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Both of my kids go through stages where they either love school or they hate it.  There are weeks when they bound out of the car, hardly able to contain their excitement over seeing their friends after a long weekend.  And then there are weeks like last week.  Ben seems to be going through a bit of separation anxiety and really, really did not want to go to school. At all. Not even for a little bit.

The pleading to stay home gotincreasingly worse, until it finally came to a head on Thursday.  I asked him to head downstairs and to the car. He refused.  So I eventually picked him up and started to carry him.  I thought it was all going well until I passed through the door frame.  I kept walking, but Ben did not. He had grabbed onto the door frame with all his strength and was hanging on for dear life begging  me to stay home.

It was the beginning of a very horrible morning.

Once I finally pryed his tiny little fingers off the door frame and headed down the stairs he found every possible instance to either hang on to something or run away if i let go of him.  I did not get upset or lose my temper, I just felt incredibly sad. I would have loved to had stayed home, but I absolutely had to go to work.  It took me many (many) attempts to get him into his car seat and and then even more attempts and finally some brute strength to get him buckled.

Once he was firmly buckled in with no option of escape his efforts turned vocal. He screamed the entire way to school, only pausing when we would pass a road. It was then that he'd cry "Turn that way mommy!!, turn that way!!"

When we got to daycare he wouldn't get out of the car, then grabbed every door frame once again and finally clinged to me sobbing once we got in the door.

Just thinking about it now makes me want to cry.

(You might be thinking that perhaps there's something going on at school that he's afraid of, but I can assure you that's not the case. Both my kids have been happy there and well taken care of for years. I have no fears about anything bad happening to him there)

The daycare director did the best thing she could have possibly done, though. Once she took him out of my arms and saw how visibly upset I was, she asked me to stay for a few minutes, to see for myself that he recovers quite quickly.  She took Ben in the other room to visit the babies and within a few minutes they were back (I'd gone out in the hallway and spied through the window) and he was pretending to be a TRex, laughing and acting as though nothing had happened.

I felt 100% better. But still cried the entire way to work.

My phone rang halfway through my commute, and  much to my instant dismay I saw that it was daycare calling.  I was sure it was the "come pick him up, he just won't calm down" call. But instead it was the director, calling to see how I was doing. Me.  She was worried about me and wanted to make sure I knew that Ben was ok and see if I was ok myself.   And then she called again a few minutes later because Ben wanted to talk to me, to tell me he'd found a colorful bug and to tell me all about it.

That kind of kindness and concern is exactly why I chose this daycare in the first place. I knew that the staff has always been concerned about the well-being of my kids, but it touched me greatly to know that they cared just as much about MY well-being.  People like that make this world a better place.

And they sure do make coming to work a whole lot easier.

Of course, the very next day Ben jumped out of the car, declared "I love school!" and ran in like it was a candy store.

These kids, they always keep me guessing.

Have you ever had a particularly bad (or good) daycare dropoff? How did you handle it?

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Both of my kids go through stages where they either love school or they hate it.  There are weeks when they bound out of the car, hardly able to contain their excitement over seeing their friends after a long weekend.  And then there are weeks like last week.  Ben seems to be going through a bit of separation anxiety and really, really did not want to go to school. At all. Not even for a little bit.

The pleading to stay home gotincreasingly worse, until it finally came to a head on Thursday.  I asked him to head downstairs and to the car. He refused.  So I eventually picked him up and started to carry him.  I thought it was all going well until I passed through the door frame.  I kept walking, but Ben did not. He had grabbed onto the door frame with all his strength and was hanging on for dear life begging  me to stay home.

It was the beginning of a very horrible morning.

Once I finally pryed his tiny little fingers off the door frame and headed down the stairs he found every possible instance to either hang on to something or run away if i let go of him.  I did not get upset or lose my temper, I just felt incredibly sad. I would have loved to had stayed home, but I absolutely had to go to work.  It took me many (many) attempts to get him into his car seat and and then even more attempts and finally some brute strength to get him buckled.

Once he was firmly buckled in with no option of escape his efforts turned vocal. He screamed the entire way to school, only pausing when we would pass a road. It was then that he'd cry "Turn that way mommy!!, turn that way!!"

When we got to daycare he wouldn't get out of the car, then grabbed every door frame once again and finally clinged to me sobbing once we got in the door.

Just thinking about it now makes me want to cry.

(You might be thinking that perhaps there's something going on at school that he's afraid of, but I can assure you that's not the case. Both my kids have been happy there and well taken care of for years. I have no fears about anything bad happening to him there)

The daycare director did the best thing she could have possibly done, though. Once she took him out of my arms and saw how visibly upset I was, she asked me to stay for a few minutes, to see for myself that he recovers quite quickly.  She took Ben in the other room to visit the babies and within a few minutes they were back (I'd gone out in the hallway and spied through the window) and he was pretending to be a TRex, laughing and acting as though nothing had happened.

I felt 100% better. But still cried the entire way to work.

My phone rang halfway through my commute, and  much to my instant dismay I saw that it was daycare calling.  I was sure it was the "come pick him up, he just won't calm down" call. But instead it was the director, calling to see how I was doing. Me.  She was worried about me and wanted to make sure I knew that Ben was ok and see if I was ok myself.   And then she called again a few minutes later because Ben wanted to talk to me, to tell me he'd found a colorful bug and to tell me all about it.

That kind of kindness and concern is exactly why I chose this daycare in the first place. I knew that the staff has always been concerned about the well-being of my kids, but it touched me greatly to know that they cared just as much about MY well-being.  People like that make this world a better place.

And they sure do make coming to work a whole lot easier.

Of course, the very next day Ben jumped out of the car, declared "I love school!" and ran in like it was a candy store.

These kids, they always keep me guessing.

Have you ever had a particularly bad (or good) daycare dropoff? How did you handle it?

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