Flashback

Isn't it funny how one little thing can cause a flashback?

I was taking the day's things out of my son's backpack, when I pulled out a page of half finished work. I looked at it and wondered if this was a timed assignment, or if he was supposed to finish it at any point during the day. (Here's where the flashback comes in) 4th grade, I had Mrs. Walker. My best friends were Michelle, Amanda, and Elizabeth. My friends were smarter than I was (or so I thought). Mrs Walker put our 4 desks in a square. I think she was trying to get them to rub off on me. Whenever we would have assignments we had a certain amount of time to do them. If we didn't finish we could take them home and finish them there. My friends would put their heads down and finish theirs pretty quickly. I, on the other hand, had a more difficult time finishing my assignments. I would get embarrassed that my friends were all done, so I pretended to be done too. I would slide my unfinished work into to my messy desk, telling myself I'll just do it later. Every now and then Mrs. Walker would call me out and, embarrassed again, I had to tell her that I didn't finish. At the end of the day when we got everything we needed to take home, I opened my desk, and grabbed my homework for the night. Forgetting, of course, the unfinished work from earlier. Probably because it was already lost in the mess. When time came, the next day, to hand in our work, mine was always undone. So I would pretend I did hand it in, and it was Mrs. Walker who must have misplaced it. And again, every now and then she would call me out. She would have me empty my desk, in front of my whole class, and she would pull out sheets and sheets of unfinished work. I spend a great deal of my childhood being embarrassed for my incompetence. I really thought that, deep down, I wasn't smart. A feeling that has followed me into adulthood. For the past two or three years, I have been trying to convince myself that it wasn't my fault. That I'm not stupid. But, when you're branded with a lable at a young age, it's difficult to shed it.

I sat on the living room floor looking at my child's unfinished paper, and saw my entire life laid out in front of him. I will not have that happen. People know more about ADD now than they did back then. Not that I'm diagnosing him by looking at one unfinished assignment. And I don't just jump to conclusions. I don't think my son needs to be on medication, but it is something that I'll watch for and be a better Mother because of my experiences as a child.