Those of you who have read previous entries probably remember me
saying I was jealous of folks who liked school breaks because I was not one of
them. For those of you who didn't read that entry, let me explain - I DO NOT
LIKE SCHOOL BREAKS!
We survived the 9 days of Thanksgiving "vacation" (excuse me while I laugh hysterically). So it was only 5 days off from school, but flanked by two weekends that equals 9 days of utterly dysregulated TK. While she likes spontaneity, she needs the structure, the (relatively) controlled time with peers, the interaction with other adults who can help her stay regulated, and the predictability that school brings. Not having that makes her incredibly dysregulated. The good news it isn't the meltdown/throwing things dysregulation (well mostly it isn't.....there are moments). It is the "I need you right next to me constantly because I don't feel safe that I can self-regulate" dysregulation. In some ways that is even worse than the meltdown/throwing things. At least those are over and done with. This velcro-itis is all consuming. During a regular school week TK will spend some time alone in her room or upstairs on the swing, the bar, outside on the trampoline (self regulation for her requires movement), but when the structure/predictability is gone, she will not go to any of those unless I go with her.
With the exception of a playdate here and Thanksgiving evening at a friend's house, it was truly Mom/TK time every waking moment. We had some great fun days and it was honestly relatively smooth sailing (well, until tonight...more on that later), but I am emotionally and physically EXHAUSTED. Part of if is the challenge of her sadness at not being with family at Thanksgiving. We are from the Washington, DC area, where almost everyone was from somewhere else and family was the group of friends you cobbled together. Here it is so much the "umpteenth generation" mindset, and family is blood relatives only. It is very exclusionary (don't even know if that's a word but I'm too tired to care, and exclusive wasn't the right fit).
I poured myself into making the last 9 days as fun as possible, packing in activities and trips in the local area to keep her busy and save myself from yet another dreaded round of "Mom, you pretend to be my best friend and we'll play sleepover." Things went pretty well until today. One night I even got the "thanks for making this such a great day" comment!
I had a hint that things were going downhill this morning as we were getting ready to go to the library. I walk into TK's room and all of her clothes are on the floor, dresser drawers are all open, and she is furious. "I have nothing to wear! Why don't you do the stupid laundry? I hate these new pants - they're size XL and only fat people wear XL!" (Gee dear, you have no clean clothes because I haven't had three seconds to breathe, much less do laundry, and your pants are size XL because you are 4'11" and 85 pounds. No, I didn't say this out loud.....but I really really wanted to!)
The downhill slope steepened in the bedtime warmup - bath, hair brushing, etc. I should have remembered that the transition day from break to school is rough, but I think I shove some of those hard times far back in my brain and honestly forget about them until they rear their ugly head again. Sadly for both of us, after 9 days of incessant togetherness, I did not have it in me to be in the place of compassion I needed to be in to nip it before it grew. No major blowouts, but a child sobbing in her bed (for absolutely no reason except being tired and transition - which is reason enough, but didn't feel like it to me at the time), me muttering as I stomped around trying to get in the right emotional space to go pat her to sleep. Luckily, God always grants me enough grace to settle myself enough to pat her and tell her I love her and say it in a truly loving way.
Tomorrow morning will probably be ugly. And I will probably be incredibly annoyed by that. I should warn her teachers but not sure how the day will go - she could settle right back into the routine and sail through, or she could have a disaster of a day. I honestly have no guess as to which way it will go. But I will seek the grace to get through that tomorrow. Right now I'm glad she is sleeping, that tomorrow I get to breathe a little, and that we found the grace to get through this break with minimal meltdowns.
As to the grace I will require in 3 short weeks when they are off for 20+ days? That will require a miracle...but hopefully I'll have the grace in the meantime not to hyperventilate just thinking about it.
Give yourselves grace for surviving a holiday. Heaven knows they are tough for our TKs, and thus tough for us. And stockpile some grace for the upcoming month -- and if you have any extra be sure to send it my way!
We survived the 9 days of Thanksgiving "vacation" (excuse me while I laugh hysterically). So it was only 5 days off from school, but flanked by two weekends that equals 9 days of utterly dysregulated TK. While she likes spontaneity, she needs the structure, the (relatively) controlled time with peers, the interaction with other adults who can help her stay regulated, and the predictability that school brings. Not having that makes her incredibly dysregulated. The good news it isn't the meltdown/throwing things dysregulation (well mostly it isn't.....there are moments). It is the "I need you right next to me constantly because I don't feel safe that I can self-regulate" dysregulation. In some ways that is even worse than the meltdown/throwing things. At least those are over and done with. This velcro-itis is all consuming. During a regular school week TK will spend some time alone in her room or upstairs on the swing, the bar, outside on the trampoline (self regulation for her requires movement), but when the structure/predictability is gone, she will not go to any of those unless I go with her.
With the exception of a playdate here and Thanksgiving evening at a friend's house, it was truly Mom/TK time every waking moment. We had some great fun days and it was honestly relatively smooth sailing (well, until tonight...more on that later), but I am emotionally and physically EXHAUSTED. Part of if is the challenge of her sadness at not being with family at Thanksgiving. We are from the Washington, DC area, where almost everyone was from somewhere else and family was the group of friends you cobbled together. Here it is so much the "umpteenth generation" mindset, and family is blood relatives only. It is very exclusionary (don't even know if that's a word but I'm too tired to care, and exclusive wasn't the right fit).
I poured myself into making the last 9 days as fun as possible, packing in activities and trips in the local area to keep her busy and save myself from yet another dreaded round of "Mom, you pretend to be my best friend and we'll play sleepover." Things went pretty well until today. One night I even got the "thanks for making this such a great day" comment!
I had a hint that things were going downhill this morning as we were getting ready to go to the library. I walk into TK's room and all of her clothes are on the floor, dresser drawers are all open, and she is furious. "I have nothing to wear! Why don't you do the stupid laundry? I hate these new pants - they're size XL and only fat people wear XL!" (Gee dear, you have no clean clothes because I haven't had three seconds to breathe, much less do laundry, and your pants are size XL because you are 4'11" and 85 pounds. No, I didn't say this out loud.....but I really really wanted to!)
The downhill slope steepened in the bedtime warmup - bath, hair brushing, etc. I should have remembered that the transition day from break to school is rough, but I think I shove some of those hard times far back in my brain and honestly forget about them until they rear their ugly head again. Sadly for both of us, after 9 days of incessant togetherness, I did not have it in me to be in the place of compassion I needed to be in to nip it before it grew. No major blowouts, but a child sobbing in her bed (for absolutely no reason except being tired and transition - which is reason enough, but didn't feel like it to me at the time), me muttering as I stomped around trying to get in the right emotional space to go pat her to sleep. Luckily, God always grants me enough grace to settle myself enough to pat her and tell her I love her and say it in a truly loving way.
Tomorrow morning will probably be ugly. And I will probably be incredibly annoyed by that. I should warn her teachers but not sure how the day will go - she could settle right back into the routine and sail through, or she could have a disaster of a day. I honestly have no guess as to which way it will go. But I will seek the grace to get through that tomorrow. Right now I'm glad she is sleeping, that tomorrow I get to breathe a little, and that we found the grace to get through this break with minimal meltdowns.
As to the grace I will require in 3 short weeks when they are off for 20+ days? That will require a miracle...but hopefully I'll have the grace in the meantime not to hyperventilate just thinking about it.
Give yourselves grace for surviving a holiday. Heaven knows they are tough for our TKs, and thus tough for us. And stockpile some grace for the upcoming month -- and if you have any extra be sure to send it my way!
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