Every Summer, I think that we will fold right back into school when the times comes back around. June 1st, I think the Summer is going to be as organized as the school year and as simple as a weekend. That makes sense, right? We can still be our regular, put-together selves for a 3-month long weekend, right?
Wrong. Wonderfully wrong.
Summer is joyful chaos in our house. Summer is messy, and funny, and full of spur-of-the-moment play dates and trips to the pool. Summer is waking up late, skipping naps in lieu of playing outside, and going to bed late after eating ice cream at 8:30. Summer is Family Video Game Nights and building forts out of sheets that cover an entire room.
So why am I even a little surprised that today, the day before school starts for my big Second Grader, I am still in my pajamas at 9:30 am, blogging and drinking coffee as if it were still the middle of June? I'm procrastinating like the first day of school is more of a chore than a milestone. I am waiting to the very last minute to give up this summer, because it has been a good one. I am just not ready for school to start.
1. I'm not ready to get up early. Let's all face it, getting to occasionally sleep past 7:30 is one of the best perks of being a stay-at-home mom. The day my kids figured out how to go downstairs and watch an episode of Pokemon by themselves in the morning was a great day for me. I feel guilty about getting to sleep in for three whole months of the year when my husband still wakes up at 6:30 every day, but it's a perk I take full advantage of in the summer. So my kids roll out of bed when they feel like it, watch 23 minutes of Netflix and then I get up and make them breakfast while we figure out what the day will hold. Starting tomorrow, I will wake them up at 6:40, herd their drowsy bums down the stairs to eat breakfast like zombies and then load them in the car. I drink coffee and sometimes a shake on the way to the school, almost always still in my pajamas. Nope. Not ready for that either.
2. I'm not ready for homework. Homework is great. It grows minds, teaches responsibility and time management. It lets me see what cool things my kid is learning at school. But let's face it, homework for a Second Grader is almost more homework for Mom. His homework folder comes home and it is my job to make sure he sits down and completes it all. I have to check his answers.Not doing well on a spelling test? Your mom must not being studying with you.Handwriting needs improving? Work on it more at home. I feel like at this age, it's not homework for the kid, it's homework for the parent. And don't even get me started on the guilt of not knowing when it's his day to take snack!
3. I'm not read to make lunches. It sounds dumb, but picky eaters are hard to pack lunches for. At home, I can do a number of warm things that will appease the pickiness, but when I am suddenly limited to cold things, it feels like all I send with him is bagels and PB&J. I had planned to make his favorite strawberry banana jam, have it all canned and ready to go for the first day. My bananas are on the counter, gnats buzzing around them, and my strawberries are still not out of the freezer. But hey, there are a lot of days in the year, right? I'm sure he'll have the right jam by Christmas.
4. Emotionally, I'm pushing it all down. Other mom's are super
excited for their kids' new adventures and making new friends this year.
I dread losing six hours a day with my kiddo and sending him off into
what I can only hope will be a "green day" every day. I have to hope
that he finds a few good friends who will include him. School is not
easy for my son. He has been diagnosed with AD/HD on and off and is on
medication. (Yes, I tried everything else first. Thank you for you
concern.) He deals with a great deal of anxiety and frustration over it
all, and spends a lot of time in trouble at school. I don't enjoy getting phone calls from the school at
dinner time, or worse, during the day when he's still there. I don't enjoy
dropping him off every morning after praying all night for a good,
positive day.That is a
routine I'm not ready to start again.
5. I'm not ready to let him do it alone. I love watching my sons grow up. They are amazing, smart, caring, hilarious balls of energy. And I miss watching it when he's at school. I miss him terribly and I worry about him ceaselessly. I want nothing more in the world than for him to make tons of friends, be happy, enjoy all the great things that school has to offer! But the fear of letting him do it on his own...that ugly fear of anyone ever hurting him when I'm not there to fix it... that is the hardest part. I don't want some other kid to break that part of my son that is so special. And here I am, sending him off into a sea of kids who may or may not get how special and awesome he is. And I want to yell out the window, "No matter what anyone says, no matter what happens, I love you!" It's scary to drive away.
So I'm not ready for school to start tomorrow. It's 11:00 pm, and I'm still up writing. And maybe I'll make his lunch before I go to bed to buy myself a few extra minutes in the morning.
Still, that greatness in my son came out at bed time tonight.
I told him, "Tomorrow is the first day of school."
He replied, "Yep. But it's not going to be scary, right?"
"No," I said. "Of course not."
He laid his head down and said, "Yep. I've already done this before. It's going to be easy."
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