Oh & I came across photos from when my parents dropped me off 28 years ago and my dad was in a coat and tie!! Needless to say, we will not be that fancy!
Talking from experience (yes it’s been all of 2 weeks since DD was dropped off ?) the first week is the hardest.
DD was calling non stop and I think the COVID-19 restrictions plays a big part in socializing. However in-class 6ft apart classes began this week so she’s meeting more people and not calling as much.
I’m amazed at how mature she’s gotten in just 2 weeks (and she was already a very mature 14yr old).
@Calliemomofgirls so feel free to shed those tears and add flavor to the dinner ? ? …
All our CC kids (and parents) are going to do just fine on this new journey
We had a great drop off today. The school has done a really good job adjusting to Covid and I got more than two hours to move her in (finally got kicked out). There are only 16 girls (out of 70+) moving into her dorm this weekend which I think is great for my daughter as it will be less overwhelming to make friends. But then less than an hour after we left, she started texting me asking to pick her up. So my husband and I are now at a bar drinking, hoping she will adjust sooner rather than later. Please let this week go by quickly!!!
Have another martini*, @cityran. Those calls are more common than you’d think. The advisors and dorm parents know how to handle first-night-fright and homesickness in general. She’ll adjust. If she texts again, order another and put your phone on mute. 
*The local town bar is one of the things we miss most about about Choate. The bartender made a mean martini, and the nachos beat anything we have here in the SW by a mile. Sigh. (We also got a lot of skinny on the school from outsiders.)
@cityran I also endorse martinis.
We also are two weeks post-drop off and I agree with @amumof2 that the first week was much harder than the second. Our daughter is very independent, so it may have been harder on us than on her, but I can tell each day she feels more at home in her new school. She just sounds happier than she has been in months (lockdown has been so tough on the kids). Our daughter is very introverted, but is finding her people and really enjoying her new community. It was hard to choose boarding school at all in the pandemic, but I am so glad we did! Every day I am grateful for her new “bubble” and how for how hard the school is working to give the students some degree of normalcy.
Please continue to post happy drop off stories and good reports from your kids! I think we all could use some regular doses of good news these days!
Day 5:
I (finally) got my first conversation with DD! We Facetimed for maybe 20 minutes and I heard all the things. The excitement! The homework! The classes being amazing! All of it! So busy. Crazy schedule but loving every second. Exhausted but oh-so-happy.
Day 6:
Tears. It’s overwhelming. Can she keep up? It’s so hard, and she really, really wants me to tuck her in and hug her and snuggle her and give her comfort. She begged me to send her a home cooked meal. Anything, Mom! Even your pasta with cream sauce would remind me of home. (um. We live across the country. how about a pan of brownies instead?). oh the tears were so earnest and deep.
I fully expected all of this. Still, it’s harder to live than write about.
Today is day 7.
I just had to say hugs to you!! I find school super stressful, it is really hard to let go so much.
We are still on the roller coaster of emotions too…today is day 8 for us. Yesterday and today, for the first time since drop off, I did not receive a morning phone call from her crying and asking to come home (a huge win), but when I facetimed her yesterday afternoon she looked worn down and broken. 
She’s been feeling overwhelmed with the amount of work, but then last night rejoiced in a text when she finished her work with one hour left of study hall. I know its just a balancing act that she needs to learn how to manage.
Oh and she did laundry the other night!! Woohoo!! 
The kids are feeling a bit less like prisoners and have been given a tiny bit more freedom. Restrictions loosen up every few days, given covid test results continue to come back negative. They go for a group walk every night, and are spending more time outside. Citykid was really excited to send us photos of deer and cat walking around campus that she took on her dorm walk.
I have no idea what this weekend will bring in terms of emotion. But now that we are officially in week two, I hope things get easier on her and us!
My kids get to GO TO CAMPUS today! So excited for them. They ran out the door with so much nervous energy and excitement! They’re day students so I wonder how they’ll be when they get home, and I hope things stay on track with covid testing, etc.
@cityran I just want you to know you are not alone! I got the call today saying she didn’t want to stay, that she would never find friends, and that “trust me” she has met all the girls in her grade and they are not ever going to become her friends. Deep, lonely tears. I am really, really trying to be supportive while not indulging too much down the negative path – kept things a little bit lighter. But WOW. What a roller coaster. Holy crap. (am I allowed to say that here?). And I remind us all that DD had nothing but love for the first 6 days, so the depths of this roller coaster has been unexpected. (WHEEEEEEEEE!!!).
Someone please tell me that this will even out!!!
@DroidsLookingFor None of this takes away from the fact that I am so excited for your kiddos!!! It’s a big day!!!
@Calliemomofgirls there have been so many tears around here (for us due to covid and all that means for the kids). My older one had a similar experience. First week amazing, then classes started and friends she thought were best friends kind of started hanging out with others. It was really rough. I reached out to her advisor and said “can you please check about this one thing with her, sometimes she is too stoic for her own good.” Advisor set up weekly lunches with her - it just helped for her to have someone to talk to. It got better. Big hugs. For most of us parents this is really the first time we can’t “help” and it is really hard.
@Calliemomofgirls I’m so sorry you are dealing with this too. I remember my experience being similar to your daughter’s. The first week seemed amazing, and then friends moved around a bit and I felt lost and lonely. Hopefully she will settle in soon…remind her that the friends she makes now are not necessarily the ones she’ll be close with for all four years, so just find people she enjoys hanging out with right now.
Citykid just forwarded me a school email announcing that boarders may now move freely around campus. I almost cried reading it. It’s been a tough 17(!) days and while I know it won’t be all smooth sailing from here (she is really just beginning the friend finding stage now, which is bound to be bumpy), the freedom should hopefully help her feel more comfortable there.
LOL.
Today is the first day that the day students on campus at my kid’s school for in person classes.
My kid is a freshman boarder. She and her boarding friends are terrified. They have seen numerous day students post pictures on social media that indicate they are not socially distancing. And yes, they have attempted to go through the correct channels with their concerns.
Unlike @cityran and @Calliemomofgirls , there have been few calls from my kid, and none of them tearful. But she’s very worried about her day student classmates.
(I’ve advised her to just be extra careful about social distancing, and wait to get know her classmates better, to determine who to avoid… like the plague.)
@stalecookies
Aren’t they masked all the time at school?
Yes. But masks aren’t perfect.
And apparently the boarding students are more strict overall about masks, 6" apart, washing their hands because they’re been practicing it 24/7 for a month.
No, masks aren’t perfect but it makes me sad to see kids “informing” on each other already! There is no “safe” right now and no school is going to be able to enforce rules 100%. That is a risk you acknowledge and accept when you go to school right now.
There is solid evidence that masks are very very effective - not just in vitro studies but the case of the man who flew from Toronto to China, with a cough, masked, flight did not come down with covid. The two hairdressers with covid who saw 140 clients, all masked, none of the clients got covid. Seems to me that means your kid is probably going to be fine and likely doesn’t need to be terrified.
Steering us back into the thread topic, I’ll post a quick update. DD2 is doing great now that quarantine has lifted.
I know this because my 3 other daughters tell me because apparently she is able to keep up those communication channels. (“Mom, she let her roommate cut her bangs!”) (“don’t worry – it looks awesome!”).
No calls or texts or snapchats to Mom.
Too busy!
(this is a good thing)
Also a tiny academic update.
DD2 was taking honors sophomore math here in our tiny district last year in 8th grade. She took the lengthy placement test over the summer and discovered that she was placed in – regular 9th grade math! She read the syllabus and complained to me that she had already studied these topics. “Good!” I told her. You’ll have one class where you feel super strong from the beginning! (She has zero interest in becoming a math whiz so I felt like there was no harm in her being right in the center of the math pack.)
Fast forward a week or two, and she reports that math is really hard!
A few days later, she actually asked me to FaceTime her to explain something in math. No problem.
I was always the best math student in college and grad school.
I’m just the person for the job!
We FaceTimed.
Me: hmm. Not sure about that, honey. (as I google the topic hoping for a refresher)
About five minutes into it, DD says: no offense mom, but I think I better ask my prefect. (She did; she helped; all was fine.)
Welcome to freshman math, my friends. I’m in over my head and it makes me so happy.
Yay! I’m so glad your daughter is settling in!! Citykid has had the same experience with math. She’d always been a math whiz at her previous school and was accelerated two years. After taking the placement test over the summer, they put her back a year, which, like you, we figured would be fine because it would be one class she wouldn’t have to stress over. But now I frequently get “I have no idea what is going on in math” texts, so they’ve still found a way to challenge her! I don’t even try to offer help…it would not end well.
Citykid is also finally finding her way!! It was a rough few days after quarantine because she had to start finding her way on her own (during quarantine all the girls did everything together on a strict schedule), so figuring out who to walk to lunch with was scary, and what to do during free time was a bit overwhelming. Yesterday she had her first water polo practice (she’s never played before) and seemed to really enjoy it, despite being a dry land practice. I know being part of a team, and having regular exercise will boost her mood, and help her feel more confident around campus. We visit her in two weekends! I am so excited!!
@cityran VISIT!!!
oh what magical words!!!
glad to hear your DD is doing well!!!
ps. I finally heard from DD2 last night. A text. (an actual-on-my-phone text.). Oh happy day, right?
She wants money to buy some more warm clothing.
I should have known. (but really – it’s all good. But it was kind of funny that I let my hopes rise for a hot minute…).