Feeling Protective!

Today I was reminded of what a long journey we have had as a family over the last few weeks. Ethan has always been a very sociable and happy little boy - right from a few hours old. So when his behaviour started to deteriorate a few weeks ago it was a marked change! He then started to become withdrawn and then one day after attending nursery he remarked that a child had been hitting him! He was very distraught and showed me the marks. I of course returned to the nursery and asked why I had not been informed of this - to which they responded with 'sorry, we weren't aware of it!' This continued the following week but Ethan told the staff this time and they told me on 3 consecutive days that there had been problems with the other boy (F) hitting Ethan. Meanwhile at home, Ethan's behaviour was erratic - on a Thursday (after attending nursery Mon-Wed) his behaviour would begin in a negative way but would improve throughout the day.... I knew that the two things must be linked. He then reeled off lots of children's names saying '.... is not my friend anymore'.

The major heartbreaking crunch came the following week when on our return home from nursery in the car I asked Ethan 'Who did you play with today'? His awful reply was 'I don't play with anyone else Mummy - I just play by myself because if I play with the other children then F hits them'. I was distraught all evening and first thing in the morning I went to the nursery.... they were fantastic and investigated it straight away. The upshot was that basically F had been bullying all the other children and threatening them that if they played with Ethan then he would indeed hit them! The reason for this intense hatred of my little boy? Well, apparantly Ethan had refused to misbehave with F and so he 'hated' him! I think my disbelief at hearing these words was written all over my face! F's parents were called in and I thought that would improve things but sadly no, he remained against Ethan and he continued to come home upset.

Two weeks before Christmas I could take no more and investigated other childcare options - these are very limited in the small Cornish town where we live. I luckily found a FANTASTIC pre-school attached to the school that we wish him to attend in a couple of years so I applied for him to attend... they only had some part time hours so after sweet talking my Mum into having him on two mornings a week, he now is attending there part time and his old nursery on a day when F is not there (I only work 3 days most weeks). He attended there yesterday for the first time and loved it.... his response to Grandad when collected was 'Grandad, they all played with me!!'.

I had my old Ethan back again over Christmas and he was as lovely as he had always been with just the normal boundary pushing that you get from any child... until today! Ethan arrived at his swimming lesson to find that F was in the same group! Ethan got extreamely upset and F made a beeline straight for him! I walked straight out to the pool reception and requested a different group... I understand that some people may think that I reacted quite quickly to this situation but I have never seen such a small child be so vindictive and nasty to another child and result in such mental turmoil! I am a teacher and like to think that I am level headed and understand children and this has shaken me to my emotional roots over the last few weeks... I have learnt that actually whilst I knew that I would protect every hair on my child's head, I didn't realise how him being upset would have such a large impact upon my own emotions... I just pray that all is not lost with F and that there may be some way for him to learn to interact correctly with other children and not be a bully.

This all said and done the day did finish in the most lovely way though.... Ethan gave me a massive cuddle and said 'I love you Mummy - you are beautiful'.