Emotional Wreck!

So Gardner left very early this morning to fly to Sweden. He will be back Wednesday late. I guess I should feel lucky he will be back Wednesday instead of Thursday like before. I keep telling Gardner we are a team player when it comes to his work. Anything they need from him, I think he needs to help out, for the most part. And right now, they need him in Sweden. Once again, we don't know how long this assignment will be for. I guess maybe Gardner will have more of an idea when he gets back. Our goal for Gardner is to get a promotion at work. And in order for that to happen, he needs to focus more on the company and not so much on our family like he did in Wisconsin.

This morning, I took Spencer and Shantal to school and went inside with the smaller three kids to talk to the Principal of the school about moving Shantal to the 2nd grade. At first, she was saying that Shantal has made some great friends in her class and if I did not think that Shantal could catch up. And then she proceeded to ask me how long we are planning on living in Germany. I told her perhaps 5 years. Then she mentioned then it might be a good idea because she can not move on out of Elementary school without the basic fundementals, which right now, Shantal does not know. Then she asked perhaps maybe Shantal stay where she is at, move on to the 4th grade and then repeat the 4th grade. But by the end of our meeting, she was in agreement that Shantal needed to go to the 2nd grade and not hold out. She needs to talk with Shantal's teacher though as she had not heard this information before. I mentioned that her teacher wanted her to wait until Parent Teacher Conferences (3 weeks away) before making a final decision. But I told her how important it is for her to move NOW not in 3 weeks. The Principal also asked me which class we would want her moved to since there are 3 of them. I let her know that after long talks with Gardner and a lot of prayer, we decided it would be best to put Shantal in Spencer's class. She agreed this would be a good move for Shantal.

Now to the problem, we can not just move Shantal from one class to another. There are forms, of course. We have to have a petition from Shantal's teacher explaining why she needs to be moved. Then they have to have a meeting with ALL the teachers involved. And Shantal has a good 6 teachers through out the week. I don't see any changes being made for probably a week. The Principal did say she would talk to Shantal's teacher today and get back to me. I just hope we can make this a fast change for Shantal. Shantal knows what is happening and I don't think it is good on her emotionally to just keep waiting.

So Hannah is pulling on my heart strings. I took her to school today and she did not want to stay. I tell her that is not an option and ask her which room she wants to go in. In Germany, Kindergarten is just a play time. They can choose between 5 different rooms to play in. She was not sure where she wanted to go. This is not unusual for Hannah. Well, I told her I had to go and if she could not choose I was going to leave without taking her into a specific place. I counted to 3 and then picked up Emma and Ian and walked out. She SCREAMED at the top of her lungs. I went to my car and just cried. I have not heard from the school, so I assume she stopped. The stress of taking Hannah to school everyday is really taking a toll on me. I wonder if anyone else ever feels like they don't want to be a Mom anymore? Sometimes, I do feel that way. I feel so bad when I start to get feelings like that.

Emotionally, all the kids are basically putting a strain on me. All the fighting that happens between them. All the yelling. I have kids that talk back to me, tell me I am mean. I sometimes wonder if it is ever going to stop. It seriously drives me crazy.