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September looms!


lurker

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My son starts the big K in September. I'm having a lot of anxiety over it. I know that it is stressful for kids, and stress -- well, you know!

 

Has anyone not had an increase at the beginning of the school year? Any advice/encouragement for Mom here?

 

Thanks,

 

Tami

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Yes, for the past week with the talk of the upcoming school in 8 days etc. my son has been a mess again. Of course it doesn't help he was around a friend with strep last week. He has been anxious and emotional difficult and angry! I am very concerned because he will go all day in first grade for the first time. I don't know how he is going to hold it together. If his recent behaviors are any indication of the mornings I have to look forward to I think I will need the prozac! He got a great teacher but still until the dust settles we can look forward to some difficult times. If he doesn't calm down his temper I will have to put him on antidepressants. I can't take much more of his moodiness.

 

Michele

My son starts the big K in September. I'm having a lot of anxiety over it. I know that it is stressful for kids, and stress -- well, you know!

 

Has anyone not had an increase at the beginning of the school year? Any advice/encouragement for Mom here?

 

Thanks,

 

Tami

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It is taking EVERY effort for me Not to contact my son's teacher! His tics have been totally under control and I am waiting for an outburst due to stress/school. Today was our second day. I have not seen anything at home.....I am afraid to ask him to try and read to me because I don't want to see any tics....if the stress is bringing them back. I can say though that so far so good "at home".

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Yes, for the past week with the talk of the upcoming school in 8 days etc. my son has been a mess again. Of course it doesn't help he was around a friend with strep last week. He has been anxious and emotional difficult and angry! I am very concerned because he will go all day in first grade for the first time. I don't know how he is going to hold it together. If his recent behaviors are any indication of the mornings I have to look forward to I think I will need the prozac! He got a great teacher but still until the dust settles we can look forward to some difficult times. If he doesn't calm down his temper I will have to put him on antidepressants. I can't take much more of his moodiness.

 

Michele

 

Michele, have you tried valerian root for your son's anxiety? I find that it works nearly as well as valium for my daughter.

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No I have not. What is it exactly? I have never heard of it. What form is it in liquid or pill? Thanks for the suggestion.

Michele

 

Yes, for the past week with the talk of the upcoming school in 8 days etc. my son has been a mess again. Of course it doesn't help he was around a friend with strep last week. He has been anxious and emotional difficult and angry! I am very concerned because he will go all day in first grade for the first time. I don't know how he is going to hold it together. If his recent behaviors are any indication of the mornings I have to look forward to I think I will need the prozac! He got a great teacher but still until the dust settles we can look forward to some difficult times. If he doesn't calm down his temper I will have to put him on antidepressants. I can't take much more of his moodiness.

 

Michele

 

Michele, have you tried valerian root for your son's anxiety? I find that it works nearly as well as valium for my daughter.

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Hi Tami,

 

When I was a mess in Aug. 2 years ago, my Dr. gave me some medication, but he told me not to fill it unless I really really had to. He said I was just afraid of the unknown and to give it some time.

 

He was right I never filled it and about a month after my son started school my stress went away.

 

It takes my son 3 weeks to get into school and settle his tics.

 

My oldest (does not have tics) 16yo now, when she started K she throw up every morning. We thought it was car sickness, but found out it was nerves. It took her until Oct. to finally stop. K was the only year she did that.

 

He will be fine...

 

For mama, you could get a photo album, take lots of pictures, and do some scrapbooking while he is at school to keep your mind off worring.

 

I have one for my son when he started K, their is pictures of the first day drawings handwriting...ect...Funny, he went to a private school in K that was about an hour from our home with kids from all over the Washington DC area. I told him for his scrap book he could only keep one valentine from one girl and one boy. Well the one he chose for the girl move out to our area and last year I ran into her and her mother, the kids had not seen each other since 2nd grade, when I told this young lady my son kept her valentine she started to tear up. The two of them go to the same school again now after 5 years of not seeing each other.

 

I'm so happy I did that for him, they love looking back on that day.

 

God Bless,

CP

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Lurker,

 

what i have learned the past years since my son's acute onset of tics is that our children pick up our stress and anxiety even we tried our best to hide it. The best way to approach it is to change the direction of our energy, by feeling confident and safe and our kids will too.

 

Good luck!

 

Pat

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Thanks, Pat.

 

I have been working on "glass half full," "positivity" because I am aware of the effect of "Mommy stress" on my son. I have a lot of baggage here though. My son had a tic explosion in late September of last year. It was three days after his DTaP shot, but my mind is playing tricks on me lately. Was it the shot, or the fact that the beginning of pre-K was so stressful? -- he had a hitter/kicker/biter in his class that was not efficiently dealt with for a month and a half. My mother passed away a year ago tomorrow and there was obviously that family stress.

 

Pat, if anyone on this board is my "voice of reason" it is you. I have even passed on one of your gems -- "strive for the overall well-being of the child" -- to others. (It's my personal mantra now). Thank you for the reality check! I have been spending my time on Kinder preparedness websites. Today, we picked out backpacks and lunchboxes. Tommorow, we are going to pack them and eat lunch and play at his new school. Thursday, there is a picnick there, and he will be able to meet his new teacher. And, there will be NO SHOTS this year (I signed a waiver; I live in California, so it was easy!)

 

Thank you,

 

Tami

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Tami,

I second you on this. I am also going into this year with a positive outlook. I know my son got a wonderful teacher. I pressed and had all his testing done before school started. We go in tomorrow to meet her and bring in his supplies. I am not going to say a word to his teacher about his issues. They did not want to make accomodations in writing for him so let him just go in there and do his best! I am sure she will figure out what works best. I am sure last years teacher sent a list of things he did for him. However I will wait for the teacher to contact me with her concerns. I know he is having a rough time emotionally at home but he will be fine at school. I will look at everything through my new rosy glasses. "Strive for the best" We did K shots last year also and are not this year either so that is in our favor too.

Michele

 

Thanks, Pat.

 

I have been working on "glass half full," "positivity" because I am aware of the effect of "Mommy stress" on my son. I have a lot of baggage here though. My son had a tic explosion in late September of last year. It was three days after his DTaP shot, but my mind is playing tricks on me lately. Was it the shot, or the fact that the beginning of pre-K was so stressful? -- he had a hitter/kicker/biter in his class that was not efficiently dealt with for a month and a half. My mother passed away a year ago tomorrow and there was obviously that family stress.

 

Pat, if anyone on this board is my "voice of reason" it is you. I have even passed on one of your gems -- "strive for the overall well-being of the child" -- to others. (It's my personal mantra now). Thank you for the reality check! I have been spending my time on Kinder preparedness websites. Today, we picked out backpacks and lunchboxes. Tommorow, we are going to pack them and eat lunch and play at his new school. Thursday, there is a picnick there, and he will be able to meet his new teacher. And, there will be NO SHOTS this year (I signed a waiver; I live in California, so it was easy!)

 

Thank you,

 

Tami

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Hi all,

Just figured I'd post how the summer went. Well things were very waxy April/May. I did some fine tuning and added and subtracted some of his supps. Thankfully, maybe I did something right as the summer has gone pretty well and there were days I thought that if he was just like this for the rest of his life, I would be very happy, I could relax and accept even these mild ticcing.

 

Of course about two weeks ago, the vocal seemed to kick up again, and I was a little rocked. I'm continuing my supps, maybe upping here and there and try to backtrack what he could be getting too much of recently (ie. tomatoes, Wii, ice cream?, stuff like that). He seems a little better, but now of course I am holding my breath till school starts. He still has a little sideways eye glancing, but as long as it does not escalate (which of course I am imagining it is), than I can deal with that. I've noticed it and the vocal kicks up when he reads with me.

 

Well, I do hope we all have a good beginning to school with not much strife. Good luck and God Bless, everyone.

 

Faith

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  • 2 weeks later...

UPDATE: We survived the first day of kindergarten!

 

And, unless lying is a tic, the stress did not trigger any. When I picked him up, The Little Master announced that his teacher was mean; she beat him; she "stealed" his lunch; and he will not be going back. He later relented and said that if I give him a piece of gum, he will try it for another day -- just one though.

 

Tami

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We were good for school days one and two. After that there has been screaming, and refusal to get ready. He says he is not going. School is too hard, too long and he hates all the handwriting and the lunch room ladies are mean. I am in the process of using positive reinforcement to get him ready each day. We put a smile face on the calander each day he is coopertive. After a week of good days I will take him to get a lightsaver sword. The problem is he just keeps trying to bump up the days till we get the sword. It is killing him to have to wait. He talks about and looks it up online over and over. His teacher says he is holding it together well there at school though. I have a feeling he is letting it out here at home. Lots of vocal squeals in the PM. The school completed his evaluation testing. The meeting is Sept 24th. They are waiting for the teacher to be able to make input after getting to know him. Because they haven't put any accomodations into writing after a year of this evaluation process I am thinking of having a TSA advocate along for the meeting. Has anyone done this before? Have your kids have had to be failing in the classroom and on the testing to get help? I would think they are aloud some help based on diagnosis alone. The school makes me feel like I am imagining this disorder. They said not many kids have been to as many Dr's or have as many diagnosis as your son does in first grade. Like that is reason to sit back and wait on the IEP process? Shouldn't that help my process that he has been to the Dr's and has the diagnosis?

 

Michele

UPDATE: We survived the first day of kindergarten!

 

And, unless lying is a tic, the stress did not trigger any. When I picked him up, The Little Master announced that his teacher was mean; she beat him; she "stealed" his lunch; and he will not be going back. He later relented and said that if I give him a piece of gum, he will try it for another day -- just one though.

 

Tami

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Tami,

 

Not much changes in ten years, my son (almost 15) anounced yesterday his Algebra teacher was mean.

 

He was appalled that she stated anyone who forgot their pen/pencils got lunch detention (LD)

 

If they don't do their homework they will have LD, and the worst part was, she would sit with them until it was done.

 

And... OH YEAH! No fooling around, or LD.

 

My husband and I laughed and welcomed him to high school. I guess math will not be his fav. subject anymore. B)

 

 

CP

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Michele,

 

re IEP have you seen this link? http://www.tsa-usa.org/educ_advoc/education_q_and_a.htm

 

We live in CA so the situation may be a little different (and our concern was dyslexia, not tics)...but we found the school to really drag their feet on our IEP. We requested testing last fall (2 mo. before PANDAS hit for 6mo. and turned our lives upside down) as my husband and I, and her teacher felt "something" (eg dsylexia) was going on. I agree, it's almost like your kid needs to be totally falling off the charts for them to declare that there is a problem/disability (never mind the fact that your kid is completely stressed out or not living up to his potential). They ran achievement tests, IQ tests, etc. etc. DD could still read at grade level (sight words) even though her spelling was terrible, phonetic decoding terrible, handwriting terrible, great difficulty with memorizing rote math facts, plummeting self esteem, etc. They declared that there was no problem. When pressed, the school psychologist admitted dd had a learning "difference". He refused to refer to it as a "disability" or "dyslexia" (and said that they don't test for dyslexia!)

 

Anyway, now that PANDAS is in remission, we will soon have independent testing with a neuropsychologist and educational specialist...who I hope will be able to give our daughter the help and accomodations she needs (and advocate for us in the school system if necessary.)

 

Anyway, that was a little long and perhaps a bit off original topic...but my point is it's not really in the schools best interest ($$$) to admit (esp. on paper) that your child has a disability and needs accomodations etc. , esp. if your child has a problem that is a little more subtle/out of the oridinary/ or can be glossed over. ..so IMO if there is somebody knowledgeable with IEP/school system who could help you that would be a good thing.

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We were good for school days one and two. After that there has been screaming, and refusal to get ready. He says he is not going. School is too hard, too long and he hates all the handwriting and the lunch room ladies are mean. I am in the process of using positive reinforcement to get him ready each day. We put a smile face on the calander each day he is coopertive. After a week of good days I will take him to get a lightsaver sword. The problem is he just keeps trying to bump up the days till we get the sword. It is killing him to have to wait. He talks about and looks it up online over and over. His teacher says he is holding it together well there at school though. I have a feeling he is letting it out here at home. Lots of vocal squeals in the PM. The school completed his evaluation testing. The meeting is Sept 24th. They are waiting for the teacher to be able to make input after getting to know him. Because they haven't put any accomodations into writing after a year of this evaluation process I am thinking of having a TSA advocate along for the meeting. Has anyone done this before? Have your kids have had to be failing in the classroom and on the testing to get help? I would think they are aloud some help based on diagnosis alone. The school makes me feel like I am imagining this disorder. They said not many kids have been to as many Dr's or have as many diagnosis as your son does in first grade. Like that is reason to sit back and wait on the IEP process? Shouldn't that help my process that he has been to the Dr's and has the diagnosis?

 

While I'm familiar with the IEP process as a parent, there has never been any doubt that my daughter needs an IEP. Its pretty obvious with her. But, I also have experience as a teacher, trying to get help for kids who are not failing miserably, but are barely keeping their heads above water. Its frustrating, even with parental support, its an ordeal trying to get the district to test and get with the program. All the while, the child is falling further and further behind. . . They almost always take a "wait and see" approach with kindergarteners. It might be helpful if your child can see a developmental pediatrician who will document areas of concern and make recommendations for accommodations. It kind of sounds like they're accusing you of munchausens (in an underhanded way). Have they completed the testing yet? If you disagree with the results (check wright's law to be sure) I believe you can have an independent evaluation done at school expense. If a 1st grader thinks the staff at school is mean, they are probably expecting him to do things that he cannot do, or to not do things he cannot help doing. For, instance- kids with poor impulse control are always getting into trouble and being punished, instead of being taught strategies for impulse control. And from a purely developmental standpoint, I agree with your son, a first grader's schoolday is too long.

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