School Sick Days

Every school has rules about when to keep your child home from school. There’s the contagious stuff like Pink Eye of course. You know not to send your son in when he’s running a fever or your daughter in when she can’t keep any food down. What do you do though when your child tells you that they don’t feel well and there really aren’t any drastic symptoms?

Have you heard on a school morning, “Mom, my tummy hurts” or “Mommy, I’ve got a headache”? I have lots of times. Determining the truth can be about as difficult as picking winning lottery numbers. Because kids are smart, smarter than we think. And because we moms sometimes act out of guilt, even though we don’t want to admit it.

I’ve learned about this the hard way. My older daughter is now 21. She is in Graduate school and has done very well in school every year. She has graduated high school and college early. I didn’t have to help her with homework or studying. If she missed school because she pretended to be sick and I fell for it willingly or not, no biggie. She could easily make up the work and the time lost was just chalked up to a mental health day in my book.

Now comes my 9 year old. My guilt trip is that she’s our last child and I’ve been sick with Myasthenia Gravis and then lots of other things since she was 4 years old. You fill in your guilt issues. Almost anything can make us as mothers feel guilty. We work too much. We don’t play enough with our children. We don’t discipline them the right way. The list goes on.

Next your child goes off to school. Most of the time that first day in Kindergarten makes us sad. Some of us cry. Even the first days of the later grades are hard for us. Possibly more guilt.

Here’s the math – Possible Child’s Sickness + Guilt = ?

For me the answer was let her stay home from school. Maybe she really was sick. What an awful mother I would be if I sent her to school and she got worse. Maybe she was tired and didn’t sleep well the night before. In Kindergarten, even First Grade it wasn’t so bad. As it continued though it was becoming a habit and I wasn’t helping to stop it. She was starting to have to make up her work and her grades were hurting. There were family emergencies that came up and then she really was sick. Her time out of school was getting to be too much.

I’ve learned my lesson big time. I’ve accepted that I was giving in to my daughter. And it was out of guilt that I thought I deserved. I now understand that I don’t. I’m a good, caring Mom even though I am sick. Yes she’s my last child, but so what does that have to do with her?

When she tells me she has a headache I tell her if she doesn’t have a fever she’s going to school. If her stomach hurts, she’s going to school unless she’s green. There’s ground rules now. She’s taking more responsibility and feeling more mature. And it’s working so much better for the both of us.