What would you do?

[Hayley Solich]

I moved my children to a public school system at the start of the year after I left my husband. Since moving to the school, I have been in the Principal's office more times than in my whole life, as there appears to be something wrong with each of my children on a consistent basis. Some days I just feel overwhelmed by it all. I have a son who is not doing number twos in the toilet yet. He is almost six. His older sister, my number three, had the same issue and after dragging her around all the specialists she eventually just decided when she was ready to sort it out. So this time, to save him the embarrassment of rectal examinations, I decided to let nature take its course, only nature is taking too long for the school.

Every day when I take him to school there is an issue. He has done something to not comply with their standards or rules or he has pooed himself. This morning I got a call to say he'd pooed himself early in the day and as I had only packed spare underpants and he'd soiled the pants there was an issue. The phone call came just as I was going into the radio studio to do a three hour morning program. I asked them to call me back if they had trouble finding some spare pants at the school. I didn't hear anything back. Then when I went to pick him up, they told me off because they couldn't reach me. They said they'd called my mobile phone three times but there was no evidence of the calls on the phone. I was sitting next to my home phone (which is on my desk) while I was working with a client at home in the afternoon. The phone did not ring once.

Another situation this week is that my third daughter got sick with a virus which dried her lips and mouth out and consequently she ended up with cracked and blistered lips and ulcers on her tongue. The school would not allow her back to school because she "looked" contagious. I went to the trouble of taking her back to the doctor to get her cleared and he told me she was not contagious. I took her back to school and they refused to have her back at school without a medical certificate. I have not been able to get a medical certificate because the doctor who saw her only works part-time. She's now missed a whole week of school because they would not believe me!!

I'm not sure what to do about the situation. I was in tears today as this has been a really tough year with the new school, which had a heap of unwritten rules that they failed to communicate then wanted to beat me up with. Things like they prefer the children to be there at 8:25am instead of 8:35am which is the official school start time, however, my youngest son is not allowed in his classroom until 8:35am. It just doesn't make sense. I feel like pulling my children out of school and working with them at home, as I am a trainer after all, but I'm scared that I would resent them for taking up ALL my time if I did that.

This week alone I've been in the principal's office twice, plus had two phone calls, plus the teacher in my son's class has had something to say to me twice. I understand that they are frustrated by the situation also, but I cannot poo for my son, nor can I wave a wand and make my daughter's mouth appear normal. The doctor said it would take a week for her mouth to heal properly.

I had no idea that being a single mother would make me this vulnerable. I'm convinced that had my husband attended the "case conferences" with me, they would not be able to be as militant with me.

Any thoughts on how to handle the situation?