Welcome to Our Jungle – Kindergarten part III

Kindergarten part III

Part 3? You know it. The “fun” never stops!

So where to start? Approximately 2 weeks before Christmas. I will start there.

I was in line for my lady’s first Christmas concert. I was with my Dad for the matinée performance. We were super excited. I couldn’t wait. I happened to glance over at where my daughter and her class were lined up to go inside after lunch had ended. I could see some commotion. I couldn’t tell what was happening until it became clear. There was a boy that had her and he had her by the neck of her jacket and was trying to drag her around or drag her down. I called out for them to stop. It wasn’t stopping. It seemed to be going on and getting worse. At this point I started to walk very quickly to them yelling for them to stop. As I got closer the boy was getting more aggressive and I started to run. Umbrella and purse in hand and screaming at this point for him to let go of her. As I got to where they were he backed her up to a parked car and had his arm drawn back and fist ready to punch her. I yelled firmly and loudly to STOP. He had a grip on her jacket still and I reached down and I ripped him off of her.

About 30 minutes later the concert started. I was a mess inside. I couldn’t focus at all on the beauty of what was my child singing in her first concert. She wasn’t herself up on the stage. I sat and replayed what I had just witnessed in my head over and over. It was devastating to say the least. That 90 minutes or so of the concert was one of the longest moments of my life. I just wanted to see my child and hug her and take her home. When I picked her up she got in the car and she cried so hard. Needless to say we missed the night concert. She said she didn’t feel safe.

That, by the way, was a concert I had waited 10 years to see. Our little boy never made it to school and this “1st” was a special one for me. Ruined by the events before it.

So this was our first physical experience at school.

It obviously made me think a lot about how we go about this with our daughter. We are not advocating more violence. We talked to some parents and probably more than half said we should tell her to hit him back. We didn’t. I don’t judge advice like that or if other parents teach their children that. We just won’t. It does really make you think as a parent what you want to talk to your child about should another incident happen like this.

I thought for sure that I would be the first person to teach my own children to hit back. Push back. Yet I don’t feel that way which is odd for me because I am very much an action first and talk about it later person. My husband is the complete opposite. Calm cool composed. Think first and act after. Ironically in this instance I am on the same page. Now if my daughter was older I may think about it a little different but at 5 years old I feel (for myself and not judging any others) that giving a child permission to hit back could back fire. At 5 they sometimes think that if they bump into someone it’s a license to hit. I don’t want to put that pressure on my daughter and I don’t want to give her that golden ticket to fight just because someone bumped into her or might have stepped on her foot accidentally. It may sound hokey but I really want her to use her words. They can be loud and screaming words but I would rather her use her words than get physical. I know at this age it isn’t easy but this is how she will learn.

Some parents thought it wasn’t really a big deal but more did. Again, no judging. We don’t feel it is not a big deal. This was a really big one to us. It has many branches of problems attached to it. This is potentially how bullying starts, the physical outcome of this incident could have been far worse if I wasn’t there to stop it, if it happens again when we don’t make a big deal out of it and for the child hitting who knows if there could be any issues that they need help with. Branches. Lots of branches.

Heading back to school last week after Christmas break my daughter was really anxious about going back and seeing this boy again. She was worried he would put his hands on her again. I assured her that he had to have learned his lesson and he wouldn’t. If he did to yell very loudly for an adult to help her. I was confident that he wouldn’t do this again. But guess what. He did. Another student. My daughter witnessed it and came home and the fears were now worse. I told her that she could push back. I didn’t want her to hit anyone but she could push someone away. She cried and said she didn’t want to put her hands on anyone and she didn’t want to get in trouble. Thinking about it, I thought I should at least teach her how to try to get out of holds if someone grabs her again so we went over holds and how she could get out of them. It would at least give her some confidence going to school each day. She had almost nightly bad dreams about facing him. She was cranky every morning not wanting to go. This isn’t how she normally is. She loves school. She looked forward to it every day. 2 days last week she cried asking me not to send her to school. When she got home I would ask her “what was the best part of your day?”. She would say “recess”. I then asked why etc. and she said she played all by herself. That she needed peace and a break. That usually would hurt my heart since she has had a bit of a hard time at school since September with kids leaving her out. It didn’t hurt my heart this time. I thought she probably needed it and quite frankly she was probably trying to stay away from any possible incidents. The last 2 days of school last week were better during the breaks.

I honestly thought Kindergarten would be easy. I think it should be. I don’t think it should be this hard. I don’t recall any of this when I was 5 or even when my sister was 5. It’s just been one thing after another and I am so hoping for peace and a break my daughter, myself and my husband. That’s a pretty decent request I think.

Here’s to hoping week 2 of being back is better.

Kindergarten Part III … let’s toast to Part IV being unicorns and rainbows!

Tiffani

tiffani_warnick@yahoo.com

 

 

Welcome to Our Jungle – Kindergarten part II

Kindergarten part II

So there was a part I to this Kindergarten saga so I had to follow-up with a part II.

I kind of laugh every time I think of the topic and what I’m about to talk about.

When our daughter was born and my husband went back to work he left me. That’s how I looked at it. Abandoned. Just left me to fend for myself and navigate this terrifying world of having a new baby! From what I can remember one of the things I dreaded and stressed about the most was the first time I would have to get my baby into the carrier and OMG actually put it in the car on my own. I dragged my feet on that for as long as I could. I was in a Mommy group and we all talked about the horrifying experience we all had to try to get the guts to do; getting the baby into the car ourselves.

Now from memory I remember besides the anxiety attack before, during and after was that it was fine. Not only was it fine, it was as if I had accomplished the impossible. I did it. Damn it, I conquered the car seat! YAH I DID!

Now fast forward to Kindergarten. Wait, of course there were in between worries. I mean these kids do not come with manuals. So there were “horrifying” firsts for so many things and here I am alive to tell the tales 😉

Ok back to Kindergarten. Again, this involved more Mom groups. Online chats, in person chats, lots of anxiety and worries. WHAT would we pack for lunches? What would we pack their lunches in? What time should I get up in the morning to make the lunch? What do we pack their snacks in? Would they eat their lunches? (I’ve always been on the side of, if she doesn’t eat her lunch she’ll figure out the hard way that hunger isn’t fun). HOT lunches. OMG the hot lunches. When I went to elementary school my parents’ biggest worry was a hot dog day lunch. Plain or mustard. Plain milk or chocolate. They had it easy AND hot dog day was maybe once every month? I think. It was easy. Sports Day we had the luxury of McDonalds and again, a plain hamburger or a cheeseburger. My parents didn’t know what stress was about. We have hot lunches a lot. Ordering snacks too. This whole food issue for Kindergarten had me up at night!

Guess what? It all worked out. It’s amazing but once the stress clears the answers are right there in front of you. It’s quite something. I am sure there will be more things to worry and over think about. For now, I have conquered the lunch. YAH I DID!

So what got me thinking about this topic was the other day I got up and I wasn’t in a hurry, I took my time and wasn’t worried or rushed to make the lunch. As I was making it I had a little chuckle to myself of what a FREAK I was about it and how I stressed over all of it. It brought me back to the new baby stage of stressing myself out about the carrier (and other things). I thought, I should really write about this.

It got me thinking to how Kindergarten was the new birth of a new chapter in all of our lives here.

Kindergarten part II … don’t get me started on abduction scenarios and how about the search for the perfect rain gear 😉

Tiffani

tiffani_warnick@yahoo.com

Welcome to Our Jungle – thankful

thankful

I am thankful every day for what I’ve been blessed with in my life. I don’t always realize  or think about it, especially when I’m having an off day though. Last Friday was my daughter’s very first assembly at school. I was very thankful and it was that event that  made me think I wanted to blog about it. About being thankful.

Let me rewind briefly. This blog is mostly to be about the every day family life we live but I have thought about it and obviously I have to combine both of my children into one blog. If you aren’t familiar with our story, I gave birth to my first-born; a son in 2008. Sadly and tragically our son passed away 25 days after he was born. His name is Kenneth. After we lost Kenneth we tried for 4+ years via fertility treatments to conceive another child. During this time I didn’t lose hope that we would have another child; a living child but there were many many times my hopes diminished and it was a lot over the years. I never thought I would hear someone call me “Mommy”. I would be out and hear children call out for Mommy and it would bring me to my knees. Whatever we were doing had to be stopped and I needed out of there immediately. There were times I never thought I’d see my child in a costume at Halloween or hoping to see Santa at Christmas. I didn’t think there would be birthday cakes and I questioned if we’d ever see a child go to school.

Then we had our daughter 5 years + 5 months after we had lost our beloved little boy.

And so I was saying about last Friday …

My Dad comes with me to a lot of events. I usually don’t mention to him how lucky I feel or that I may be feeling emotional because as lucky as I feel to watch my daughter I can’t help but think of my son and wish so badly that he was there too. I mostly keep this kind of stuff to myself. I try to keep focus for my daughter because she deserves the full attention. It’s about her but as Mommy to 2 my heart fills and it aches for both.

Ok yes, last Friday. Getting to it! As my Dad and I drove to the school to attend the Rememberance Day Assembly I felt I needed to mention to him how important this was. The assembly. I said that this was an important day. He questioned why (besides the obvious of the occasion) and I said because I never thought I would attend anything like this for a child of mine. That it meant so much to me to be there. I needed to be thankful for every single moment I can attend something that my child is a part of. He said he hadn’t thought of it that way. That it’s so easy to take it for granted and sometimes you don’t realize how special it is.

After the assembly I started really thinking about the thankfulness I felt that morning and should feel so much more.

Like Halloween of this year. My daughter started Kindergarten and there are so many firsts besides the big one of having a child in school. This Halloween there was a parade at my little girl’s school. I knew before she even set foot in that gym I would lose it. As soon as I saw her walk through the doors my eyes were completely filled with tears. I thanked every single lucky star I could imagine that I was watching my little girl dressed up as Wonder Woman so proudly and shyly walking in the parade.

I also volunteer at the school once a week and also once a week there is a “Family Time” in the morning where you go and spend time with your child and other children in the class for 15 minutes.  These are things I never thought I would do. Again,  how could I turn down opportunities to see and spend time with my daughter during school. I swear she is the most naughty on the mornings I volunteer and/or go to the “Family Time” and I really want to say bye and quickly drop her off but I always stop and think to myself, you have missed out on this for so many years. Why would you let this be the time to make a point? How could you turn this down and miss this? So I go and when I am there and when I leave I feel so incredibly thankful.

I just felt like I really wanted to write about this. We go on with our every day lives and even though I’ve been through tragedy I take things for granted or  I let the busy and the stress get in the way of appreciation. This is my mental note to not forget where it all comes from. To stop and breathe and take it all in.

thankful … cherish the moments

Tiffani

tiffani_warnick@yahoo.com