Breaks your heart, right? About a year ago, as I was kissing Bodie good night and checking his BG one last time, he said to me...."Mom, I hope I'm not diabetic when I grow up." How in Gods name do you explain "forever" to a 6 year old? To him, "forever" is how long it takes at the grocery store. "Forever" is how long it's been since we went on vacation or even how long it's been since he had Oreo's...even though we know it's been a matter of hours or months or days. How long IS forever for a 6 year old? They have no concept. Bodie knows that "dead" is forever....things don't come back alive but do I want to equate dead with forever in terms of how long he will be diabetic for? No, not really.
Bodie is one of the more "difficult" children in his class. Not so much "difficult" as I want to say, non-conformist. He is VERY smart for a now 7 year old. He set up my iTunes account on the computer for me...he burns his own cd's and figured out how to play his guitar through his radio just by going through a bunch of old wires and junk we had in the basement. He DOES NOT want to sit and read Magic Tree House books or write about the rain. He is beyond that and his teachers know this. Unfortunately, his homeroom teacher chooses not to deal with him in the best way. In his classroom there are 3 tables and 2 single desks. One desk is facing the side of a bookcase the other is a little cubicle facing the wall and has 3 foot side walls attached. At the three tables, the children who's names are on the stickers sit there and do their work as a group...then one child sits at the bookcase desk and another at the "cubby" desk. In the beginning of the year, Bodie was at the bookcase desk. I figured, "Oh well, SOMEONE has to sit there." I noticed that the other "difficult" child, a little girl that was in his kindergarten class whom I knew to be on the loud, whiney, over-enthusiastic and demanding side, was seated at the cubby desk. HHMMMM...interesting. When it came time to switch seats after Christmas break guess who got the cubby desk, and guess who got the bookcase desk? Everyone else in the class switched tables and got to interact with different children within the classroom...EXCEPT Bodie and Isabelle. Bodie and Isabelle just switched seats...separated from the rest of the class! Bodie is singled out enough as it is! He is the ONLY child in school who has to go to the nurse after lunch. He is the only kid who has his BG checked before snack time he is the last one out to recess and he HATES IT. He wants to be like everyone else. When I asked his teacher about why he sat by himself at the bookcase desk, she said it was "just random." Random my ■■■!!! The sticker on each of the 3 other tables has several names on ONE sticker...she had to write out Bodie's name singly and place it where SHE wanted him to be...same with the other little girl. Since when is it OK for teachers to decide which children they want to deal with as part of a group and which ones they don't? Bodie just wants to be like everyone else...but he's not...and this teacher is making it worse. I am going to speak to her today because if nothing else, putting him with the rest of the class will at least make him feel a little more NORMAL...it's the least I can do for him at this stage of the game. And this way he will know that some things...even little things like a desk or a classroom may seem like "forever" but they are not.
