Field Trip!!!

Field trips. Kids love 'em, teacher's have a love/hate relationship, parents volunteer either out of a sense of obligation or because they are complete masochists who feel they need to be punished.Then you have the parents who seriously enjoy going on the trips- if nothing more than to have some adults to talk to!  I can be placed in any one of those categories depending on the situation.

 I have gone on the majority of Noah's field trips. Mostly because I am paranoid and so worried about his behavior, sensory overload, etc. etc. Most of his field trips have been with the autistic class so of course these are all things the teachers are prepared for- but I definitely fall into the "I enjoy field trips" category on this one. Noah has done remarkably well on every trip I have gone on so I have been lucky.

Usually when chaperoning a field trip you get a group of kids you are responsible for. I have done that 100 times with the other 2 kids- but with Noah I have always just been responsible for him.  Today's trip I was assigned a group of kids *shudder*. I was a little worried - o.k. A LOT worried about how things were gonna go down. I was relieved to find out I would be with another mom and 4 boys- so if Noah had a meltdown, or something else happened she would be there to take up the slack.

While waiting to get on the bus I was visiting with other parents, and other kids kept coming up to me and telling me how awesome Noah was, how funny he was, how nice he was - and the icing on the cake? Parents were saying the same things! One young man told me he would miss Noah so much when he wasn't at school anymore ( he will be transitioning back to school closer to home next fall). This boys mom also told me that he was worried that nobody would stick up for Noah if he got bullied- because "I take care of Noah". I almost cried happy tears. 

My heart was so happy today! Hearing all of these wonderful, positive, amazing things about my kid-  well it was awesome. Any parent loves to hear great things about their kid- and I puff up with pride when anyone tells me great things about ANY of my kiddos. But with Noah- it's different- because HE is different. These kids he goes to school with are fantastic. These parents are wonderful. The whole environment is so accepting, diverse and helpful.

I have always known that he would be coming back to our home school. That was always the goal. But after such a fantastariffic day- my heart is heavy. Of course there are things I can put in the Pro column coming back here. But there are cons as well. I am even more worried than ever- after seeing the kids interact with him, hear their stories about him, and the fact that they truly care for his well being- I can't even describe it. These are 8 and 9 year old boys and girls- and they have more compassion and empathy than many adults I know. 

So I am just going to live in the moment for now. We had a fun day together, the sun was shining, we learned some neat stuff and got to pet a llama. A beautiful day indeed.