. :-)

Heather, I’m not at all fond of caring for fish and fishtanks myself!

Mrs. Darling, parenting is truly hard sometimes. My daughter is fine, and looking forward to a new fish, but we have a lot of work to do with the boy!

Kathleen, RIP it is. His burial is today.

e-Mom, I understand…my husband had the same response!

Renae, Oh no! What a sweet prayer.

Dana, I know, it was so tender, I’m glad I wrote it down.

SJ, When you find the manual, let me know.

Rob, yeah, Dad reinforced the whole discipline quite well. :-)
JHS March 16th, 2008 at 9:31 pm
Oh, yeah . . . we went through the gold fish stage. They all died except for one big fish that lived about 10 years — no, I’m not kidding. Bob “tried” to kill him a bunch of times — cut off the oxygen coming through the tube, got the water temperature wrong, etc. He was a true survivor until he finally died, we think, of old age.

I love the way you used this situation to teach you kids great lessons about life.

Thanks for participating in this week’s Carnival of Family Life: St. Patrick’s Day Edition at Colloquium! The Carnival will be live at midnight (Pacific time) on March 17, 2008, so drop by and check out all of the wonderful submissions included this week! This is my favorite submission this week!

Happy St. Patrick’s Day to you!
Jen March 18th, 2008 at 8:15 am
JHS, wow, 10 YEARS?! That’s a miracle, I’d say. :-)
Sunny Daydreame March 18th, 2008 at 10:38 am
Don’t we all act that way sometimes though?
A March 24th, 2008 at 8:43 am
So sad! My parents garden has at least 1 parakeet, 2 hermit crabs, 3 dwarf puffer fish, and 1 goldfish. Many hard moments for me and my two brothers growing up.

This still isn’t as bad as our next door neighbor who killed his hamster by smashing it up against the wall while trying to catch it when it escaped. For several weeks he thought he was cursed and would kill anything he touched! (I think we were around 8 years old!)

Many blessings with your teachable moment- life is so full of them!

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A Three Year Old and a Fish

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