Kindergarten Anxiety

Kindergarten anxiety is relatively normal (or so the experts say) because of the transition from preschool to the bigger grade school. Starting kindergarten is a major developmental milestone and for many parents and children, a rites of passage.

Unfortunately, many children, including AJ, will feel anxious over this huge transition. I don’t think it is related at all to his adoption but to his issues with transitions instead.

AJ did a great job the first week of school because he was very excited about his new school, riding the bus, and meeting his new teacher and friends. However, once he learned what the new expectations were for him (and he learned this fairly quickly) he shut down.

We have learned a lot about our son in the past two weeks and I have to say that it has been a fabulous learning experience for us. Not only have we learned that transitions like this one cause him so much anxiety that it actually causes him medical problems (thus the Prevacid) but we have also learned that when people expect him to behave a certain way he knows this and will act the opposite to try to get out of the situation.

I have seen him act this way before, pushing me away and trying to act bad so that I would leave him alone or push him away in return but I have never seen him do it to other people (this was, of course, adoption related). Because he is verbal now he was actually able to tell me that he was mad at his teacher because she tries to make him do things he doesn’t want to do. So, he was trying to act bad so that he could go back to his old, “little people” class where they had fun all day.

The logic of a five year old really gets ya, huh?

His teacher has been a great help. She has been extremely patient with him and has listened to my suggestions. Trying not to be overbearing is hard though…I don’t want to tell her how to do her job, I just want to help make his adjustment easier.