We've been dealing with a kid who doesn't want to go to school. I know that seems like a redundant statement. What kid wants to go to school? There is your typical run-of-the-mill "I don't wanna go to school" and then there is the flat out school refusal. We have the latter. To say that it's been a challenge is an understatement. After my residency in internal medicine, I completed a 2 year fellowship in adolescent medicine. Teenagers don't have a set of medical illnesses more so than the rest of the population so it's not like gynecology and it's not like doing a subspecialty in an organ system like cardiology or gastroenterology. Teenagers have teenager problems. The stuff we'd see as practitioners of adolescent medicine, that wasn't an STD or a gynecological issue, was mostly related to the psyche. And the teenage psyche is both complicated and not fully developed. So, you can have a fully grown man-child or woman-child but their behavior is more fitting of a 5 year old and yet they can speak in complete sentences, but so much of what they might say is completely irrational. The 2 biggest chief complaints that we would encounter in the adolescent medicine clinical practice were eating disorders and school refusal. At the time, I found the process of caring for a teenager/family with either of these problems to be ridiculously frustrating and tedious. While calmly laying out an interdisciplinary treatment plan that included a whole host of health care professionals I found myself, in the back of my mind, screaming: "Just f-cking eat!" or "Just f-cking go to school!". I knew it was never that simple otherwise these seemingly rational and normal parents would not be at their wits end and in our clinic.
Fast forward to my own adolescents living in my home. There is a reason God makes children cute when they are little. It's so you fall in love with them because once they hit puberty, they cease being cute (unless they are asleep and then you can still see some remnants, vestiges of their former adorableness). Sure there are lots of great things about having a teenager in your house. Generally, they are very witty. They keep you current in the humor department. You can have conversations with them about "big" topics (politics, religion, current events) and these conversations give you insight into the inner workings of their mind. But, as I think I've mentioned before, their hard-wiring is not yet been completed. There are incomplete circuits and routinely you will get inappropriate power surges. A packet of hormones might explode within them at the same time you are discussing feeding the dog and all of the sudden your kid has a volatile and tear-filled response to putting kibble in the dog's bowl. The dog is the innocent victim. And you are too. Getting hit with friendly fire is a daily occurrence as the parent of a teenager.
In regards to school refusal, I was texting my dad the other day and appraising him of the situation. It had been a particularly frustrating day and I just wanted a "You are an excellent parent. Teenagers are crazy. You go girl." At almost 70 years of age the distance between being both a teenager and the parent of a teenager is farther for him. "Just make him go!" was his suggestion. "Well holy shit dad! Why didn't I think of that?" It was unfair for me to think he'd have any solutions and I'm sure I just agitated him by proposing a problem with such an simple and obvious solution. At the end of the text dialogue he suggested that our kids were somehow more poorly equipped to handle the complexities of life because, as doctors' kids, they are coddled and have no grasp on anything other than first world problems. Maybe accountant's or plumber's or Peruvian villager's kids don't have problems similar to my own kids. Or maybe accountants and plumbers and Peruvian villagers are just better parents. Who knows? I'll talk to him (my dad) in a couple of days and he won't have any lingering resentment about the conversation or even remember it for that matter. He'll remember, but in his mind, it won't have the significance I've given it. "What, your kid won't go to school? Dammit, he has no choice. Doctors' kids!" He doesn't remember the bullshit I put my parents through because that was 35 years ago and, as the non-custodial parent, he wasn't in the trenches like my mom was. That poor lady had poo flung at her on a daily basis (by me, not my brother. He was a saint.).
I don't have a solution for the school refusal. We are working on it along with a team of professionals (which we can afford, for better or worse, because we are doctors) and every day is a new beginning but not in the inspirational meme sort of way. It the "Holy F*ck, what's gonna be behind door number 2 today?" sort of way. Seriously, I can go to work and manage a complicated patient with heart failure, diabetes, chronic renal insufficiency, hypertension and hepatitis C but this stuff reduces me to a weeping pile of rubble. I know one day said child, his father and I are going to look back and laugh and joke but right now it's like a million little daggers being thrust into my side with a generous heap of rubbing alcohol being poured on top for just the right amount of sting. You sit there and think, WTF is wrong with my husband and me that we can't get our kid out the door and into the school building? It's probably worse because we are doctors. That kind of hatred towards academics and goal setting has never been in our framework so not only is it maddening to not get them out of bed, it's absolutely mind-boggling that someone, someone that you made and has your DNA, does't get the same life-affirming fulfillment from completing assignments and having the teacher like you and making good grades. How could a child of mine not like to plan and make mental lists and organize? What is wrong with this person? That's the thing with parenting; it pushes you beyond your natural limits. I'd never, in a million years, choose this challenge. If this were a category on Jeopardy and I was a contestant, this would be the absolute last column I'd choose. For me, this is kind of like sky-diving or bungee jumping or getting a tattoo. I'm intrigued and have respect for people who fall into that category, but I just couldn't do it and not out of judgment or belief that it is right or wrong, but because I don't have to do any of those things to complete my tasks in life. I can detour around those options. But you can't detour around the option of raising your kid even when you feel entirely unequipped to raise that kid to maturity. In my mind, a pack of angry wolves would do a better job than my husband and I are doing right now. And at least they have the option of eating their young.
None of this is to say there is anything wrong with my kid (other than he doesn't want to go to school right now, but that is a temporal problem that will be solved. And in his defense, he's incredibly smart so he probably can miss about one third to one half of the school year and not really miss anything and still make good grades). And honestly, there is nothing wrong with Lee or me. I think most parents have this same dilemma a million times a day for a million different scenarios and at all stages of their children's lives. Some people quietly deal with it in their own way but not me. I need validation (back to the text conversation with my dad). I need validation from complete strangers and from my parents and from Stacey the mailman. I really am that insecure and maybe it makes a little bit of sense that my spawn might have some anxiety. I always have this internal dilemma of whether or not I'm going to post the stuff that I write onto a wider platform (because I am so insecure and crave validation) but usually I show it to a few people and the process of typing it out helps me make it sense of it all. Someday I hope my kids read this. They can read it now but it will make more sense when they are older. It's a decoder for them, in a sense; a key to why mom was the way she was. An archeological relic that helps you understand a society or a people. So Evan, Jake and Annie, I write this for you and know that if nothing else, you 3 are the best things in my life. Even in the most challenging of times and circumstances. I am prouder of producing you 3 than anything else I've ever done in my life. I know I've messed up along the way and will continue to do so but you 3 are all that matters. Take that with you to the grave and apply it to your own families and children. It's what keeps society moving forward. You will always be my greatest legacy. I love you.
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