BEing with Uncomfortable Feelings

On our way out the door for the last day of preschool, my four-year old started crying and saying that he did not want there to be a last day. He apparently loved school so much he thought he could keep it from ending if he refused to go. I had no idea what to do. Should I just keep him home? They were having a little luau toward the end of class and his Dad was taking off work to come. It was supposed to be a fun family potluck with games and I felt it would be a shame to miss it.

Not knowing what to do, I carried him crying to wait for school to start next to the other parents like we always did. He sat on my lap facing me with his face buried in my chest and tears streaming down his cheeks. Others tried to tell him how fun the day would be but he was not having it.

My first reaction was frustration. This all happened so unexpectedly I was not prepared for it. I had two hours before the luau to walk the dog, shower, run out for teachers’ gifts and thank you cards, and grab a side dish for the potluck (last minute I know!). I knew with my preschooler home it would be hard, maybe impossible, to do all those things in that amount of time. I really wanted him to go to school! More so, I really wanted him to want to go to school and enjoy this last day.

But I could see that I did not have a choice here. He was either going to have a huge crying fit, or was going home with me. Either way, the day was not going to go as planned.

So I sat and wondered what to do. I have been reading Eckhart Tolle’s A New Earth and watching the discussion between he and Oprah on Super Soul Sunday (if you can find the discussions they are very helpful to understand the book!). They both talk about feeling your emotions, asking yourself why you are feeling them AND being the space for other people to feel their emotions.

I gave it a shot. I wondered, “Why am I getting so upset that he doesn’t want to go to school?” Sure I had things to do, but really he could probably do them with me or I could shift things around and we could go to the luau at 10:30 together. When I really thought about it, it was the emotional outbursts that bothered me. It seemed to trigger anger more than empathy. I really do not remember discussing emotions much as a child. My parents were pretty tough and we were expected to be too. My Dad is still that way. He’ll walk around with burn marks or blood dripping down his leg from an injury or dirt bike riding and say that it is nothing–and this is in his seventies!

While both parents have been impressive examples of strength, it has not left me with a guide book for these children of mine who have meltdowns. Telling them to toughen up or stop crying has not only been ineffective, it has made me look and feel like such a cold and mean mom when I have told them to stop crying and just do what they are supposed to. I really am thinking “suck it up!,” but that has not been helping. The harder I push, the more they react.

So I accepted that I cannot draw from my childhood, cannot force him into the classroom, and did not know if we should leave.  I cleared my mind of all the thoughts, held him and waited (thank goodness we were early!). I sat with my frustration and my feelings of being in a situation I did not want to be in. Not only that, but I tried to be the space for him also to have his feelings. After all it was okay for him to be upset and express that. Wasn’t it?

His teacher came out to bring in the kids in and I told her that he loved school so much that he did not want there to be a last day. Since he did not want a last day, he did not want to go to class. After saying she was going to cry too because that was so sweet, she asked him if he would like to come in. He buried his head in my chest further. Then she told me that I could come in with him for a few minutes if that would help. Aha! A solution to try. I asked him if he would like me to come with him and he said yes. It was not lost on me that my reaction was for him to toughen up, but the teacher’s reaction was very soft and she teared up too!

So I went into the class and sat away from him as they sat on the floor and did their morning routine. I could see him slowly start to participate and warm up. After about 10 minutes I told him I was going to leave in five minutes to walk the dog and then come back. He said okay. After five minutes I told him goodbye and he did fine the rest of the day and we got to come as a family for his luau. He had a blast playing the games and eating his snacks and the teacher said he had been fine after I left.

In that place of accepting that I did not have an answer and experiencing the discomfort of not wanting to deal with this problem, the teacher provided a solution that worked for everyone. That day was a valuable lesson for me that I carried through the summer and into my every day life. Any time something stirred up emotion in me, instead of wanting to get out of the situation or head out the door, I waited and asked myself why I was having such a strong reaction. I attempted to just feel the discomfort in hopes that it would get resolved and move through more quickly. I realized that many times when I did not have an answer, by not reacting a solution would pop up. Now this was not an easy thing to do by any means, because I think kids know how to push your buttons, but I did make the conscious choice to stop fighting the things that bothered me the most. As Eckhart Tolle has said, “Whatever you fight, you strengthen, and what you resist, persists.” There are many things I do not want to strengthen?

By letting down my guard, not fighting the feelings that are uncomfortable, I was able to successfully move through many situations that had seemed to be reoccurring.