In the fall of 2022, my husband and I enrolled our five-year-old son at a local Catholic school. My special-needs son had responded well to intensive therapy over the summer, and we were hopeful his new skills would transfer into a real classroom environment. His therapist supported our decision.
A few weeks before the school year began, I emailed his kindergarten teacher to inform her of my son’s diagnosis. I explained about his past refusal to eat, drink, and use the restroom at school.
“We have spent the summer working to overcome these challenges in therapy,” I wrote. “We believe that my son will adjust to his new environment, but it may take a few weeks.” I asked for patience and extra support for my son when the school year began.
The kindergarten teacher’s response was encouraging. She agreed to help my son adjust to his new learning environment and provide extra support.
I felt hopeful that this year, things would be better. After all, my son had an official diagnosis now. James and I had outside help from therapy and parent training. And our son was getting older, more mature. Surely all of our hard work, and that of our son, would result in a successful transition to kindergarten.
Oh, how very wrong I was.
The Battle of the Senses
To give it a positive spin: kindergarten was a complete disaster.
The school’s 2022 kindergarten class was unusually large and crowded. More than half of the students were non-native English speakers who had emigrated to the United States as war refugees. Many of these students needed special attention and care – more care, perhaps, than the valiant kindergarten teacher and her inexperienced aides could reasonably handle.
My son hadn’t entered the classroom after escaping a war zone, but his interior battle was just as real. His new learning environment bombarded him with sensory distractions and confusing social expectations. As a result, he immediately regressed to his behavior from the year before: not eating, drinking, or using the restroom at school. He played alone at recess, and wouldn’t join in the vocal prayers or classroom songs. Most of the time, he needed the assistance of an aide to stay on track with his schoolwork.
“Why can’t I just stay home with you, Mommy?” he’d ask me, day after day.
I wrapped him up in a big bear hug. “Well, best coffee mug,” I explained to him (he was a coffee mug because he kept me warm and gave me energy), “I am not a good teacher. I want someone who knows what they’re doing to teach you.”
Still, I thought about it. Maybe I could homeschool my son instead.
His therapist rejected the idea. “He needs to be in a classroom environment. Because of his diagnosis, he needs to learn in a structured setting, with his peers, in order to learn social norms.”
Her advice, and her oh-so-calm delivery of it, infuriated me. She seemed indifferent to my son’s struggle. When he was away at school, I couldn’t stop thinking about how he was sitting in that classroom, not eating, drinking, or using the bathroom all day. How could he be expected to learn under such conditions?
Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays were the worst, when he attended school from 8 am to 3 pm. Tuesdays and Thursdays were less daunting. I picked him up at noon to drive him to afternoon intensive therapy, where he felt comfortable enough to take care of his basic needs. He thrived in the positive, encouraging, understanding atmosphere of therapy. He shrank in on himself in the general education classroom.
Try, Try, Try Again
At first, the kindergarten teacher and aides tried to encourage my son to eat and drink at school. One of the aides would sit across from my son, eating a snack and inviting him to eat one, too. I took my son to the grocery store and let him pick out special snacks and drinks, just for school. I packed him the yummiest lunches, with little notes and toys.
None of these efforts made the slightest difference. He wouldn’t eat or drink until I had buckled him in the car seat and we were driving home. The bathroom situation wasn’t much better. After two months, my son would go into the bathroom and sit on the toilet, but he wouldn’t use it. And sometimes he would have accidents.
As this behavior continued, I noted the kindergarten teacher’s growing frustration. My son was not meeting the basic expectations she had set for her classroom, or the school’s expectations for kindergarteners. Although he used the bathroom fine outside the classroom, in the school’s eyes, he was not “potty trained”.
“His teacher wants him to learn five new sight words a week,” I told one of my friends. “but James and I would just be happy if he drank a Capri Sun at lunch. Or used the restroom.”
The IEP
After three months with zero improvement, it became clear that my son couldn’t stay there. With difficulty and even more paperwork, we were able to build an IEP for our son: an Individualized Education Plan.
The IEP offered specialized service and support for our son’s individual needs. He could receive 100 percent of services in a public school, but only 20 percent in a private school. As much as I wanted my son to attend a private Catholic school, my husband and I knew that 20 percent of services would not be enough.
He would have to attend somewhere else. A public school, and at first, in a special education, transitional kindergarten program.
It was everything that I didn’t want for my child. Long before we started our family, I had dreamed of sending all our future children to Catholic school. And now, because of my son’s special needs, he didn’t belong there. The private schools didn’t have a place for someone as unique and complicated and needy as my son.
You Will Survive This
I carried all of this with me into the confessional the next Saturday. After making confession, I told Father Philip*, our parish priest, about my son.
“I don’t want to send him to public school,” I told Father. “I want him to learn about the faith at school, and go to Mass every Friday, and see the Blessed Mother statue when he walks to his classroom each day. And I don’t want him exposed to so many ideas that contradict our Catholic faith, like they teach in public school.”
I didn’t want him indoctrinated with the latest worldly trends. I wanted him to learn the truth about Jesus – at school. I wanted him to be around other Catholic children, teachers, and role models.
“In the elementary grades, those negative influences are not as much of a problem,” Father Philip answered. “Right now, you need to take care of your son’s basic needs. When he is older, perhaps he can return to Catholic school.”
“Of course, Father.” I sniffed and rubbed the tears from my eyes.
“I know things are very difficult right now. But you will survive this time,” Father Philip continued, his voice full of compassion. “You will get through this.”
My eyes widened. I had heard those words before. Father had told them to me in a dream, months ago.
In the dream, my daughter and I were coming up to receive Holy Communion. I was feeling tired, worried, and discouraged. When we reached Father for communion, he surprised me by saying: “You will survive this time, Mary. You will get through this.”
They were the exact same words he had just said to me in real life, in the confessional. Now, they pressed into my heart like blazing hot coals.
Pay attention, God was saying. I am here, with you.
Father Philip gave me my penance and absolution, and then I left to pray. Father didn’t know about my dream, of course. But God had used him as an instrument of His grace.
Because I had heard these words before in the dream, I felt like it was the Lord Himself consoling and guiding me–through His servant, Father Philip.
The Green Blade
When I did find time to write that turbulent fall, I wasn’t eager to dive into weighty, real-life topics. My heart simply could not move from darkness to darkness: the trauma of raising a special needs child, to the painful healing period of my convent days.
Instead, I played hooky from my deep, soul-crushing blog posts, and composed a new fantasy story.
The idea for this new story also came from a dream.
One September morning, I dreamed of a ruler who went to the most extraordinary measures to save one of his soldiers. Not because the soldier was of any great importance in the eyes of his kingdom, but simply because the king loved him. The soldier himself did not think his life had much worth. A few months earlier, the soldier had made the ultimate sacrifice to save the king’s daughter. His physical health was miraculously restored, but his mind and heart were hopelessly traumatized from the experience. The soldier could no longer distinguish between what was real and what was memory.
This is the premise for my fantasy tale, The Green Blade. It held the hope of my September dream, as well as the weariness and discouragement of my present circumstances. I was the soldier, exhausted and suffering, trying to do what was right and failing miserably. I was the frightened little girl that the king and soldier were trying to save. I was the king himself, fighting for the future of the soldier he loved like a son. Like my son.
And I was the Green Blade. Not an actual sword, but an idea. A green blade was someone who went to “where death happens”, to bring about resurrection. Someone who runs toward darkness, poverty, and emptiness, in order to bring life. Riches. Fullness.
New Life
In 2022, both my husband and I were trying to be green blades at our parish. Our little church had lost more than half of its weekly Mass attendance in the pandemic’s aftermath. The Sunday collection was so low, Father Philip questioned if our church could stay open even one more year. We needed new life – new people – to survive.
So every week, as I cleaned the church building from top to bottom, I prayed that the Lord would bring new life into our parish. I also prayed that my husband and I could play a role in that quest.
And then we learned that I was expecting. Baby #3 was due to arrive in April 2023.
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*Name changed
Thank you so much for reading! Please join me next week for more on my writing journey! 😊❤️🙏
And now, a fantasy update:
This Friday, February 2, 2024 is the release date for Avalon Lost: A YA Fantasy Adventure!
You can pre-order the ebook version here:
Pre-Order AVALON LOST to begin your adventure!
The paperback release date for AVALON LOST is now
February 8, 2024. I received a proof in the mail this weekend, and it looks beautiful. Thanks so much to Benita Thompson for the wonderful cover design and formatting!
I plan to have AVALON LOST available through other online retailers by the Friday ebook release date. Please say a prayer that I can work out the technical details to make this happen. This book is a gift to readers like you, so I want it to be accessible to everyone: either digitally, in print, and/or through their local library.
For the latest fantasy updates, please visit my fantasy blog on Substack, Heart & Sword❤️⚔️
