Huge and devastating setback

[Violet Crown]

Update. All things pass, and Wee Girl has I think worked through her grief for Miss K. She was able to express a lot of her sadness--and thank you all for the helpful suggestions!-- and ultimately I think it was the passage of time, and the arrival of Christmas and of her adored biggest sister, that healed. She is back to being dry at night as of this week, has stopped needing a parent with her when she wakes up at night, and is in general not sad and subdued all the time. She also asked last week if she could be in our church choir, and our children's choir director (who knew Miss K. and Wee Girl both) has encouraged her to start in January.

 

Her therapist noted that she hasn't progressed in her speech since the death (though she has recovered from the regress), but I expect she will now resume making some progress.

[texasmama]

Bless Wee Girl. I am so glad to hear she has come to a less sad place. You are a great mom.

[OneStepAtATime]

Update. All things pass, and Wee Girl has I think worked through her grief for Miss K. She was able to express a lot of her sadness--and thank you all for the helpful suggestions!-- and ultimately I think it was the passage of time, and the arrival of Christmas and of her adored biggest sister, that healed. She is back to being dry at night as of this week, has stopped needing a parent with her when she wakes up at night, and is in general not sad and subdued all the time. She also asked last week if she could be in our church choir, and our children's choir director (who knew Miss K. and Wee Girl both) has encouraged her to start in January.

 

Her therapist noted that she hasn't progressed in her speech since the death (though she has recovered from the regress), but I expect she will now resume making some progress.

Thanks for the update VC.  And best wishes to you and your family.

[TranquilMind]

Yesterday was horrible. In fact, in general this has been a horrible year, and I will be glad to see the back of it.

 

I've mentioned that Wee Girl has issues, known to the insurance company billing office as severe anxiety (her therapist remarked after the first interview that this is the most anxious child she has ever seen) and selective mutism. One of the handful of non-family adults in her tiny world to whom she is able to speak at all, is her choir teacher, who has worked closely with her to help her overcome herself through singing. And her choir teacher was murdered on Saturday.

 

So now we're down to two non-family adults that she will speak with. And she is devastated, and her speech has deteriorated, and she cried herself to sleep last night, and wet the bed. Of course she doesn't know the circumstances of her teacher's death, but there was no finessing the fact of it: their winter choir concert that wraps up the semester is/was this week, and it's all the local homeschool moms are talking about.

 

There are some people in the world who are just givers, and who go about systematically making the lives of other people better. And that someone else could take all that away in a fit of rage just makes me so overwhemingly angry and sad that it's hard to know what to do with it. I am trying to keep that all in because signs of sadness and grief from me make Wee Girl very upset and anxious, and she has begged me not to be sad. Which is really hard but I am trying.

 

We are dealing with the death through letting her talk about it (she got out some words about it last night) and through our faith's traditional prayers for the dead, and the ritualism of that seems to help; at least it gives her something she knows how to do. I will happily take any advice from the experienced about helping a very anxious child through this kind of thing.

I'm very sorry.