love advice at 7:00am!

This morning I was thankful that I had started a "relationship" with my oldest son, Eli, years ago. The kind of relationship where we can talk about things and he trusts me.

He came to me after breakfast around 7:00 this morning as Sister Girl was sitting naked at the counter playing on the ipad instead of eating, the dog was jumping up on the counter trying to eat the food that Sister Girl wasn't interested in and Ian was running around the kitchen complaining that he didn't have any blue jeans clean. I was just trying to take the first sip of my coffee and wishing I had an I.V. hooked up to myself with a caffeine drip.

"Mom, XXXXX sent me an e-mail," was all he said as he handed his I-pod touch to me with a funny look on his face. I stopped everything and shut out the chaos as I focused intently on my soon to be eleven year old son.

It read..."Eli, you can't tell anyone but will you be my boyfriend," was what the sweet girl had written. (Sweet but in my opinion too forward)

Oh my...Don't panic...Deep breaths, Sarah...Don't get too dramatic!!!

And that is when it all came flooding back into my memory. I have been having conversations with Eli for years about girls and friends and God's idea of healthy relationships. He has had many friends take on the "boyfriend or girlfriend" title but he has never fallen into that game - thankfully.

Only a few months ago did he even acknowledge out loud that this particular girl was "pretty" and when I asked if there was more to her than that he added "very nice." They have emailed back and forth since both getting the latest technology for Christmas but the extent of the messages, which he knew I read every day/week, was "hello" or "Hi." Very exciting reading let me tell you!

So when I looked down at my preteen son (wait really is he even preteen for crying out loud? He's in 4th grade!!!)and saw that he was seriously awaiting some motherly advice as to how to reply to this girl I put my game face on and replied...

"Eli, we have talked about how you are really young to have "girlfriends" so I think you should just tell her you really like her but you would rather just be good friends."

He settled on "let's just be friends." Short and sweet - I guess I couldn't have expected more from my extremely shy boy. He did come back and ask if he could tell her she was very pretty - maybe to soften the blow? But I told him that was probably not necessary.

So, I'm honored that he chose me to come to and ask how to handle the situation. I'm freaked out at how forward little girls are at the age of 10. I'm proud of my son for caring about another person's feelings and not wanting to hurt them but also knowing that moving into a "relationship" - no matter how innocent it may appear- is not really appropriate at his age.

If you are wondering...I have told Eli that the point of getting in a relationship is to truly get to know someone and then if you like them enough it will grow into a love relationship which God intended for us to have with one person. The person we would then marry and live the rest of our lives with.

Trust me, even hearing myself say these words sounds foreign because God knows Himself that I came out of my mother's womb wanting a boyfriend! And I truly believe that it led to many years of heartache and pain that I still have to deal with. So if I can teach my son a different road to take and save him the heartache than that is my plan. He will make his own choices and more than likely he will have girlfriends along the path of finding a wife but I pray and I will make a point of teaching him that relationships are serious business. Your heart is a very sacred and special thing that God has given each of us and it is to be guarded well.

But as for now maybe word will spread that Eli is not the "boyfriend" type and he can remain the friend of all...for now at least.