fieldtrip sage

[crazymama30]

So difficult child has an overnight fieldtrip at the end of the month, as far as he can maintain his behavior. The school has really stepped up to the plate to help him get his missing assignments done, if he has one then he goes to a study hall instead of recess. This has been working quite well, and makes home life much better and his teacher likes it as then I am not e-mailing her all the time.

I went to an info night tonight. The schedule is so full. It goes like so leave school at 9:30am
stop at timberline lodge for tour and lunch 12:30 - 2:30pm
arrive zoo 4:30
dinner 5pm
after hours zoo activities 6pm to 10:30pm (difficult child is asleep by 8:30 -9pm every night!!!)
Lights out at 11pm

Up at 7am
breakfast then zoo activities to 12:00pm
leave zoo
home 4:30pm

OMG, he has to maintain from 9:30am to 11pm???!!! this is really freaking me out. Right now I am reactive, and I will not be tommorrow. I almost wish I was not going, as then I would not be there to see what happens if he cannot maintain. I figure I will either put his patch on really late, or see if I can get just 1 short term pill, like focalin, to give him when he takes his patch off. I would want to trial that here at home first before doing it around a whole bunch of others. It will be very hard for him to maintain with all that ruckus around him, but then with all his friends around that could help him behave better due to peer pressure(this has never happened in the past at school, maybe a field trip will be different).

Sorry, I am just having a major anxiety issue about this right now.

On the positive side, the kids at his school have been talking about middle school open houses, and difficult child said he did not have open house this week, his school x was not going to be doing open house as they already had theirs. Many of the other kids were telling him how lucky he was to go to x, they were jelous. Major good thing for him, a status thing. I am hoping that this will show him how cool school x.

 

[Wiped Out]

Are the after hour activities relaxed like games and things? Would that help? I think I would probably run it by difficult child's psychiatrist.

Cool about the school!

 

[Andy]

4.5 hrs of zoo activities after supper is also pushing it after a long day of travel. Who ever put together this schedule must be used to working with middle to older aged teens who are used to staying up later. they definetly don't have pre-teens in their homes or lives. I can't imagine your difficult child is the only kid in his class to be asleep by 9:00 every night.

11:00 is a real late curfew - especially with up at 7:00. That is only 8 hours of sleep. difficult child's doctor said kids that age need a minimum of 9 to 9.5 hrs sleep and preferraby 10 hrs of sleep per night. Whoever is making the schedule is not looking at sleep requirements for kids this age.

A 7:00 - 4:30 day is also very long to follow the previous day. I would hate to be on that bus ride home!

Can you let him sleep in that first night and get him to school 10 - 15 minutes before the bus leaves?

 

[crazymama30]

I think the after hours activities are feeding the animals and things like that. difficult child says they get to go in the monkey cage. difficult child won't sleep in, even if we try to let him. I am glad that I am not the only one who thinks this is a lot. I think I will think about things for a day or two, and then e-mail psychiatrist and get his opinion. Right now I am in panic mode, and that is not a good time for me to communicate with psychiatrist.

 

[gcvmom]

I would vote for giving him some Focalin when he takes his patch off. That should get him through the evening hours well enough to hold himself together. I think it's awesome you are going -- I know I would want to so that I could help ensure my difficult child handles things o.k. It would just be too risky for me to send my difficult child (thinking difficult child 2) on something like this alone.

Take a deep breath... don't panic. You will get through it fine and so will he. One hour at a time!