Evil mother

[charlie]

What an evil mother I am, I must unburden my soul. Megs Headmistress has been jumping up and down recently because she has such a poor attendance record and rather alot, hmm, about 80% late attendance record so I have made a humungous effort to get the poor child in to school on time every day. I must say the melatonin has made a huge improvement in her sleeping but she still often feels sick in the morning and I just never know if it is real or not as sometimes as soon as I decide to keep her home she makes a miraculous recovery!!

Anyway, the pressure is on so on Thursday she suddenly decided she was feeling sick half way to school having been fine before. No, no i really do feel sick she kept protesting. I managed to park near the school and stood arguing with her, she did look a good colour. The school bell went and she still wouldn't get out of the car. Then everyone filed in, she still wouldn't get out so I got tough and threatened that if she didn't get out of the car I would go and get the headmistress to come and get her. And still she didn't get out. Well, once threatened you do have to carry it out so I went and got the head, who was still in the playground to come to the car. It took her five minutes but eventually a tearful Meg emerged from the car. Phew i thought and went to work, fortunately near to the school that day.

Whoops, I got it wrong, the school rang at 11 am, Megs had been sick!!!!! How embarassing!!!!! God I felt awful!!!! I really couldn't think what it might be but she did have a cheese souffle the evening before and I have always wondered about eggs so maybe it was that. Poor kid has been quite rough since so we are back on the chicken and rice.

The only plus is the head rang in the evening to see if she was oK and congratulated me on carrying it through, I'm sure they think i'm just a useless mother and my child is walking all over me. Well, she puked all over them so there he he.

[ukbill]

Charlie.. useless mother??? Oh NO not by what I've read, far from it!

Our children will always try to take advantage of whatever they can to get what they want.. in that they are not unlike most adults!

My eldest child now this will sound terrible I know, when at school (aged 5 to 8) if asked to do something he did not want to do used to go quiet and sullen.. when they asked him why he had not done the work he would say he was "Thinking of Jamie"

Jamie was his younger brother who died aged 6 months, cot death, when Rob was 4 years old.

So what could we do??? We new he was swinging the lead and I'm sure now deeply regrets not having tried harder at school as he is now doing Adult education to get the qualifications he needs.

What I'm trying to say is sometimes there is no "good" mother (or Father) without causing problems for our children later.. they are very good at the guilt trick..

We all have to practice "Hard Love" occasionally.. I admit here that I am the worst at it and my children still run me ragged and are the cause of most of my hair loss.. the worst of it is they are now 28, 22 and 20 years old!

I'm sure Megs will use the Guilt trip that on you next time she "feels sick" real or not

Its a case of Grin and Bear it!

Lets hope she dose not learn to be sick on demand..

[kim55]

It's so hard to know whether they are "crying wolf." My daughter also had a history of missing too much school, and the school would send notes home telling us she had exceeded the allowable number of absences. So if she didn't have a fever I would tell her to go to school anyway, and then we would get a call a few hours later to come and get her. Then if I couldn't get away from work to get her right away, she would call me crying to ask where I was. Needless to say I would feel really guilty. I never found a solution either.

You do tend to believe them when they vomit. My nephew, who would eat only 3 specific items, often stayed with us for a week in the summer. We decided one year while on the drive to our house that we would teach him to eat more types of food. We took him to a fast food restaurant and bought him chicken strips and he loved them! We congratulated ourselves on not spoiling him like his mother did, and we persuaded him to try something else at the next restaurant we went to. (It was a long drive.) I don't remember what he ate at the next restaurant, but I do remember him vomiting all over our car. We gave up. That was 15 years ago, and to the best of my knowledge he still only eats 4 different foods, one of them being chicken strips.

[colormist]

Just a quick tip on eggs, I can only tolerate about one in a meal--usually only one or two a week. I think I'm a bit more sensitive than some when it comes to eggs.

As for the vomiting, I'm trying to think of a way to come to a middle ground with your school. Maybe have her sit in the nurse station when she feels sick. Let her have safe saltines to nibble on. From what I remember (I don't vomit all too often anymore, too used to feeling queasy I guess) after I would purge the sugar, I tended to feel better almost immediately. She might need some milk/crackers to settle her stomach afterward, but she should be able to go back to school.

I'm also not sure how old she is or if the school would be okay with her bogging down the nurse's station, but if they are truly concerned with her education and are willing to play surrogate mom for a couple hours, this could be a middle ground.

[meaniejean]

Oh, gosh, Charlie, you are anything but evil!!! Don't know if this could be a culprit for Megs, but for Sawyer, Cal and I, the fat really does us in. Sawyer vomits whenever he eats cream cheese, too much butter, too much cheddar cheese, too much egg, fatty beef, or fish, etc. Full fat milk is a no-no for us as well.

Cal has been "sick" in the mornings lately. I am never sure if it's for real. Ugh! Hang in there!