<p>S1 wait listed today from 1st choice; because there's no FA available to those accepted off the wait list it is essentially a rejection. He was within the ballpark but it didn't happen for him. How do I comfort him? It is so hard to see your child so hurt :( Of course the standard (and true) "It wasn't meant to be" is of no help. Any ideas?</p>
<p>Time and Focusing on the choices and acceptances he has. It’s stings, but he is alive and healthy and wil go to college. Handle it the way you would of hen got dumped by his gf.</p>
<p>You have to let him have his disappointment.</p>
<p>It’s his.</p>
<p>If he thinks he’s not allowed that day or so of his own misery, he won’t move on.</p>
<p>It’s hard, I know. He will be okay. You will be okay. It’s okay to make him his favorite food, ask him if there is anything you can do to help, tell him you love him, the usual. </p>
<p>But, you have to let him feel it. It’s a part of growing up.</p>
<p>Happened to my DS last year. So hard. Took time, but finally DS was able to say, “That decision from X school was just so obnoxious!” Helped him move along.</p>
<p>^^^
Agree. The sting actually wears off fairly quickly as it morphs into indignation and eventual disdain for the school- sort of like the end of a relationship.</p>
<p>I agree, he can be upset, it is a really big disappointment. My D similarly was waitlisted at her top choice today. I agreed with her that it was so sad. Experience has shown me that trying to talk her out of sad feelings is futile and actually counter productive. I am big on talking and processing feelings, but she needs time on her own to work it out. By dinner she was at least communicative. I suggested she start looking at the website of the school she will likely go to, when she is ready, and she said she had already been doing that. </p>
<p>A sad day for you and your son, but he will feel better. Allow him his sadness.</p>
<p>Baby him for a day or two. Buy him ice cream and maybe go out to a nice dinner with him! Make sure he knows he’s not alone. It sucks, but he’ll get over it. When I got rejected from my top schools, it really made me feel better when my mom worked extra hard to do little nice things for me, like get me sushi for dinner (my favorite food hehe). And also, if you guys talk about it, make sure he knows that he was clearly good enough for the school (he got waitlisted, not rejected, after all) but that he just didn’t get lucky. It’ll be okay :)</p>
<p>At these crazy-selective schools, it’s not a personal rejection. It’s often a matter of too many applicants for too few spaces. </p>
<p>In a couple of cases at our house, I think the admissions committees were spot-on. My kiddo(s) would not have been a good fit at those schools.</p>
<p>Agree with poetgrl that your S needs to feel the disappointment, process it and move on. This will not be the first time our amazing kids are rejected for something that means a lot to them. Internships, job openings and promotions will be just as competitive, and having a bit of body armor will help them prepare to present themselves better and to handle disappointments with more equanimity. </p>
<p>Thank goodness we can vent on CC!</p>
<p>A wise counselor of my acquaintance says, “In order to heal, you have to feel.” So true IME.</p>
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<p>That’s exactly right.</p>
<p>It’s a good experience. He will be rejected from jobs, maybe from potential girl friends (or boy friends), etc., etc. Go for a nice long walk. Tell him stories about times you were (or felt) rejected (remember, our kids don’t have that much experience). Make clear that it has no effect whatsoever on his worth as a person. </p>
<p>Some kids (and people) process this stuff slowly, others more quickly. Good salespeople thrive on rejection (it just means they are closer to the next sale).</p>
<p>The best advice is for you to let it go after an appropriate amount of commiseration. Like Miini says there are disappointments in life and as trite as this sounds these things tend to make people stronger…like heavy wind on a young tree trunk. I’m kindof a tough cookie as I never kissed my kids’ boo boos and frequently would run out of bandaids LOL. My middle son took his one rejection letter to a college I secretly think he liked best to our cabin a few weeks after he received it, nailed it to a tree and shot holes through it with a bow and arrow and I never heard another word other than “I feel better, their loss.” Not my way of coping, but I thought it was pretty funny. I guess that’s what happens when you don’t kiss your little boys’ boo boos.</p>
<p>Are you familiar with Kubla-Ross’s work on grief following a death? This isn’t death but grief processes run along the same channels. If you keep these 5 stages in your mind as you watch and listen to him in the coming days and week(s?), it might help: shock, anger, denial/bargaining, sorrow, integration/acceptance. I might not have used the exact correct words. </p>
<p>It may help you to accept that he has to feel some of all these stages, not necessarily in a singular order, before he can get to the final integration and acceptance. To grieve and recover from a loss, you can’t skip a step. Each of them leads to eventual acceptance, so it’s doing its job even if it’s hard to witness in the one you love. </p>
<p>Anecdote from our family: an email received in October of freshman year, “If I’d have known how happy I’d be at my second choice, it would have been my first choice all along.” Part of that was collecting stories from other students about the school that rejected him (and some of them, too), all to confirm in his own mind that he was in a better fit situation after all.</p>
<p>I agree with the person who said let him have his disappointment. I am currently a junior though so it is hard to imagine exactly what he is feeling. I am going to go into it with the attitude that I will get rejected from a lot of places (Big trend, really bad freshman and soph) so hopefully it won’t be too bad, but I imagine if I get rejected from my top 4 or 5 (is a possibility though I think I will get into one or 2) I will probably be really disappointed as well.</p>
<p>buy him a brand-new sports car. sure to put a smile on his face</p>
<p>Allow him time to mourn the loss. This dream has run it’s course and it’s hard!! In my family, we tend to allow a certain amount of time. 2 days to be sad and then we refocus on what great options are left. Your family may have a time frame that is right for you. Either way call it what it is for now… a really rough reality. Then you can move on to the “you will go to college, you will be happy…” all true just too hard to hear on the heels of tough news.</p>
<p>I’m in the exact same situation. I baked cookies for mine tonight and will be making his favorite dinner tomorrow. It may not be much “comfort”, but it’s all I could think of tonight.</p>
<p>In a very similar boat here in CA tonight. Daughter has a nice stack of wait list letters. She is not so excited about the safeties that want her and have given her good merit aid, but I hope that changes after we revisit at Spring Break. </p>
<p>I guess misery loves company, because it has helped me a lot tonight to read that we’re not alone, and to read the posts about kids who went to their 4th or 5th choice school and thrived! </p>
<p>Best of luck to everyone. </p>
<p>Karen</p>
<p>I tell my daughter that whatever school that you end up at will be an adventure that will last a lifetime and forever friendships…</p>
<p>We are already prepping DS for that eventuality this time next year. We do keep reminding him that is is a very average candidate for his dream school, meaning, the have 25,000 applicants that look just like him on paper, to fill about 2000 spots. If he doesn’t get in, he will be disappointed but we are trying to focus on the fact that it isn’t because of anything he did but just luck of the draw. I’m still hoping for a big, fat envelope though.</p>