Allergies and school day memories
HAVE you ever sent your kid to school topped up on allergy meds ‘just knowing’ the school will call at some point to query their ‘cold’.
‘She’s not sick, it’s an allergy, she’s allergic to dust and pollens, they make her eyes itchy and nose run’ … I’ve said this verbatim scores of times.
To be fair, now she’s at a rural school there seems to be a better understanding of what constitutes actual sickness and I’m not forced to pick her up.
When my daughter was at a state school on the Gold Coast it was a regular thing.
I’d send her to school topped up on the recommended dose of antihistamine and an inhaler in her bag.
‘Your daughter’s eyes are red and she’s sneezing, come pick her up’.
It was a demand not a request, its delivery in the no-nonsense tone of an old school matron.
Come to think of it, it was delivered by an old school matron.
Her name was Ms F and she was a lady in her late 60s.
She was the one standing at the classroom door watching when you dropped your kid off late.
Ms F had the ability to take you back to ‘that teacher’ who scared the heck out of you with just a look.
Suddenly, you are 10 again and tripping over excuses and apologies as a thoroughly unimpressed person of power looks on.
Just that you’re not 10, you’re an adult.
Trigger warning?
I can understand the need to not let a sick child attend school, it’s not good for the child or the other students.
The thing I struggle with is what is considered a ‘stay at home-able situation’?
The number of times I have had to pick my daughter up because she has a snotty nose and cough (sinus and post-nasal drip) is a lot!
I could be an hour away from the school and told I need to stop what I am doing (working) and pick her up.
It’s usually about four hours into the school day and when the allergy med dose is wearing off.
Leave the medicine with the school?
Nope, they refuse to give it to her because ‘if she’s sick then she should be at home’.
Allergies are not a communicable sickness.
And then we get back to the beginning again.
You drop them off and as you drive away you just know you’ll get ‘that’ call soon enough.
You hype yourself up, you’re not going to take it this time.
You’re going to lay down the law.
The phone rings, you answer and it’s Ms F.
Allergies are not sickness and nasal drips cause coughs, is what I thought I said.
What came out was ‘on my way, no worries’ because no one wants to get on the wrong side of Ms F, not even me.
