You know what I am talking about.  It’s not just the voice inside your head, it’s that sinking feeling in the pit of your stomach.  Your gut, your intuition, something almost palpable.  Whether we like it or not, we tend to feel more “balanced” when we go with our gut.  Unfortunately, we don’t always like what it is telling us, which leads us to put our blinders on to the blaring red flags, leaving us feeling inharmonious.  Today, I went with my gut.  Today, I pulled Harper out of school after just one day.  

I said I would give it until the end of September.  I said I would give it a fighting chance.  But when my little girl was hiding from me before school this morning after creeping into my room three separate times last night, I could sense her fear.  Silent tears streamed down her cheeks when I asked her to come talk to me- she knew I was going to try and talk her into wanting to go to school.  I looked into her little face and I understood.  For a moment, I was her.  The youngest in a class of 10 students, a two-year-old in a threes classroom.  Intimidated.  Nervous. Not yet ready.

I asked her if she wanted to go to school, to which she responded “No, I want to go to Stroller Strides with Mommy.”  She didn’t just tell me what she didn’t want, she told me what she wanted, which is more than a lot of us are capable of doing most days.

I could have forced her to try again today, next week, even this entire month, but to what end?   Because of her October birthday, she will not be able to go to Kindergarten for another three years so this year is already an additional year of preschool that she will have over Aurora.  I am home with Emma, so having Harper, too, is not a game changer.  In other words, the decision to keep her in school impacts her a lot more than me.

She will miss the opportunity to socialize in a structured setting, to learn to write her name and letters.  She will miss making new friends, singing in the winter and spring shows, and she will miss doing ballet with her sister.  But if she goes to school, what she will miss more than anything else in the world is me.  That’s all she wants right now.  As much of me as she can have.  To her, that matters more than any letter, new friend or show.

She has only one momma; I have only one Harper.  And this year, we’re going to have each other.