@dramakid2 Go Marshall!!!
On March 9th, someone reached out to my daughter excited that she will also be bleeding blue this Sept. I asked my teens do they know anyone that were taken off the wait list at their school. They said yes.
I am at the mall while the kiddos are doing plenty of window shopping. One week left and then back to peace and quietā¦
Anyone elseās kid having a hard time socially? DS has never been a social butterfly, and he had a tough fall term (roommate problems, didnāt find a group he connected with, etc). Things seemed to be getting better, but he admitted today that the people he thought were his friends had mostly ditched him. He was in his room, 2 hours before check-in, all alone and just feeling down. I feel so bad for him, and donāt fully understand why this is happening - heās a genuinely nice kidā¦
@momof3nyc So hard! Just sent you a PM. I hope he can make new, better friends as he gets more involved with clubs and activities. He needs to find his tribe!
@momof3nyc Iām sorry that your son has hit a rough patch and you are worried. I would reach out to his advisor. You may get a better understanding of the situation if the advisor is attuned to it, or you may put it on their radar if theyāre not. Or they may tell you that he is playing ping-pong with a bunch of kids while you are agonizing at homeā¦
To answer your question, my experience is that social ups and downs are fairly common. My daughterās advisor has been most helpful in dealing with them. My faughter has also reached out to a counselor at the health center, who provided a different perspective that was also helpful. Finding new friends may be the best solution though often not the easiest one.
I come from the student side of this-- Iām a freshman as well-- I can confirm that Iāve had those issues too. There have been moments when I was alone in my dorm on the verge of tears because I felt so lonely. It definitely didnāt help that all my friends had gone to a camp together that was sort of a recruiting program for the scholarship kids, and I was the only one who didnāt-- you can imagine how left out I felt.
What Iāve found most helpful is to reach out to the RAās. Tell your DS to ask them to take him to dinner with them and just talk about stuff-- some of the most important moments of my year so far have been seeing how much my RAās care about my well-being. The discussions Iāve enjoyed with my RAās, and having the opportunity to get to know them, has been one of the most rewarding aspects of my new school. Talk about the problems with the counselor, or the chaplain, or an advisor, or literally anyone with whom youāre comfortable. There are resources all around, from deans to advisors to that junior whoās in your German 1 class for some reason, and it is incredible just how many people there are happy to talk to you about it, even if thatās not in their job description.
As for the parents, donāt worry too much about it. Those moments I was upset, I never even told my parents. I didnāt really need to stress them out-- especially because my mood went back and forth just about by the week. One day I would be miserable and the next things would be looking up once again.
And even in the lowest moments, even when I had a mental breakdown while sitting on my desk after not talking to anyone over the weekend for a full 24 hours (other than the check-in teacher), or for my roommate when he took a metal bar and banged it into the wall until it broke in half, there hasnāt been a single moment where I wasnāt ecstatic to be here, and I donāt know your son, but I imagine itās very similar for him as well.
Your concerns are reasonable and totally warranted, but you need not worry about it too much. Hope this helps!
@woodcal03 Thank you for the student perspective! I know itās ups and downs - as my mother would always tell me, adolescence is a tumultuous time of peaks and valleys, and as you get older, the peaks donāt feel quite so high, but at least the valleys donāt feel quite so low. I think many students experience loneliness at school, and I wish there were a way to connect them all! My sonās advisor - who is a lovely woman - said much the same thing, that there were probably hundreds of kids sitting and feeling lonely, feeling like they were the only ones feeling that way, but everyone was suffering behind closed doors. Parents, please encourage your kids to be kind, especially to the kids who might be struggling!
It takes time for kids to find their own tribe that they feel comfortable with while away at school. The friendship groups constantly change each trimester.
Happy Easter and to enjoy all the various other wonderful holidays coming up !!! Hope everyone is doing well that reads this post. My kid sent me a picture of a huge turkey walking near her school. I only have to worry about ground hogs that like to stand up in my back yard . One of the parents invited a bunch of students to her house for a sleep over. She told be that the teens talked until 3 AM laughing and talking, evening though they all live on campus and see each other every day. Boarding school friends for life.
Hope Motherās Day was fine for all. My son had a growth spurt. He might be around 6ā2". The food must be that good. I had a small get together of their friends at our hotel rooms. No one slept. Yesterday, it was hail coming down from the sky. Is this the true New England weather? When will it end? My car was over loaded with their clothes . The dorms close on May 30th. After a while a local parent, offered to store their bikes. Has anyone else started to remove items from the dorms?
While New England is definitely unpredictable, this is a bit ridiculous this year! I was at my sonās game today and it was 45 degreesā¦and summer break starts in < 3 weeks! And yeah, snow yesterday in the Berkshires!
I know @CTMom21 - slick driving up in the Berkshires yesterday. Horrid weather 41 degrees and raining for college graduation over the weekend for a friendās son. Just heard from family up in Lake Placid that its a snow-rain mix tonight up there. Anyone expecting snow in NH?
Hearing about the New England weather makes me grateful the kid chose Thacherā¦
Itās not just New England. Our sons college graduation was moved indoors in CO last week as they got 3 inches of snow the day before the ceremony. Of course, we didnāt mind the snow that fell when we were sitting in the jacuzzi in Vail over the weekend.
@CaliMex , Thacher toughens up the kids with mornings in the barn and pitchforks in their hands, whereas the NE schools simply rely on the weather.
Iāll take the horse, than you! Definitely a better choice!
Or, you can have the fab California weather without the horse poop. Just sayinā 
Well, youāre either a poop person, or youāre not. Just sayinā
@CateCAParent I know you jest, but it is actually something I appreciate about Thacher. Because boarding schools are so expensive, they all attract their fair share of incredibly wealthy families. But families who believe their kids are āaboveā shoveling horse manure simply donāt choose Thacher. It weeds out some of the more entitled brats and is also a great equalizer. It doesnāt matter whether you grew up in a housing project or mansion. You muck for your horse and make sure he is fed, watered, groomed, and cared for. It really informs the community and cultureā¦
Having said that, I would have probably chosen Cate over Thacher if I were the one going off to boarding school!
Totally agree that the mucking is a great filter. Cate students all have jobs, but the worst it gets is kitchen duty. My formerly public school kidās observation was that the school has a small percentage of the uber-wealthy that act like that stereotype, a small percentage that orbit around the uber wealthy, but the vast majority are normal (or come across that way). My guess is that every school breaks down that way, just the percentages change.
Also, being a self-entitled brat is not the exclusive purview of the uber wealthy. We know people all across the money spectrum who fit that description - and the corollary some of the nicest people are really rich.
You have to have faith that the AOs can suss out the kids that donāt fit. It wonāt be perfect, but I bet the question āhow do you feel about mucking out a stall at 6:00 amā gets to the heart of the issue pretty quickly.
The twins are happy with their final dorm selections for fall. My daughter has a two room double. My son likes where the building is located. Waiting seemed to be a stress for some.