This is my journey with anxiety, ADHD, and trying to figure things out.

Hey,

Ms. A sounds like a lovely person. Have you thought about telling her how you feel? :) 

I am probably going to with part of a christmas present i'm giving to her, I am making cards for teacher gifts, but only for Ms. A's and Ms. H's (Probably) because I have a few things to say to both. 

I love that! I'm sure she will appreciate hearing it :) 

I told her last night when I gave Ms. A her christmas gift. She had the best reaction I could hope for. She said.. (I'm calling myself Nadia)  "Nadia, you really are like my fourth daughter, it's not in favorite order its by age. You are one of the sweetest and most thoughtful young ladies I have ever met. I love you Nadia." (The reason she said fourth daughter is because of age, she has two kids who are both older then I am and also another girl who is like a daughter to her. It's not an in order of favorites and she made that clear, I am just the youngest. I don't mind that at all because that means I have 3 older sisters of sorts.) I almost cried then and their, and that made my day. It took me like 10 minutes to find her gift because I had done teacher gifts for a few people, I do that every year no big deal. I had personalized it a bit this year to each person and my mom labeled them, but did it wrong and double labeled one of them, they were in bags so I could look under the tissue paper and figure out which one was hers. That got very confusing after some time and I eventually figured it out. She was so cool about it, probably cause she had known me long enough to figure out that i'm fairly high strung. We eventually figured it out and it went great. She read the card and the conversation above happened. I also said something that i've wanted to say for a while... "I love you too Ms. A." and during the course of about 10-15 minutes I got like 7 hugs. In other news she had some amazing news for me which was at summer camp next summer they were offering archery for my age level. Which I may have screamed a little bit after being told that. She also told me that we had an opportunity to shoot on Saturday that my mom did not know about. And her kid and I are in the works for panning something to hang out.   

Hey there,

Thank you for sharing this with us. What was the Christmas gift you got for her? 

Also, I noticed what you wrote about how she said that she loves you. How do you feel about that? Has she said this to you before or anything similar? 

Hey,

The christmas gift I got for her was a pair of fuzzy socks and a bath and body works lotion that was a christmas scent. That was the first time she said she loved me i'm pretty sure not 100% sure though, I don't know how to describe how it felt, it felt really good. The fact is I knew she loved me she had always treated me like a daughter and I love that. If I ever got hurt, she would help me and not because she felt obligated to, because she actually cares. It was for sure the first time I had said to her I love you and it felt good. She is ultimately my second mother and she knows that, and i'm her 4th (?) daughter.

Hey there,

They are great presents - what was the Christmas scent, like cinnamon? 

Also, thank you for telling me how it made you feel. I'm wondering, have you ever heard of other teachers/camp staff telling the children that they love them before? If so, what did you think of that? 

Hey, 

It was like black raspberry vanilla, I think. I'm not utterly sure it was a christmas scent but it was in a red bottle and according to Ms. A it smelled nice.

I haven't really heard of it in standard situations, but the fact is Ms. A is like no other. Most parents would like get to know their kids friends names and maybe something else, I don't know most of her daughters friends for a multitude of reasons and I don't know how involved she is normally but with one other girl and me she treats us like we are her kids and is so kind and sweet to us. I have worked for that a tiny bit just always trying to be a very kind and sweet person to everyone, the work part of it is there are only like 7 people in the world who I actually like. It's a hard situation to describe, especially to someone who doesn't know her. She isn't exactly camp staff either, it's a camp that is held at a summer camp that we don't own. She is actually a college professor (99% sure, its 12:45 in the morning) She is one of the directors for the camp along with another lady, they do an amazing job at it and I met Ms. A at that summer camp. It wasn't a standard summer camp to say the least. I can explain further if you need me to. 

I honestly think that people can love who they want to, it could be romantic (I don't love her like that.) or just unconditional love. Everyone is different, she has made me feel like I belonged somewhere for the first time in my whole life. There are many reasons why I love her, and I can't even begin to describe the feeling. 

As of romantic relationship, I don't like her that way, not at all she is like a mother to me. I have only had romantic feelings for one person in my whole life. I want to make a blog post about it but it is a tad controversial I guess. I am currently straight i'm not into girls at all and all but the possible blog post i'm not really into guys either. I am happy to have Ms. A in my life, I get to see her, later today I guess. It's saturday by now lol.

Hey there,

Yeah, I completely get what you're saying about how parents want to get to know their kid's friends more, and it's great that you have a good relationship. I think that I am looking at the bond you two have with different eyes, and I'm wondering, if your mom said the same to one of your friends, like 'I love you', how would you feel about that? Let me know what you think :) 

Hey, 

It really depends on the kid who she said it to. My mom wouldn't say that though she has never been close with my friends, and i'm ok with that. 

Hey there,

I think that it's important for adults to have boundaries with children who aren't their own, because saying things like 'I love you' might be crossing the line a little; what do you think about that? 

Hey,

I agree, I do take things case by case. It really depends on the relationship between that specific child and adult. With Ms. A and I she already treated me like I was her daughter, and I didn't cover all of what she did in this post. She did something no adult had ever really done before, she treated me like an old friend without knowing much about me other then my name and the fact that I was the new kid in the troop. She might have remembered me from the first time I was in that troop, her daughter does but I remember four people. I'll ask her if she remembers me, Even if she does, she didn't know anything about me. I had changed a lot in the last four years. Depending on a few things it could be crossing the line, again it really depends on the relationship and a few things. With Ms. A and I it's not crossing a line in my opinion because i'm very close with both Ms. A and her daughter. 

Hey there,

Yeah, I get that it's a case by case thing, but as an outsider, I think it does sound tricky. I'm sure it's well intentioned, but it is interesting to think about. I'm wondering, do you think it could be useful to ask someone you know what they think? 

Hey, 

I have asked people, they are fine with it. Most of these people know her and know her personality. I don't have very many friends that don't know her mostly because I spend a lot of time with my scout troop, who all know her. There are well intentions and she is a person who is helping me be my best self.

Hey there,

I'm wondering, might it be good to ask someone who doesn't know her? Could you ask an adult if you haven't already?

Well the thing is, I don't have a lot of people who don't know her just because I spend so, so much time with people who do know her and only do like 1-2 activities with people who don't know her. 99% of people I know, know her and the other one percent are theater kids who don't want to hear about this. 

Hey there,

Ah, okay. What do you think your parents would think? Also, how have you been? 

Hey,

My parents know. I've been good, I went to Ms. A's house today to hang out with her daughter an had a great time, we are already planning the next time I come over.

Hey there,

What did you get up to with Ms A's daughter? :) 

We watched Hamilton toether

Ah, that's cool. Have you seen the stage show? :) 

Hey, 

No I have not, i'm probably not going to be as active this week, I am sick. Getting some tests done tomorrow but i'm pretty sure it's a cold.

Hey there,

I'm sorry to hear that you're sick. I hope you get plenty of rest and we look forward to having you back :)