Unspoken Words

It’s that time of week again….I realized as I sat down to type that I was sitting in this same exact spot last week with a sick child at home. SURPURISE, here I am again. Seven weeks!!! Yes, someone in my house has been sick in one way or another for the past seven weeks. I’m pretty sure that the folks around here are thinking that I either don’t keep a clean house or that I don’t feed my children properly. I promise that’s not the case :-) Anyone who knows me, knows how particular I am about having a clean and organized house. They also know that although I am not a world renowned chef, I do my best to cook well balanced meals.


I am truly beginning to understand that I don’t like having sick children at home. First of all it’s not a whole lot of fun to have a sick anybody at home and second of all, my mind tends to wander off to far off places when I’m not kept busy by the hustle and bustle of raising three children.

I think most of you know that the road in kindergarten with Travin has not been an easy one. Jason and I have been fighting a battle that I am not sure we are ever going to win. Winning or losing isn’t actually the point. All we have ever wanted from day one is what is best for our son. Unfortunately, we view education differently than his teacher and that is something that cannot be changed. We do what we can to make things as easy as possible for him. Our main focus has been to get our son through kindergarten without any feelings of anxiety and as smoothly as we possibly can. Sadly, this should not be our main focus but it is. Kindergarten should be amazing and fun. It breaks my heart to not be able to enjoy the things that he is doing or should be doing. It breaks my heart that his teacher chooses to keep the parents uniformed. It breaks my heart that we are nearing towards the holidays and we don’t have any fun memories to be able to share with Travin. I have not been able to display any of his art work or any crafts this year. Why, because there are none. I have a handful of pictures from school that I have to treasure. I find myself throwing away his work from school because every paper he brings home has big red X’s or circles around the areas where he didn’t write perfectly on the line or where he colored a little outside the lines.

We found out last week that we missed out on an event at school. I was so irritated because it was the second kindergarten event that we weren’t made aware of. I decided to do some investigating. I found the kindergarten event calendar posted on all of the other kindergarten teachers websites. The kindergartners usually have 2 or 3 fun events a month. "Crazy" as it may sound but the other teachers actually encourage the parents to join in on the fun.

I just don’t understand. I can’t for the life of me even begin to comprehend how my son’s teacher operates. I have never met a teacher who doesn’t embrace or welcome support from parents. Most teachers are always eager to have an extra pair of hands in their classroom. Slowly this teacher is trying to push me away. Unfortunately for her, she has a tough fight on her hands; one that I can guarantee SHE WILL NOT WIN! Maybe that’s why she doesn’t like me. I’m not sure. I have never been one to question an educator’s way of doing things. In fact it has always been the opposite. I am the one who wants to learn. I have always valued each and every one of my children’s teachers. They have been my mentors. They have given me inspiration and filled my heart with hope. I have always gone to them with questions in regards not only about my children but also about myself. I have always taken some type of a learning experience out of every single classroom I have ever set foot in. I can't tell you how many times I have come home after a day in a classroom and jotted down notes on things that I saw, heard, or got to help with (I call it my little black teaching book). Up until now I have always been fortunate enough to be an active role in all three of the children’s education. This is very hard for me. I am not sure which way to turn or what steps to take. I have done everything in my power to offer my support and my help. I keep trying to move forward. I keep looking for the good in all of this. Jason would tell you that my heart is too big. He always tells me that no matter what I will always make the best out of any situation that is thrown my way. My husband has a lot of faith in me.

I know that some have not agreed with the decisions we have made over the past couple of months and that's okay. Trust me when I say that this has by far been one of the hardest things we have ever gone through because no matter what choices we make Travin is going to affected. I can't even begin to explain the raw emotions that have bled out of me. My head has told me one thing while my heart has said another. My emotions and feelings have been twisted and turned in so many different directions. The only thing I have to keep things into perspective is watching my son progress a little each day.   

This completely took a different turn. I had no intentions on coming on here and sharing this much. This has been eating at me for the past 3 months. We take things one week at a time. The hard part of all of this is that right now, Travin is doing really well in school. A month ago he was really far behind. We had to start everything over with him because he regressed so badly in the first 2 months of school. In the past month he relearned his entire alphabet. He can write his letters without any help and he knows all of his sounds. It is amazing to watch him read his sight word books. He is so eager to learn. I just wish that there was more encouragement and more positive praise coming from his classroom.