A butterfly over a rainbow
Gin will soon be covered in all the golden hues of autumn and today is a beautiful crisp day that you should make the most of summer! In fact, it was a perfect day to take my two year old to the park. Instead I drive around the many parks en route to the big white building with a rainbow painted on the front that reads ‘L’ Arc en Ciel’ (rainbow in the sky). As I get closer, I can literally feel my heart beating and hope it doesn’t somehow vibrate from my hands to the handlebars of the stroller. I’m talking all kinds of nonsense trying to distract us both from the big fact. It is the beginning of our slime’s first game school. It is the beginning of the end of our constant cocoon since his birth.
As we enter the building, I see an endless amount of butterflies hanging sporadically from the ceiling, luckily catching our drool’s attention, that’s for a few seconds until he starts crying. He wants to be outside, running down the grassy slopes and up and down stairs and resting on a swing or a slide. I don’t blame him, it’s such a nice day and we’re inside with lots of relaxing parents with lots of babies and toddlers around! But this is for your own good. I gather up some courage and carry him crying into our classroom which is just down the long corridor. Seems like it takes forever to get there. I notice I’m late and most of the little ones seem to have settled in, if not for a little wimp or cry. I can’t help but feel the eyes of all the parents and carers on me as my precious moans and moans loudly, showing the door, saying ‘out’ and ‘park’! It’s like he knows this is where I’ll leave him. I fight to keep it within the four walls of our bedroom. It’s divided into little compartments of play areas, a lounge, a toy parking lot with lots of cars and highways, a craft corner, and a play kitchen with all kinds of delicacies that I know Baba would love, if only he could see through. of all your tears!
Alas, we survived two hours together! A standard in this period of ‘adaptation’. My back hurts trying to hold it. He has mostly cried the whole time, except for a few brief moments where a toy iron and a stroller caught his eye. I’m exhausted as I’m sure he is! I long to go outside and get some air and let him do what his crying heart wants. His usual smiles have returned when I mention the park and say goodbye to everyone. His mood of him takes an immediate summer jump! He is very excited, saying goodbye to everyone, loving the new word he just heard and repeating it over and over again to everyone-‘à matin’ (see you tomorrow)! Actually? Has he really grasped the meaning? I am emotionally and physically exhausted. Tomorrow I can wait!
But yes, tomorrow comes. And I’m full of fears. Luckily, my always so ready to compete but considerate husband is ready to help us out! I’m glad the helping hand literally carries some weight and doesn’t think so much about who has the most effect on our son. As we enter the facility I expect the howling to start, but other than a little scrambling to get slime out of the stroller, we’re inside the room without a scream! Miracle! And miracle of miracles, she runs over to the iron and starts ironing as my husband gives me a kind of ‘it’s all me’ triumphant smile. Well my thoughts are forming. The first day, baba thought that she was going to leave him. On the second day, she received the message that I will not leave. Which is a place for the two of us to play together and leave together. Wrong message but right at this stage, as the caregiver explains, first you have to eliminate the fear of abandonment so that you start to enjoy and get to know the place and the people. Then in a few days as he gains his confidence to do bits of ‘breaking up’ starting at 10 minutes to orchestrate my consistent return to him.
The following days are good. We like to play school together. Baba actually walks into the classroom by himself and starts his activities, all within a radius of me that I’m supposed to expand! What complicated science! At the end of the 2 hours, his greatest goodbye of all time comes running with his ‘â matin’s and ‘au revoir’s! He affectionately calls his caregivers Aunt So-and-so and knows some of the children by his name. He is confident. Poor soul, he thinks this is it!
Then the day comes when one of these chicks comes up to me and tells me that it’s time to do a ‘separation’. I’m not that ready. I haven’t lost a night’s sleep in anticipation! I nod and with a trembling heart say I’m going to the bathroom. I can hear her crying, with ‘mama is coming’, ‘mama is coming’. I walk without looking back. The look I long for but am not allowed to give! It’s been a full 20 minutes right on the other side of the closed door and I hear her words as she tells me to go back into the room, with ‘mommy is coming’. They told me that I played between these statements. We keep 20 minutes for a couple of days. Then the days that follow see a gradual progress with 20 minutes stretching to half an hour, then an hour, then one and a half with ever changing stories to explain my absence to keep you warm while I’m gone. He remembers these stories and tells them to her husband. So I am aware that I need to keep them real and believable. I was told that it is an approving behavior without crying.
Of course, there are some side effects of his start at the game school. He says more than ‘take mom’s hand’ and ‘mom leads’ at home. In the day he has statements of ‘very tired, very tired … many games’. At night, sometimes, he is restless and anxious. And he waits to poop at home! One day I assumed he really wanted to go, but he held on for so long that when I got there, he was crying, shaking and saying ‘Mama kakka’ (conveniently meaning poop in both French and Sinhala). poor soul. Of course! How was he supposed to know unless I told him? I bring him home where he squats to do his business! That day I kept explaining to him that the aunts at school have lots of new diapers and they will wash him if he ever wants to poop! So to relax… Thereafter every morning he gives work to the aunts! He relieves me that he’s relaxed, yet another sign that the caretakers say he’s used to school.
After three weeks, his adjustment period was officially declared over. And today, in the fourth week, with her pram in storage, Baba was literally running to school with a bag slung over him. Of course, he was ‘smelling the roses on the way’, pressing the elevator button, looking for birds under the big willow tree, pressing the ‘red man, green man, light’, counting the cars, going up the stairs, opening the doors and giving ‘bonjour’s and ‘ça va’s to everyone and looking at me with a smile and giving a high five to leave!
I know there is no definitive happy ending to these memories, that there will be good days and bad days, but looking back over four weeks, I can’t help but feel proud. I know that with the big picture in today’s world, these can be considered small trivial steps, but in fact in my slime’s world they are giant and the most important ones. This is his first experience of the world without his mom and her dad, in a whirlwind of unfamiliar emotions with new skills to master, learning to hold his ground and be a person on his own! As I look at all those twinkly butterflies hanging and seeing the little ones in their rooms I get it. All are caterpillars passing through the chrysalis, the transformation stage in which tissues break down and adult insect structures form before they become the butterflies of tomorrow. And I really hope that the skies tomorrow are bright for them or that it rains, they will be joyful creatures whose eyes can always picture a rainbow!
Some important tips that really worked for me, where I expected the worst:
1. Warm-up: Explain to the child about school, before the start date and during the first few weeks.
2. Take it easy: Give yourself as much of an adjustment period as possible, taking it easy.
3. Earn trust: Give him different stories of your absence and give him evidence when possible to gain his trust. (For example, go buy eggs, then give eggs for lunch!)
4. ‘Family’ comes up: He basically talks about the carers at school, letting him know he can count on them.
5. Let off steam: at the end of the day, ask him for his account of the school day.
6. Praise the good, Embrace the bad: Praise him and tell your other loved ones at the end of the day in front of him. If he’s not that good, don’t be tempted to create any drama. There will be bad days!