speechless.... angry.....~shaking head~ what can i say!?

I dont know about you, though I was raised in a house where it was wrong for a boy to hit a girl and have raised my son with exactly the same kind of respect for women as his father was raised and what i had heard all my life.

Sadly, it appears that not all kids are raised in the same way.

On the way home from school today, Miranda was assulted by a boy almost 8 years her senior. Yes, you read right.... my 8 year old was hurt by a 15 year old. Both Jamie and her walk home together and in a moment where Jamie had told her to drop a stone she was carrying, his ball that he was bouncing bounced away from him and he went after it, letting go of her hand for no more than a second, all shit fell loose.

She tossed the stone on the ground and it bounced, hitting this 16 year old boy on the back of the ankle. We are talking about a stone the size of a bit of gravel... something small enough that it is amazing that he even felt it... anyway before jamie could get back onto the footpath to Miranda, this kid had grabbed my little girl by the throat, ripped her up into the air and was projecting her towards the pavement. His hand firmly around her throat still, he was leaning over her with his fist brought back ready to lay into her.

Jamie tossed the ball at the kid, hitting him to distract him and called him something rather "obscene" to be repeated here, and in that second that it took for him to be distracted from Miranda, Jamies friend grabbed miranda and pulled her away.

She has brusing down her neck to her shoulder, skin grazed from areas on her back which is going to scab badly, skinned elbows and bruises all over. Quiet understandably, she is a complete mess, as is poor Jamie who has not stopped crying for more than a few minutes all afternoon.

The police were called and have arrested the boy, taken him to the police station to be finger printed and charged. The police are disgusted that this boy found no remorse in what he had done, and that his actions, if had not been distracted would have been most definately, horendous.

Matt and I, as you can very well imagine want to do very bad things to this boy and make him hurt in a way that he has not ever hurt before in his life. Matt.... my goodness, I have never seen him so wild... his eyes are dark .... and its scary... my gentle giant.... well..... it hurts to see him so lost as to what to do
Work is putting him on stress leave... His friend is going to teach Jamie how to box and Miranda how to defend her self (not that we would expect her to ever be able to fight off someone so much larger than herself)... me, well I am upset.. angry and like matt, lost as to what to do... though I am doing what I do best... distracting myself and planning my day for tomorrow out in my head. He will stay home with them... I will work... simply, so I dont become the mess that I am on the inside, on the outside.

Godess give us strength.