Fear, bladder infections, and holiday decorations

It was early December, and Joey seemed to have developed a bladder infection. Whenever we had a group lesson in the circle time area, he urgently needed to use the restroom. He looked truly miserable as he walked, hunched over and with furrowed brow, to the bathroom. We took his temperature and he wasn’t running a fever, but I called his mother and described what we had been seeing, and she made an appointment for Joey to see his pediatrician that afternoon.

The next day, Joey was back at school. His urinalysis had been negative, and the doctor had seen no indication of illness.

It was puzzling, because Joey continued to find reasons to escape circle time, and he no longer wanted to join with his peers in activities he had always loved, like singing and reading books and doing science experiments.

Finally, I asked him, “Joey, what is going on here? Why don’t you like to be at circle time any more?”

On the verge of tears, Joey begged, “Can you get rid of that THING??? It’s scary and I hate it!”

“What thing, Joey?”

He pointed to the wall where I had posted several sample art projects, so the students would have a visual model of how to assemble the materials. One of them was the classic hand and footprint reindeer, complete with googly eyes and a red pompom nose.

My size 8 1/2 narrow reindeer head had been terrorizing poor Joey for days. When I took it down and threw it in the wastebasket, Joey breathed a sigh of relief, and the holidays were wonderful again.