Another Year

When my in-laws divorced I clung to the idea that once we got through the first year it would all get better from there. You know, the first round of birthdays, holidays, etc. I held out through each event certain that after we had been through it once, the next time would be easier - and then it wasn't. I woke up on the one-year divorce anniversary and was so disappointed to realize we were still in the same place as when we went to bed the night before, except we had another whole round of birthdays and holidays to get through.

In this moment I feel the same about the school year. Every year we start strong. We collaborate with teachers, we get an action plan in place, we promise it will be "the best year ever," - and then it's not. I hear the same complaints, wipe the same tears, and shed my own over the same concerns. We've spent hours on end and dollar after dollar for tutoring, training, medication, and herbal "support." What was it all for if what I hear at the end of the day is still, "I'm the only who can't do it." "I try and try but I can't learn it." "Everyone makes fun of me and thinks I'm stupid...?"

Does anyone else out there feel like their child's school career is destined to be a series of the same frustrations disguised in the context of a different classroom?

I kind of hope so, because if someone else did then maybe I would feel more like this is just part of learning and growing and less like it's probably my fault.

Ok, ok. Time to stop griping and get a grip instead. Let's review some facts: my daughter is a better reader than she was last year, and she was a better reader last year than the year before that. She is doing well in history and in writing and she scored the class high on three different assignments in the first half of this year. She has improved and for that matter, so have I, so regardless of our homework meltdown tonight, there are lots of things that have changed for the better this year. Something that has not changed and will not ever change is that SHE CAN LEARN and SHE IS NOT STUPID.

I suppose every year is another round of spelling tests and timed drills to get through, but it has to be more than that. It's a year - 12 months, 52 weeks, 365 days, - of learning lessons (whether you like them or not), and in that year it's the moments and not the grades that count. I don't know if we will ever have a school year where Dyslexia and ADHD don't trip us up a bit. Whether or not we have a day when I don't compliment my daughter, give her encouragement, and tell her I love her, is up to me.

A new calendar year is approaching and the school year is half way done. We're better than we were before and who's to say we won't be better yet? So, bring on the new year - we'll be taking it one day at a time.