The last couple days I have thought a lot about school starting back. Part of me wants that for them and me but part of me wants them here under my wing all day every day. I worry how other kids treat them as do most of you, I'm sure, but I also worry about how teachers treat them.......when I'm not there. We have been fortunate enough to have some wonderful teachers, last year especially and I find myself dreading what this year will bring.
I think I worry mostly about teachers because i had one as a child that was simply horrible to me. I hated school. Hate is not even a strong enough word for how I felt about school. As a child i had issues of my own. i never wanted to be away from home. I did want to have friends and attend sleep overs, ect. but as soon as I stepped foot out the door out of the safety of my home I immediately became a nervous wreck. This tipped the scale at age 10. Fourth grade just like Eli is going in to.
I'm not sure why that particular age and grade. My parents were older when I came along. Thirty seven and thirty eight. I watched my grand parents die at a young age. My parents were in and out of doctors and the hospital that year for various things and I stayed a lot at the only living grandparent's I had left. I was drug to a lot of funerals as a kid, too. My parents sang for most of them so I sat alone in churches and funeral homes till they ended staring at this dead body I'd never met before in my life. I explain this because I think I feared death. Feared them dieing because they were so much older then all of my friends parents. Between this fear and the fear that began to develop of any place other than my own home I was a nervous little wreck at school. I enjoyed nothing. Friends and sports were not important to me. Through this time I was sick all the time. Headache and nausea mostly. Soon as my feet stepped on a bus I was sick till I returned home. I kept my head layed over most all day and cried at school. Teachers began to make fun of me when they thought I couldn't hear them.........or maybe they knew I could. This year one teacher in particular was leading me to the principles office for yet another speech about what my problems was and how I needed to stop acting so stupid and foolish when she met another teacher in the hall.....their conversation went something like this:
MG-Sick again today are we??
MH-Yep
MG-Hmmm...imagine that.
MH- What this gal needs is her ass busted and she would cut this
shit out every dam day.
This conversation stuck with me my whole life. I'm 32 years old now and can still go back to that very moment when I realized those teachers were not going to help me. They didn't believe me. They thought I was playing games. I never told my parents. They thought a lot of these women and still do. But to this day when I see these women I think of that day.
Of course no one was educated back then. I know now I can't be in large crowds. I struggle with the grocery store and department stores. I do well if my children are with me, but alone I freak out to say the least. I passed out at work once from the headache this anxiety brings on. I still have issues with date night, which my husbands totally gets and is ready to jump in and slow my racing thoughts and bubble gut. There are times that I simply cannot even sleep in a room with him. I usually head for the couch or a room close to the bathroom. It's just like school days......nausea, headache, ect. Times it's absolutely paralyzing but, has improved greatly since I finally got up the nerve to start classes at WKU. That was a huge step forward for me.
I see alot of myself (Social Anxiety) in Eli and Zackary. We all come unglued in crowds. I hope school is a fun place for them always. and I hope they never have to deal with rude and ignorant teachers.
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