Holistic Educational Services

I have so many parenting moments where I reflect and realize I didn't handle that moment the way I would like to, when the overwhelm or the time constraints get to me. Moments where I need to go back and apologize and repair with my kids. But then I have moments that I look back on and think, "That. That is how I want to show up with my kids. That is what I want them to know about life and relationships."

Friday was the last day of school and when my three children arrived in my classroom at the end of the day they had all participated in class parties and all the sugars, processed foods, and colorful dyes those include. They had been completely off their normal classroom routines. Their teachers had probably been pretty lax on classroom expectations. And to top all that off, they most likely were carrying a lot of unexpressed and unprocessed emotional turbulence from the big transition from grade to grade - the excitement of getting older and moving on to new things, the fear of the unknown of the next grade, and the grief that the meeting of people (teacher and classmates) that they had participated in 180 times over the last several months would never meet again in that same way.

So, with all that as perspective, it wasn't surprising to me that some behaviors came out. We had unkind words, inability to function, everyone talking at once, a general sort of chaos that exploded when they walked into "mom's" classroom. I was also keenly aware of my dis-regulated state, for many of the same reasons. All of a sudden, with very little provocation, one of my boys reached out and kicked his sister. She immediately started screaming and he ran away crying out for punishment. My initial reaction could have been a lot of things. I was overwhelmed myself. I was angry because someone had kicked my baby girl. My protective instincts, aka "Mama bear" rose up. Because my son had run to the other side of the room, no immediate danger of further harm existed. That would have required a different response from me if he had stayed in proximity to his sister. Because he had had made the choice to remove himself from her after the initial harm, I could take the slightest pause, and then do what I have worked so hard to do, make my response one focused on care rather than punishment - for both of them. I went to my daughter and comforted her while checking to make sure no significant damage had happened. While I cared for her physically, I spoke to my son:

"Right now the person who needs our focus is the person who has been harmed. We can talk later about what was going on for you and how to help you learn a different way to respond. Right now, we need to care for your sister because she is hurt."

Now, with sadness because he knew he had hurt someone, but with the overwhelm and anger and shame gone, he came to his sister and began to assist me in comforting and caring for her.

My kids' dad and I are divorced, so they spent the weekend with their dad. Today will be taken up supporting them in transitioning back to our house and the way we do life here, which looks significantly different than the way they do things with dad. But tomorrow, or the next day, I look forward to coming back to this with them. Here are the takeaways I hope we can work through:

1. When we are overwhelmed, we need to regulate. It is how our bodies work.

2. We can regulate our own bodies by hurting others, but is that really what we want to do? (I believe all my children would say no, with varying levels of conviction and self-awareness).

3. What are some other things we can do when we notice that we are overwhelmed? (Walk away and care for ourselves - use the bathroom, drink some water, breathe, move, have a snack, do some crunches, run, jump, draw, journal.)

4. We all hurt others sometimes.

5. When we do hurt others, the person that we hurt now becomes the priority. We offer care. If they "reject" our care, that is understandable, they were just hurt by us and don't feel safe with us. If they want us to go away, we do so. If they will receive our care, we give it.

6. After the initial hurt (physical, mental, emotional) is cared for, we seek to repair with that person, taking responsibility for our actions and the impact they had on the other.

7. Then we get compassionately curious about ourself. Why were we feeling so overwhelmed? What was going on for us that made us "explode" like that? How could we notice that we are heading to that place earlier next time? How could we better maintain care for ourselves so that we aren't as often overwhelmed? What can we do the next time we are that overwhelmed?

My children are 9, almost 7, and 5. They may not have the capacity for all of that at once, but these are the concepts I am teaching them as they are able to receive them.

*Photo from a recent decades school event. 🥰

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My Resume:
- Degree in Elementary Education
- 25+ years of teaching and caring for students
- Classroom teaching in 8th-10th algebra, 5th grade, 2nd grade, and PreK
- Tutoring in math at multiple grade levels through college algebra
- Homeschool teacher for 4 years
- Two different positions in customized curriculum development
- Mother

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