There are moments in parenthood, particularly when you watch your child struggle, where it feels like your heart is being skewered and pierced with a sharp metal spike. (I’m not talking about capital “T” trauma moments, but rather the lowercase “t” everyday life moments that you will still talk about in therapy for years.) This was me yesterday, and every day since my son started going to camp. Camp requires taking a bus – and taking the bus is his version of hell.
I can’t say I’m surprised. When I was young, I also loathed taking the bus. I hated it so much that I would have screaming, sobbing fits so horrifically embarrassing that my sister begged my parents to skip it altogether since my behavior made it hard for her to make friends. My parents tried everything to make me like it, even going so far as to draw a picture of me on a bus smiling. This picture was laminated at the local Kinko’s (it was laminated because I ripped up earlier versions), and I was encouraged to hold it as I walked on the bus to manifest happiness. It failed. We had a car, my parents were available as they did drop-off—why couldn’t they drive me instead? Hating the bus is in my son’s DNA.
Buses are scary. You have to relinquish your control and get on a vehicle where it’s always unclear where to sit and if you have to wear a seatbelt. The politics of who you sit with on the bus are deeply stressful. My son is barely four, and he doesn’t understand that prior to pick-up he should be campaigning at the bus stop to get other children to sit with him. It’s torture to watch him as the campers form a neat line and pair off by twos, as if they are animals entering Noah’s ark, while he twirls around looking for bumblebees, asking me to tell the big counselor his name. He’s the lone creature of his kind going on the bus each day, not sure what to do, so he sobs instead. Inside, I sob too. This is the part of the skewering where I feel like my heart has just been put over the coals, and the grill has been turned on. My aorta is engulfed in flames. It’s taking everything in my power not to just drive him to camp myself, as was done for me.
Instead, I’m pushing myself and him so my days start with me waving at my son, who’s crying through the window, as I scream, “Have a great day! Have so much fun!” Sometimes I feel like the louder I scream, the more he I will believe the words I’m saying. In my head, a track plays that saying this is good for him, the money you are paying for camp is worth it, and then a louder track begins that says this is bullshit. The bus pulls away, I pray that maybe in five minutes his tears (and mine) will subside. I guess this is parenting, heart-skewering and all.
oh man, so hard, and so relatable!
😢