Building Resilience

What a week for building resilience my little one has had!  I think he has handled it really well.

First - he can't go into the staffroom at work anymore. He loved going in there to sit at the table and have his afternoon tea. He also visited one of the Deputy Principals and got a tasty treat. Such is teaching, I do not finish work when the kids go home. I still have work to do, so Callum often comes to my room while I work, then on our way out to various therapy appointments, we would stop and have a quick afternoon snack in the staffroom (it's where the fridge is, I don't have one in my room).
He would also go to the ladies toilet with me before we left.

Someone at work complained, so now he is not allowed in there. I can understand that it is a teacher's space, but it wasn't crowded and I certainly didn't do it when social gatherings were being held. I wasn't ready to send him off to the toilets on his own (he'd have to use the older kids toilet and I'm not ready for the teasing and comments about the weird boy who acts like a train. I'm sure there would be a complaint if I went into the boy's toilet with him, and if he went into the girls toilet.)

So he has had to wait outside the staffroom. He did get teary and upset, but it didn't last long. Luckily the Deputy Principal is very understanding and she came outside to him.

His second resilience lesson was on the weekend. We went away for the weekend, our sole purpose really was to go on a steam train. Callum has a very clever daddy who decided that we would go into the town where the steam train was, to check that we knew where we were going the following morning. We went to the local information centre, who informed us, that the steam train was not currently operating on account that they hadn't completed the necessary government paperwork on time. (We did ring a fortnight earlier to check that it was still on, yes we always run was the reply!) Imagine if we had shown up Sunday morning, complete in our train engineer costume that we had packed?? Endless questions about why the train was broken, but other than that, he handled it very well. "We can come back another time, when it's not broken."

The third lesson was his show and share on Monday. He has daycare and school on Monday. Callum thought he had his show and share (a pamphlet of the steam train from the weekend that we were supposed to go on) at daycare but we couldn't find it. He thought someone had stolen it. Some little tears but then after talking with him, and reminding him that it might be at school, that he could check the next day, he was happy.

They don't seem like big things, and not that Callum has huge meltdowns, but they pretty important to him. Learning to regulate his emotions and calm himself quickly are important skills that he needs to develop. I'm so proud of how he has handled himself this last week - especially the second one!! :)