Monday, August 2, 2010

Countdown to Kindergarten

Three weeks. Twenty-one days. It sounds like a long time, but then suddenly, it doesn't.

We have three weeks before Bryan starts kindergarten. This is supposed to be an exciting time- getting ready to start at a new school with a new teacher, new classroom, new friends, new everything. Which unfortunately for me, is kind of the scary part. I will admit that I am by nature an introvert, and I think that Bryan has inherited that characteristic from me. So any sort of new situation tends to be a bit overwhelming anyway from that perspective. My main concern, however, is how to handle and negotiate Bryan's food allergies in this new situation.

We met with the Assistant Principal of the school back in April, mainly to give the school advance notice of the issue and to try to gauge how our concerns would be addressed, and overall, we felt pretty good about the meeting. The school has had students with food allergies before, but none with quite the severity of Bryan's. However, we discussed Bryan's allergies and related issues at length, and the Assistant Principal seemed willing to work with us to feel comfortable about enrolling Bryan at the school. He actually followed up with me recently, and was hoping to be able to arrange a meeting for us with Bryan's teacher before school starts. That definitely made me feel better- that he not only was keeping us in mind, but actively trying to work with us to make the transition a successful one.

Do I feel better? Yes. Do I feel prepared? Not even a little bit. To be honest, I don't know that I will ever feel completely prepared when it comes to putting Bryan in a new situation. But I guess I have three weeks to try to get there.

1 comment:

Sunshine Eyes said...

I'm so glad that your school is taking your concerns seriously. I've been thinking of you as we've prepped for preschool the past few weeks. I hope that everything goes smoothly with his transition and that he's as well adjusted at his new school as he has been at preschool this past year. :) love from Chicago.