Locker Angst

It’s Back To School Day and our youngest has always had a “nervous tummy.” Once on the way to the Alaska State Fair, and he was still young enough to ride in his car seat, he leaned out the window at the filling station and threw up because he was so excited to go on the rides. We are always careful not to create any additional anxiety before road trips, vacations or big social events. If he knows what the plans or schedule will be and what to expect all is well. Today is the first day of school for the Anchorage School District and the first day of Junior High can be a bit difficult to predict –especially since he’s gone to the same elementary school his entire life and due to the zoning splits, not all of his grade school buddies are going to the same Junior high as Gus. Yes, we went to the open house, registration and even did a run through of where his classes would be. What was probably creating the most anxiety for him was his locker. He has his combination and location down but his locker sticks and probably only opened 1 out of 8 times he tried it during registration. Though this was a step up from the first locker they issued him because all of the numbers had been scratched off that one and even after my Sharpie marker doctoring we gave up and requested another locker. After feeling like he was going to throw up no less than four times at home this morning, all is well and Gus is safely and happily at his first day of Junior High School. He even was able to open his locker on the third try and my Happy Mommy Dance could begin!