My Baby Started School!!

Written by Lisa on Tuesday 28 October 2008

Last year, when the time came to put in application forms for primary and nursery schools I filled one in for our youngest lad Daniel. I knew that his birthday narrowly missed the cut off date of the 1st of July and that technically he was about a month too young to start nursery this year, but I thought "what the heck" and submitted a form on the off-chance.

I was pleasantly surprised to find out that our local nursery was, for the first time, undersubscribed and that they could admit Daniel a year early. However as his start date was the 20th of October it was a long way off.....or so it seemed.

Just two weeks ago I realised that Dan started preschool in two days and that my baby was taking his first steps 'out there'. I admit that I had spent so long convincing myself that this day was a long way off, it crept up on me before I had a chance to really emotionally prepare myself.

Dan started nursery last week and at first it seemed harder for me than for him. He ran in every morning and I hung about like a bad smell pretending to reassure him, but really taking time to get used to the idea myself. Daniel has always been an incredibly outgoing and headstrong wee thing so I was unsurprised when he settled so well into the routine.......or so I thought.

Monday morning of his second week came and I left Daniel in as usual. Gerard came along for the first time and we both laughed at how eager the wee man was to get in and get started. We left the school laughing at how confident he was. Imagine our surprise when fifty minutes later we got a phone call asking us to come back as Daniel was inconsolable and crying for his mummy.

When I arrived Dan was indeed quite upset and just kept telling me that he missed me and wanted me to stay at his school. I took him home and gently probed, sure that something more had happened to set him off. But it appears that he did genuinely just miss me and that he is finding it hard to integrate with the other children.

Most of the rest of the class started 4-6 weeks ago and are well settled in their own groups, with their own friends. With Daniel being the youngest of our brood he has never had to make friends himself. he is always flanked by at least two or more siblings and their pals, looking after and introducing him. he obviously finds it hard to make that step himself.

Daniel's teacher is sure that he will settle in a few weeks time and is making time to introduce him to the rest of his peers, but for now it has really hit home that my baby really is still just that. Not just as headstrong and brash as he sometimes appears, a wee boy who just sometimes needs his mummy and daddy. Kind of nice to feel wanted you know?