Soooooooooo…

It’s no secret that I looked forward to Wednesdays. That I *hearted* them. A week after starting my schedule the power of Wednesdays began to weaken. ONE and I got along much better and I enjoyed our time together and started looking forward to our Saturday-Tuesday stretch. I think I finally started growing up. Having time for myself made a huge difference.

And then, three weeks ago, ONE added a new element to her nighttime routine. “Do I have to go to school tomorrow?” She’d follow that up with “Do I have to go to school today?” during breakfast, with no reason why other than, “I just want to stay home with you.”  Since she’d been attending the school for three years, knew all the teachers and had lots of little friends, I didn’t think much of it. I figured she’d just been having a good time with me at home.

But then the nightmares started again. And the night terrors resurfaced. She asked me as I’d drop her off at school to please pick her up before nap.  And then came her first, “I can’t go to school today because I don’t feel good…” lie.

Clearly something was going on that she wasn’t yet able to express.

I knew she was feeling stressed at the idea of starting a new school and saying good-bye to her friends, so I was more sensitive about how I handled things at home. But something was off, and when I asked her what was going on at school, why she didn’t want to go, she only said, “because I just don’t.”

So since she was unable to express it to me, I thought maybe she could talk about it with Belle, or Aurora, or better yet, Gaston. Sure Gaston’s not known for his insight and compassion, but since she only knows him in coloring books and music, she especially enjoys bantering back and forth with him. And by bantering back and forth, I mean, “Mommy, can you be Gaston, please? I’m Belle and I don’t want to marry you.”

As we walked the dog one day and debated whether or not Belle would marry Gaston this time, “Gaston” started talking about the different teachers she saw during the day and evaluated them with her. Who was fun to play with, who read the best stories, who she liked the most, etc. We continued our walk, threw rocks in the water and Gaston disappeared and we were us again.

The next day, while we encouraged the dog to hurry up with her business, ONE turned to me and casually mentioned that, “Miss Nettie puts me in time out when I cry for you.” She lost interest in the topic after we talked about how this made her feel and she turned her attention to Belle’s current marital status.

This was upsetting for several reasons. 1) She was being punished for emotional behavior and 2) they hadn’t told me about it. When she’s awake, she deals with stress by being clingy with me. (When she’s asleep it’s the terrors.) She wants me to do everything with her and when she gets called out for something, she cries for me. Even when I’m the one calling her out. So I wasn’t surprised that she was behaving this way at school, but I was surprised that I wasn’t informed.

The following week her nightmares got more intense. She was waking up in terrors several times a night. I felt in my heart that something was actually wrong. She begged me to pick her up before naptime (it turned out that the teacher she was afraid of subbed in the afternoon when her regular teacher left). It wasn’t just stress about a new school. After all, it wasn’t like this behavior started after she started the new school when she didn’t know anyone and was uncomfortable. That Wednesday morning she started crying about having to go to school. When my husband told her she could stay home she said, “Thank you, Daddy. My heart was breaking if I had to go there today.”

And for me, that was it. My husband and I had already discussed it and wanted to pull her out too. Plus I felt super guilty, like I should have somehow known exactly what was going on, that my senses as a parent failed and that I had questioned my gut feeling for too long. Even as I write this it seems so clear, but it wasn’t then and I have to accept that I’m doing my best.

I pulled her out that day, told the director what was going on, scheduled a time with her teacher for a little good-bye party and left. An overwhelming feeling of peace washed over me as I cried on the way home. I had no idea I’d been carrying so many emotions. (And I wondered where she gets a silenced anxiety from…)

The nightmares/ terrors stopped that very night. In the weeks that followed she mentioned once or twice to Gaston other little things that this particular teacher did. She was very rough when helping her out of her dance clothes, she was harsh in how she spoke, she made her feel bad. (I still don’t know what for.)  I spoke with some of the other mothers and it turned out that their kids had problems with this teacher as well. One of them told me that her child melted down at the idea of sitting next to this teacher in the car when they offered to drive her to a field trip. In the end, the teacher had to ride with someone else.

Naturally I was concerned that my daughter had her own emotional issues and I didn’t want to get into the habit of rescuing her from them. But she’s three. And I’m grateful that taking her out of school was an option. As she starts the new school, I’ll have the chance to really see what was the old school and what was her. But she’s been a different child since she’s been home. I know I’ve been different too, so part of that is certainly a reflection on me. But she’s still her own person.

So I guess we’ll see what happens.

http://badmommymoments.files.wordpress.com/2008/08/bbgaston.jpg

But for now..

Say it again
Who’s a man among men?
And then say it once more
Who’s the hero next door?
Who’s a super success?
Don’t you know? Can’t you guess?
Ask his fans and his five hangers-on
There’s just one guy in town who’s got all of it down

And his name’s G-A-S…T -
G-A-S-T - E - G-A-S-T-O - oh!

Gaston!