Parental Thread

[Traum]

Originally Posted by EvoFire

For the majority of the heat and air quality issues, chances are it's August and the kids are out of school anyways. There's probably a select few days in Sept that there's an issue. To rectify the problem is going to be a mid 8 figure project minimum, if not into the early 9s, there's simply no budget for that, and nor is there enough public will.

Some teachers have portable air conditioners that I've seen, not sure if on their own dime or not, or the school or PAC/PTA pulled some money for south or west facing rooms.

Yeah, we're lucky here in Metro Vancouver that the majority of the worse heat and air quality warning days are gonna take place outside of the normal school year. That said, even back in my HS days, which was a good 30+ years ago, I remember being stuck in a hot, stuffy, and stinky portable classroom, and it wasn't very pleasant at all lol~

A lot of teachers at public schools frequently spend their own money on buying necessary supplies for their classes, even though that money should have been spent by the School Board. So I have no doubts that many of the portable air conditioners that might be found in school classrooms are also paid for by the teachers themselves. Many teachers really love their jobs, and they like the kids as well. Plus, they would benefit from having a more pleasant classroom themselves as well. But what I find interesting is -- while I was watching the news in the summer, it was mentioned that in a lot of the older schools, it is actually their electrical infrastructure that would not be able to support the power demands if every classroom had air conditioning. And the costs to rectify that problem is HUUUUUGE.

[Traum]

OK, quick change of topics, and I could really use some help for this one -- how do you break the news to your kid that a dog familiar to him has passed?

The backstory is -- my kid is in middle elementary school. We typically swing by his godmother's place to visit her and play with her dogs on the weekend for a bit since her place is along the way to one of the extracuricullar classes. Ms. Godmother has recently accquired a new and relatively young dog from animal shelter, and my kid had played with her (Persia) since the first week when she was taken home. Unfortunately, after the initial few weeks of being brought into her new home, Persia has started showing signs of being sick, and despite ongoing tests with the vet, her condition has continued to get worse. When we were visiting last week, Persia had already gotten quite weak, and I was more or less expecting her to pass into heaven soon, or that Ms. Godmother would end her misery by putting her to sleep.

Tonight became the night when Ms. Godmother made the difficult decision to send her onwards to cross the rainbow bridge.

We're gonna be visiting Godmother again on the weekend, and I think it is only appropriate that I break the news to my kid prior to our visit. The problem is -- I dunno how. Or rather, I dunno what the best way is to do this.

My kid has been playing with Persia for just under 2 months now, and he has taken on a liking to her. Godmother still has another young-ish dog -- 3 - 4 yrs old? -- that my kid has played with for the past several years, and she definitely knows and likes the kiddo dog more. Prior to that, Godmother also had an old dog, Granny. Although my kid had played with Granny as well, he was really too young back then to remember or feel too strongly about losing a dog. He knew Granny has passed, and that Godmother was very much heart-broken at her passing. But he never felt or understood the emotional loss because it all happened when he was just too young to understand any of that.

But by now in middle elementary school, he knows at a basic level what death is. I know full well that no matter how I tell him this time, his affection and emotions are gonna be strong enough that there'll be some good amount of crying.

I hope we can turn this into a valuable life lesson somehow, and I hope I can minimize the hurt and the pain (for my kid). Persia is not my dog, so while I am sad about her passing, I am also rather logical to feel thankful that she no longer has to suffer, and that she had gotten the chance to have and know what a loving family is before she passed. But I really dunno how I can break the news to my kid, and I'd have to do it some time on Friday before we visit Godmother again on the weekend.

I would really appreciate your help. ��

[SSM_DC5]

Dog got loose and ran away, your next weekend can then consist of putting up lost dog posters in the neighbourhood.

[roastpuff]

I think you should just break it straight. Don't lie to them. Don't mislead them.

"Persia got sick and wasn't going to get better, so Auntie X decided it was better that Persia wasn't going to suffer longer."

Kids understand more than you think. It may suck for them to learn about loss, but the crying will lead to (hopefully) more emotional growth in your child.

[westopher]

Yeah our dog died when our daughter was about 7-8 months and her friends dog died when she was like 3.5. Just tried to explain it best we could to her. We aren’t a religious family so there was no doggy heaven in the convo, but we did say we hope Monty and Kobe meet and get to play together wherever they are now, but they were too sick and they can’t be here with us anymore.