Sick Day

I'm home today. I am not sick, but my daughter is. After a weekend of bad coughing and one day home from daycare, the doctor diagnosed her with an ear infection and bronchitis. Yesterday was an epic battle of wills. You see, my daughter does not like medicine. It's not necessarily the taste, because she doesn't even know what it tastes like. It seems to be more the concept of medicine to which she is resistant. I called home during lunch to hear her screaming for me to give her the medicine instead of mommy. I know how this game goes. As soon as I get home, she doesn't want me to give her the medicine anymore. She's too clever for a three-year-old and I'm getting afraid of the teenage years already. I got home and she still hadn't taken her medicine. I came home with many different bribes (nutty bars, chocolate milk, donuts). Bribes don't really work because she has such a strong will that she is willing to forgo these treats to make her point. Reverse psychology doesn't work either. She is a master at managing cognitive dissonance. She has no problem stating one desire and then denying its very existence with her next breath, as long as it makes her point. The key to dealing with her is somehow working out what we want to end up as her idea. She eventually started saying that she wanted the medicine in bed in a cup. I said we couldn't do that. Then she really started to want it, so I said we could try it. We put the medicine in a sippy cup, took her upstairs, and she drank it.

As she was throwing a fit this morning because we wouldn't let her drink chocolate milk in an open cup next to the computer, she started screaming that she wanted more medicine. She definitely keeps us on her toes.

Today is a well-timed break. My students are driving me crazy. I cannot believe how mean they are. There is absolutely no empathy whatsoever. I would not want to be on an island with them. It would end up like Lord of the Flies or Battle Royale (which is an awesome book by the way). I know it's the end of the year, but the trends I've been seeing, just in the last three years are not promising. Of course there are some great kids, but even the best can resist only so long. Some of the elements in my classes are so toxic that they infect everybody. 20 days left!