Self-image after surgery
Zack broke my heart last week. He came home one day and said that he thought there was a kid in one of the other 1st-grade classes who had had surgery like him. I asked him why he thought that...could he see a scar? His response? No, he just has a big head like me. I told him his head wasn't big and that one of the reasons why he had all the surgeries was so that his head would be normal. He (very matter-of-factly) said that he always thought his head was bigger than other kids.
None of it seemed to bother him at all. I just hate that he still thinks of himself as "different." (And for the record he just was in the 1st-grade musical this week, and his head is no bigger than the rest of the kids...and I had no clue who he thought the other kid with a big head was.)
In other news, we got a note home that he was having trouble seeing the Smart Board, even when she moved him closer. Ophth follow-up is Tuesday...wondering what we'll find out, but I suspect that patching only an hour a day is not working. Guessing we're heading for more patching or glasses. Uugh.
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These kids go through stuff like this even without cranio it sucks that they decide to say its their head they are focused on but I guess with a whole childhood centered around their heads(check ups...ect.) they learn what gets them attention from us. At lease your little man did something as innocent as picking out a kid just like him. Leigha in the first grade lied to a teacher and told her the miscoloring in the center of her forehead was from us punching her in the head and got us turned into child services and investigated. Made the school look stupid for not realizing she had the miscoloring from the first day of school and has had it since she was a baby. Anyways that was a fun ordeal. Leigha is 9 and still talks about her scar but her worry is that her hair wont grow. I keep hoping it will fill out after puberty. 
Originally Posted by BusyBee
Lesson learned tho - now every year we make sure to tell her teacher about Leigha's cranio, her scar and that those two veins in the center of her forehead look darker in some lights but they are not a bruise. We don't go to that stupid ass school anymore either and I suspect her dumb ass teacher asked her if that was a bruise - Leigha was in the first grade at the time so I imagine her answer was 'I guess', then the teacher probably asked 'did mommy or daddy or your brother punch you there' and again I'm sure she answered 'Yea she punched me.' or 'I don't know I guess.' Leigha used to have a real problem of answering I don't know to everything so I think she was prodded into the answer. What was worst was cops meeting me at Day Care and refusing to let me see kids until they talked to me. Then they demanded to see where my kids lived before they released them in my care. So I guess if I lived in a run down house I would have lost them?? Pretintious pricks....I've known more well to do families that abused their kids then I've known poorer families.... Gawd that sucked...in the middle of a divorce and then having to call the surgeon, her peditrician, and her ortho for statements on Leigha's head. 
...lmao 
