The Great Kindergarten Search of 2015 is over for us, and we are very happy with the results. For the next nine years, Scarlett will be attending a school with tons of outdoor space, great teachers, and a lunch program that makes me jealous.
But she was not initially thrilled by this news, mainly because she is in a contrary phase. “Daddy and I have something exciting to talk to you about!” I said, once our decision was made.
“It’s not exciting!” she yelled, after I had given my spiel, full of warm and fuzzy observations about the school. She dashed out of the room.
“I think you might have oversold that,” Rob said.
Perhaps. First of all, it did not involve Care Bears. Second, Scarlett doesn’t know the details of The Great Search, which included the difficult decision to leave her current school, a wonderful place that offered her a spot through 8th grade. She doesn’t know that we spent months going to tours and open houses, filling out applications and sending emails. She doesn’t know that last weekend was spent trying to determine where she would thrive for the next nine years of her life, a discussion neither Rob nor I took lightly.
Everyone’s life changes in a decade, but Scarlett’s life might change more than most. Thanks a lot, ALS.
I took her to visit her new school on Monday afternoon, and watched her look around. “I get to be like those girls?” she asked, clearly awed as she looked at a group of 2nd graders throwing frisbees on a wide green lawn.
An eighth grader came up to us as we were checking out the playground, and we talked for a minute about the school play she was rehearsing. “When you are her age,” I told Scarlett, “she’ll be done with college.” It’s a long time, nine years.
It’s safe to say that by the time we left, Scarlett was significantly more interested in her future education. “I want to go to this school right now!” she told me, more than a few times. Me too, I thought.
I was feeling good. She liked it, Rob and I liked it, the choice was made, the process over. And then I realized that the process is really far from over. Yes, we know where she’ll be, but how will she be? How will I be? Even as we cruised around that afternoon, I had a glimpse of the first day of school, when I will be identifiable primarily as the mom in the wheelchair. It’s still so hard for me to believe. I said as much to my friend Stephen Finger, and—wise man that he is—he basically told me to get over myself. Before long, he explained, they will just see me as her mom. “She will be the one who stands out,” were his exact words. And I know he’s right about that.
Besides, although I would rather not be the mom in the wheelchair, at least the mom in the wheelchair is there.
More than anything, I just want to be there for Scarlett, in a meaningful way. I desperately want to know my daughter the 8th grader. I want to know what she looks like, what she sounds like, what she loves to do. I want to talk about her day, and her friends, and that awesome sounding lunch. I want to know if she still thinks fake burping is hilarious.
It would even be a privilege to experience all the frustration of parenting a moody adolescent. I’m certainly getting lots of practice with the moody preschooler, who threw a banana at me in the car this week when she didn’t like my song selection.
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I think I am here before everybody else again… May be I spend to much time online lately…
I understand you and I think that many parents who suddenly become chronically ill will understand you perfectly. A couple of months ago I was in the waiting-room of my neurosurgeon and I started talking with the lady next to me. She had a beautiful red hair and I mentioned to her. Not the best comment, it was not really hers, she lost all her hair with the radiotherapy. But who cares about hair those days!!! I will remember that conversation all my life because she told me something that sounds very true to me those days. She told me she got her diagnostic when her youngest child was 6 years old and now he is 19. He is an adult and in a way, it was a comforting knowing that if she has to go one of those days, her children are independent persons that can thrive without her care. She did not tell me “I have been sick for this long”, the new time frame are our kids. And in my mind, time works that way those days. Everyone of his birthdays is a kind of victory.
She was happy, I was happy for her. And I really wish you the same Sarah, and to me, and all the parents who do not face only adversity but this fear of leaving behind their kids.
After a morning spent fussing over some minor setback with my very own moody preteen, you have me reset my priorities back in the right order. Tears in my eyes and being very humbled and incredibly grateful because there are people like you in the world, and especially YOU.
I would like to say so many things but I’ll leave it at that.
Sarah, my mom had Polio and I hated that I stood out. I hated being different; feeling like an outcast (and kids can be inherently cruel). I wished my mom was like the other mommies. And, yes, I cried about it. Lots.
And then I was 18 and I didn’t hate it anymore. In fact, a profoundly deep appreciation developed for my mother’s strength. She endured weak muscles, lived as an orphan, was a non-English-speaking immigrant with a young child, divorced and with no marketable skills or support. She overcame every last obstacle, and persevered. Nothing short of miraculous!
There is no one I’m more eager to talk about, prouder of or more inspired by than my mother. When I tell others her story, they’re on the very edge of their seat. They should be. The empathy I developed and the ways my childhood created a beautifully complex lens in which to view this world….well, hard-earned perspective is truly priceless.
Your illness won’t always be easy for her but it will gift her in seemingly imperceptible, evolving and wonderful ways too. Yes, I know you’d rather find other ways to enrich your child, but right now, it’s this.
Scarlett will be an extraordinary person deeply in love with her mother not in spite of ALS but – perhaps – because of it.
Thank you Sarah for sharing this lovely story. I do not know Scarlett nor seen a picture of her, but it is funny how you make a mental image a people. I imagine her like a little Shirley Temple with all her charms and wit. Your letter makes me smile. My best to you. Keep writting please.
Hurray for making your choice! S will be a star there. xxoo
I’m sure she will still love fake burping. Who doesn’t?