Background and reminders. Kate went to school last year. Half days, five days a week. She LOVED school. She loved her friends, the extra stimulation, her teachers, pretty much everything there was about school, she liked. (Well, the singing of Happy Birthday and the performing in front of the whole school thing? Not so much.)
As the summer progressed, I was starting to get the feeling that Kate wasn't all that thrilled by the idea of going back to school. She wasn't coming out and saying it. Wasn't telling me, "NO! I'm not going!" Just a weird lack of enthusiasm that I was detecting. We talked about school. I didn't want her to forget that she was going to go back. We had play dates with her school friends so she could look forward to seeing them more often.
And then the big day came yesterday. She got up, no problem. Got dressed..... unenthusiastically. (Given that some days Kate would probably live in her nightgown if she could. It didn't strike me as being anything out of the ordinary.) The dressing, the brushing of teeth and hair and washing of face, the going downstairs, the eating of breakfast.... it all had a feeling of dragging feet.
The walk to school was decidedly morose. It didn't help that it was overcast and chilly. Raining periodically. She went willingly enough, but there was a silence about the journey that was unsettling. She's normally a chatterbox. (For example, we recently had a long conversation on what your veins ("these green things" as she calls them) and by association your blood actually do in your body. She just loves to talk.
We went past the door that she normally would go in. The only way she could have gone any slower would have been if she had gone backwards. And then she spotted the playground.
Basically, all the kids in the school EXCEPT the nursery kids (Kate last year) gather on the playground every morning and line up in their class lines. Their teachers then lead them into the school at the appropriate time.
So, Kate turned the corner and saw this MASS of people standing around. She just froze. I tried to point out her friends to her and other kids that she knows and plays with, but she just didn't see past the crowd. Like other parents with semi-shy children, I walked with her and the class to the little rainbow gate that leads to her classroom. (Reception class has their own private entrance.)
It was all down hill from there.
Mrs Downy was a teaching assistant in her classroom last year and Kate absolutely adored her. She is now an assistant in Kate's classroom this year. She was there and Kate was having NOTHING to do with her or anyone else. She just grabbed my leg/coat/whatever she could hold onto and would not let go.
They literally had to pry her off of me and carry her into the classroom. And when I say "carry," I don't mean the nice comforting carry. I mean they had to carry her in like a log. She was not going into that classroom.
The last image I had of her as she disappeared was her arms outstretched towards me, calling my name.
So, yes. I have the blues.
When I picked her up, it was as if nothing happened. In the past, she has been known to cry when seeing me because she is so relieved/happy to see me. On this occasion, I simply got a... "Hi, Mummy! I'm starving to death! Let's go home and have lunch!"
I could have killed her.
Today was better. She needed a little guidance about the whole line thing, but she was much chirpier and went in without a speck of trouble.
So. Here she is .... the obligatory first day of school shot. Before it all went so so wrong....
And that is all I'm writing about that subject. I'm definitely much more traumatized over it than she is.
I'll get over it.
Someday.
Maybe.
Talk to you again soon!
For those interested:
Kate's Schedule
This week: Tues - Fri 9-12
Next week: Mon - Wed 9 - 1 (she'll eat lunch there)
Thurs 9 - 2:30 (they get out at 2:30 every Thursday)
Fri 9 - 3:20
