The irony - bullying in anti-bullying week

Last night Bug was a real nightmare,refusing to do her Kumon even after I switched off the TV. She sat in the dark and refused to come out and get on with the 10 minutes work she needed to do. She cried, she wailed, she said she was clever enough, and she didn't need do it.

Finally I lost my temper, really lost it and turned into the shouty Mummy I hate to be. When I finished my rant, she, cowed, got on with the work. As she was doing it I  thought about something she'd said - that when I go to the parent teacher meeting today her teachers will tell me how sad she is at school,and it was all my fault for making her do this extra work.

I couldn't figure out the connection, so when she'd finished and we'd both calmed down I asked her what was going on, how come she is 'sad' at school. Finally she told me - the boys are teasing her, again, and sometimes the girls are joining in.

They are calling her 'Brainbox' they are telling her she is ugly, they are shunning her in the lunch queue and she has decided she doesn't want to speak up in class any more. Some of her stuff has disappeared and she has startted to complain of not being well in the mornings, and was sent home last week because she said she was sick.

Now it's all starting to make sense....

This is probably the fourth time this has happened. Yes, she is different, she is reasonably bright, she speaks with an accent tinged with Irish, and infant years spent in a different part of the country, she is full-on and vocal and draws too much attention to herself. She is not ugly - she is actually, and I know I may be biased, quite beautiful.

When I told her teachers before they smiled enigmatically and said, 'Well, she's not the easiest...' yes, I effing know she's not the easiest - I've had her for 10 years, and you've only had her for 5. She is 110%, she is enthusiastic, she is vocal, she is stubborn and she is opinionated, she can be exhausting. And the fact that she has been even moreso at home over the last few weeks should have been a clue. And I realise with a horrible hollow feeling that by getting angry with her, I have been making things worse...

And I contrast this with Bubble - she too is bright and pretty and, being our child, probably just as 'different' but the key is she has figured out that she needs to 'disappear'. She wears glasses, she has a full on local accent, she is quiet and sweet and doesn't seek attention, either at school or at home and so her life is far far easier than her sister's. She may get picked on as a Geek, but that is in the future, she is happy right now.

And while sometimes I wish Bug was more low-key,  I also get angry that she can't be the person she is - I can't change her, and the bullies shouldn't try.

When I went to find out more about bullying at http://www.bullying.co.uk/ I found that it is actually National Anti-bullying week, and it makes me sad to realise the school is probably running a campaign, and either the bullies are unaware that what they are doing is bullying or they know it is wrong and are doing it anyway.

And I read this lovely blog too http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/parents/2010/11/anti-bullying-week-1.shtml and will show it to Bug and to take a copy to the school. Visit the links and learn the signs that indicate your own child or another child may be getting the same treatment.

Bug and every other child has a right to be different, as long as they are kind and considerate - they need help to understand that differences are good and not bad, that one day they will all have a chance to shine.

Back to work

No, I did not lose my job, and monumental though my hissy fit seemed to me, I am not that sure anyone else particularly noticed. Last Tuesday I crept back into the office feeling extremely sheepish, and was so touched by the warmth of the greeting I received that I felt silly for getting so out of control in the first place.

I only realise now that I almost reached a point of no return, to what felt like the edge of madness, and a combination of physical pain, stressful work and the looming exam results had taken me there.

I thought I would never stop crying, and didn't know why.

Now that I am back to 'normal' I can thank the people who brought me back - a lovely GP who listened to my incoherent list of woes and advised that I work at home until I felt better, a surgeon who injected me with a massive dose of cortisone, that allowed me to sleep and move with ease again, and above all kind kind friends who listened and supported and helped me see in perspective.

I am stronger because of them.

Kill Bill or Wi-Fi Wars vol 1

The Girly Nerds did a great post about Passive-aggressive Wifi names And I am reaching the point where I am going to reconfigure my Router and the name I have chosen is...
 
Kill Bill

About 3 weeks ago we started to lose WiFi pretty regularly - around 7 each evening our WiFi goes down and the only WiFi we can see is....

Bill

We don't have any neighbours called Bill, at least no-one that we talk to - There are a couple of NIMBYs that do back on to us and who did take exception to our house being built, but no-one who looks like a Bill.
 
No idea who it is.

So, each time, off I toddle, down to the 'computer room' under the stairs (see it's not just me who's a Geek Engineer - Alpha Geek Macca is worse) and re-boot the router.
 
This does the job until Bill restarts his sodding router too.

Now I know that the reason is probably that we are on the same channel, and I know I should just change it, but Macca has the manuals and he is in denial that this is the cause.

So, if I change the name of our Router - will Bill get the message, and change his channel instead? Or will he turn out to be the leader of a lethal assassination squad and send them around to blow us all away? 

Vol 2 to follow.... 
 

Lessons from a 10-year-old

Well, Bug missed her (and our) first choice school by a measly 6 points out of 334, but passed both the others by hoooge margins. I am soo proud of her - she made up a huge gap in such a short time and yet doesn't hold the hard work against us (see Good Mummy or Pushy Mummy), but has demonstrated so many qualities that will stand her in good stead as she goes out into the world...qualities I never fully realised she had...

Consideration - We had a good weep, Bug and me... Me weeping for her, and her disappointment, until I realised Bug was weeping for me and not for herself....

Kindness - I spotted her hugging one of her friends who hadn't made any of the schools they'd applied for, and when she realised she was one of very few in her class who had made it to any of them, she stopped talking about it at all.

Optimism - Bug wanted that school place from the moment she walked through the door on Open Day, and to not get it was a terrible disappointment - the first genuine, life-changing disappointment of her life, and yet she is talking with such joy about the school she will be attending, I cannot fail to believe she will be a huge success wherever she goes....

Resilience - I suppose this is innate in 10 year-olds, but Bug is already back to herself in a way  I am not sure I could ever achieve so seamlessly after such a blow - and I resolve to try to look at life through the eyes of a ten-year-old, at least some of the time. I so wish I could bottle her energies to brighten all of our days....

Job Abandoned?

Today I lived up to my demented tag when I took a self prescribed 'Mental Health Day'. Problem was, I was already in the office and I didn't exactly slip away... I am not sure how my colleagues or HR are going to take it and I might find myself with a status update on the HR system of 'Abandoned job'. I know I have had a lot going on and it has all been taking it's toll, but wish I could maintain a little more self control and a lot more discretion. Final straw was probably fairly minor but resulted in a fair amount of bad language, a hasty shutting down of my PC and a determined exit from the office. We Irish are sometimes tagged the Latins of North West Europe, and I think there may be a some truth in the apocryphal family tales of us being descended from a survivor of a shipwrecked Armada - while I don't have Irish red hair either, I certainly could be described as 'having a Temper on me'. Anyway, I'm home now and considering my options. Wondering if I will have a job tomorrow, and at the moment, not particularly worried. Twenty years is a long time, especially if a fair amount of time has truthfully not been that enjoyable, so If anyone knows of openings for geek engineer Mums with a temper on them, then let this one know...

Walking and thinking - or not

I haven't been very attentive to my blog and finally made the tie to the fact that I haven't been walking much lately either. For three months over the summer I was on a challege at work - to walk 10,000 steps per day, and being a bit of an alpha type I managed to average over 15,000. I absolutely loved it, and it provided me with some much-needed thinking time, almost satisfied my addiction to exercise, and I lost over a stone too! The key to it for me was the chance to clarify my thoughts - Coming up with words in rhythm to my steps, blogging in my head as I paced - the hardest thing was trying to remember it all and get it down when I got home. The challenge ended in the middle of September and I have to admit I miss it, and the chance to free my mind - Time to get my pedometer out, a new pair of shoes on and get off my aching butt and walk and think and blog.....

Good Mummy or Pushy Mummy?

A few weeks ago I mentioned that I had some stuff going on that I didn't feel like posting about at the time, well finally as things resolve I'm feeling better about it, so here it goes. The Primary (hah!) reason for my worries were the looming eleven plus exams. We are lucky (or maybe not so lucky - read on) to live in an area where a lot of the Grammar schools have stayed in the State system, so it is theoretically possible to get a top class state education for your bright child, if they achieve the grades in the competitive entry exam for the school of your choice.

Things went horribly wrong for us when we realised that despite the tutoring, the reading the Kumon, Bug was not ready for the 11+ Maths test for the most selective school in the area - she was ready for the Entrance exam to the school that her Primary feeds into, but not for the mega-selective (4:1 applicant:place ratio) one that we thought was the best match for her. This was not a question of ability, but of her having been exposed to the types of questions being asked.

I could go into all the reasons why - but suffice it to say that the feelings of guilt were primarily mine. I questioned all aspects of my life - was being a Working Mum the issue - was it because I chose the tutor that lived nearest so the Au Pair could take her, was it because I was too busy to supervise homework, because I hadn't been around to run her to a better tutor further away, was it because of my insane travel schedule which left me largely excluded from the School Gate conversations, where I might have discovered that he wasn't very good, was it because despite all this I still don't earn enough to send her to a private Prep school?

We were 'lucky' enough to find out in time, and find a different tutor - one who could actually prepare her for the exam, and then followed what have been the most testing, guilt ridden few weeks of my life.

Running Bug backwards and forwards to almost daily Tutor sessions, having her do 11+ tests between times, worrying, worrying worrying, gave the last two weeks before the test a nightmare quality that I never want to repeat.

And this was my problem - is this really the right way to approach education? Bug is bright, Bug is confident, she is a strong soul who knows her own mind, she is literate and verbal and could probably give a Literature undergraduate a run for their money in the length and breadth of her reading list. Most of all she is loved, and hopefully she has successful role models in us to aspire to, she has all the traits to be highly successful wherever she goes to school. But she is barely 10 years old and we have been treating her like an exam machine...

Here is the rub - State Grammars were intended to give all academically bright children an equal chance at a top class education, but the have largely become the preserve of the wealthier middle classes, who actually send their children to Private Prep schools which guarantee entry to the more selective State schools - in the end I was flummoxed by the parents at the gates of the school on the day of the test last week - We could have been queuing at the gates of Benenden from the accents and the clothes and the cars.

I never ever wanted to be a Pushy Mummy - but found I became one in the end - was it the right choice? I don't know - I'll tell you in a couple of weeks when the results come out, or in 7 years when the University question comes up, or in reality in 20 years when she is making her own way in the world. But I know this - I desperately want the best for my child, and for her to have every opportunity, even if I can't afford to fast-track her now.

So what are my conclusions? If you are bright but impecunious family, and you want to go this way, you need to start early, you need to practice for the exams, or get them tutored - the schools tell you not to, but this perpetuates the problem - the wealthy are doing it for sure - because they can afford to, and as long as that is happening your equally bright (if not brighter) child has an even higher hurdle to jump.

So I hope I have been Good Mummy in trying to secure Bug's future for her, for giving her role model of a woman relatively successful in a Man's World, for working hard to give her and her sister a good quality of life, but above all I hope that she doesn't remember me as Pushy Mummy who made her last year in Primary school a misery.....