I tried to look at it in a positive way thinking K will be getting full babysitter's attention, but somehow I couldn't sleep the night before. Since the wee hours, I tried to prepare Klaudia for her adventure telling her how much fun she was going to have at school watching movies and playing with Yadira while mom is next door at a meeting. She listened and kept saying: "Yeah, mama.'
Yadira turned out to be a very nice lady who sensed K's shyness right away and did everything she could to switch her attention from me to her. K on the other hand once she saw me turning around and heading for the door, started crying. For 20 minutes, we tried everything, but I couldn't just sit next door and listen to K's crying. So, eventually I told Yadira that it wouldn't work, thanked her, paid her, and we parted our ways. K couldn't have been louder when saying Bye Bye to her.
I waited for K to calm down and decided to take her to the meeting. My plan was to leave as soon as she gets loud. Once she was ready to go, I packed all the toys, and that's when K turned around and walked right into a table that was 2 inches away from her hitting her head and getting a cut right next to her eye. The cut was tiny but big enough to bleed a bit. As we both sat there on the floor, I was close to losing it. I was fighting the tears and was ready to go home. I still had to go into the meeting to gather my stuff.
It took us a few minutes to pull ourselves together. When we walked towards the other classroom, K seemed happy again. She was very proud to be in the big people's room. I decided to stay and listen as long as K would let me. At this point, K was just hungry. She sat and ate quietly for the rest of the meeting, and at the end everyone was impressed with her good behavior.
By the time we got home, I was emotionally exhausted. Looking back at yesterday's happening, I think we'll wait a bit before we leave K alone with anyone again. Someone at the meeting yesterday said that it's good to leave kids with strangers from time to time. I disagree. Maybe it's good if the kids are OK with it, but I don't see anything good putting them through this trauma when they are not ready. K has been lucky to have us stay with her all the time, so she is not used to staying with anyone else alone. She will get better once she is older... right?
2 comments:
I think that you are absolutely right to trust your intuition on this one, Kate. It's pretty easy for me to leave E with a babysitter every week while I work in A's class, but that's because I know his personality is such that he'll have fun socializing and playing and not miss me too much.
I would never in a million years have considered leaving A with a babysitter when she was a little thing. It would have been sooo traumatic for her (and me). So you can rest assured that a child who was an extraordinarily shy and clingy 2-year-old and who was never left with a babysitter even once at that age can grow into a perfectly social young lady who loves to chat with new people and has no trouble whatsoever separating from her mama. :-)
Wow, glad you were able to make your meeting sane and intact. Yeah, I don't know who thinks that it's a good thing to leave your kid(s) with a stranger from time to time. I mean, what does that teach them? I signed us up for dance lessons as an Xmas gift. When we go, my bro and his wife volunteered to come over. Even that took many months of prep just for C to be comfortable without us. I say go at your own pace. When your child's ready, they'll let you know. I'm sure it won't be long when we reminisces about the days when they did cling to us.
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