Into the light...

We are coming up to the 10 month anniversary of Connah being enrolled in childcare. 10 months of bi-weekly hell, of which we have not missed one single session.

We are only now at the stage where the mere mention of kindy doesn't make him start obsessively rocking in a corner, counting down how many days until he has to go. I believe - dare I say it - that the worst is behind us.

Let me explain with a dog story:

Connah has never liked our dog, and I've never really thought twice about it. If Jax is a huge clumsy oaf to me, I can only imagine that it's much more unsettling to have him knock you around when you're only 3 feet tall.

A few weeks ago, Connah asked if Jax could come inside, so he could play with him. This surprised the hell out of me since he hasn't ever voluntarily interacted with Jax, except when he was a very small puppy.

I let the dog in, and the boys spent half an hour jumping all over him, all the while, Connah is patting him saying "He's a good dog now." and "I like Jax, he's my friend now."

And the light bulb went off.

I like Jax now. (Or at least, I don't resent him anymore.) It took all of half a day for Connah to catch on to my new attitude towards the dog.

I've always known that Connah is very sensitive to other peoples moods, especially mine. I just didn't fully realize how much my own personal opinions where helping to shape his own. I recently re-read all my childcare posts, and a question I wrote jumped out at me: "Am I hindering him?" Now I know the answer: Yes.

All the fake smiles, and "Kindy is fun!"s in the world were not going to convince him - he can read me too easily. I had to believe.

Crap.

Before I had children, I fully intended to go back to school and study after they were born. Mark was on-board with being a stay at home dad, and I really liked the idea of having a job that constructively used my brain.

Then they were born.

I had no defense against them. They blasted through to my core, and there they remain, tangled up in my soul.

I couldn't happily skip off to my new brain job every day - only see the boys on weekends, - I would be leaving my soul at home. You can't do good brain work with no soul.

And that is what it feels like when I leave Connah at Childcare - like I'm missing part of my soul.

I didn't know how to be Ok with that. It took me this long to see that most of the problems we were having were mine. I already knew about my issues, but I thought that just made it harder for me. Now I know that I was reflecting all the confusion and fear I had felt as a child, onto him, and he was absorbing it as his own.

I couldn't save me, so I was trying to save him. Every day, I try to save him. The thought that he in turn, was reading my hurt, and trying to save me, is a horrifying thought. No child should be burdened with that.

So I stopped viewing childcare through the eyes of my child-self, stopped trying to save him, when he didn't need to be saved. And it has stopped being devastating.

He is doing so much better now. He interacts with the children more. He voices his opinions occasionally. He even stood up and sung a song at mat time.

I think he will always be quieter than other children. He is introverted, he can be very literal, and he wants to understand everything. He finds other children with their carefree teasing nature difficult to figure out - children don't really explain their actions very often.

He doesn't always "get" them, but he is no longer isolated from them.

And that was really the whole point - not to make him "fit in", but to help him create positive experiences involving his peers.

So, it's taken the best part of a year, a lot of tears, epic amounts of learning, and a fair bit of soul-searching, but I think we are finally out of the shadows.

Can the fun start now, please?






xox