A lot of feelings have come up for Juli in the past week since Seth and I told her about the new school. She's definitely sad about leaving her friends, but I do think deep down she knows it's best for her, even if she doesn't exactly know why. In a way, I think it's helped that she's had to comfort her friends at school who are sad about the news.
When she told me yesterday she didn't want to change schools, I gave her my spin of the "living in the moment" speech. The less than a minute version. I told her that she was still going to her school right now, to enjoy it, and I suggested she give herself permission to worry about the new school, let's say, in August--that she had 10 weeks off from school this summer (I put up 10 fingers, and then I left only 5 up)--I said, when we get to 5, then start thinking about it. Because money is extra tight this summer, there won't be any summer camp, so days spent with her school friends will be part of the routine over the coming weeks. Hopefully, that will help take the sting out of it all. All that said, I will be giving myself the same talk until we have the meeting with the public school about Juli's future. Otherwise, it will be impossible to pay for it all.
The unfortunate thing about all of this--and that's a gross understatement--is that all of this could have been avoided if the teachers in the public schools were trained to teach children with reading issues--whether it be dyslexia or not. Since my mom is a reading specialist and deals with this all the time, I've learned quite a bit over the past few years. She tells me that over 20% of the kids in our schools have some sort of reading difficulty (from what I've observed, I'd say the percentage is even higher in Juli's current class) but that most of them can be taught in their own classroom if the teaching methods were changed to the sort of specialized system she has learned. Even a teacher in Juli's school right now who has taught for over 25 years and knows Juli quite well told me they just simply are not trained to teach kids like Juli. And so she encouraged me to look into other alternatives for Juli...and I did.
Now we just have to see how the summer unfolds!
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