Necessary conversations

Life is full of tough talks to have with your kids: the birds and the bees, the death of a loved one, divorce, employment changes that may affect family finances, or necessitate a move. The hardest part of these conversations is that the subject matter is most likely going to happen, and you want to prepare your kids as best you can how to deal with change or an uncomfortable situation.

Recently, I added another item to the list of things I would do just about anything to get out of having to talk to my kids about: school safety.

Just like, “Why did Grandpap have to die?” and “Why do I get hair here and not here?” I was at a loss to explain why kids might think it’s OK to bring a gun to school and kill students. On the one hand, I was glad that my kids find this kind of behavior unfathomable, but at the same time, just because they can’t imagine someone doing it, doesn’t mean it won’t happen.

We had to talk about the importance of speaking up and who to tell if they heard someone saying something that sounded like it could result in someone else getting hurt. Inevitably, the kids were concerned about being a rat or a tattletale. A, who’s a little bit older and wiser, understands the “better safe than sorry” path, but at the same time, was quick to point out how sometimes I say things I don’t mean in the heat of the moment.

“Mom, how many times do you say things like, ‘I’m so mad I could scream?’ I’ve never heard you scream.”

I pointed out that he frequently tells me he’s going to clean his room, and he obviously doesn’t mean that either! I stressed the importance of understanding intentions and context.

I would hope that schools are fostering an environment where students can approach teachers and administrators with any of their worries or concerns or things they may have overheard, and the comments can be shared without fear of repercussion. The stakes seem too great not to have that teacher/student/administrator relationship.

There’s a whole other layer to the onion when you factor in social media, but for now, none of my kids are allowed on any platform, but I know that will be an issue someday. Sure, capturing screenshots of comments and photos is one thing, but if there’s anything I’ve learned on social media, it is that people don’t have a lot of context clues and can leap to judgments faster than ever. That’s just a can of worms I don’t want to open.

My kids also have questions about what they should do if there is an emergency in the school. Honestly, I have to push back to them to approach those in charge at their schools with those kinds of questions. I don’t want to tell them something that is going to disrupt plans put into place by school officials. Ideally, I’d like to be the one asking my kids the questions and have them know the answers.

When I was a lifeguard, we were trained how to use backboards to remove victims with suspected head, neck and back injuries from the pool. Backboarding properly is a tough thing to do even when you’re calm.

As a lifeguard team, we realized that we’d rarely have a “perfect” backboarding opportunity and we’d be up against the clock to get someone who wasn’t breathing out of the pool, and most likely have a crowd of people, including distressed family members surrounding us. We knew we had to practice backboarding to the point that we could trust our hands and fingers to do their job, even if we were distracted or nervous. That takes a LOT of practice.

It’s been 20 years since we ran those drills, but to this day, when I hear an emergency whistle in a pool area, my body starts to move. I instinctively reach for my rescue tube, and I can feel the adrenaline start to flow. I have no doubt in my mind that if I needed to perform that task today, my body would go through the same motions that it did all those years ago. (Also, I’m not really a lot of fun to take to a water park. I can’t stop planning for things to go wrong).

That’s how I feel my kids should be drilled enough and trained enough to act in an emergency. A few years ago, one of the kids struggled with some serious weather-related anxiety issues. It was one of those summers when there were a lot of sudden thunderstorm and tornado alerts. Even though we knew the likelihood of a killer storm striking us was low, for the sake or our kid’s anxiety issues, we walked through and planned to shelter in place.

One of the things we quickly realized that we needed to include in our plan was a puke bucket, because sometimes that kind of stress triggered anxiety vomiting, and having to shelter in a very small, safe place in the basement was bad enough. Doing it with someone who was puking all over was even worse.

We learned by relentlessly planning and practicing our plan. Having a plan and following it also gave the kids something to focus on besides the threat at hand.

It’s a sad and scary plan to have to have, and it’s even more nerve-wracking when you’re relying on a whole host of teachers and administrators and other school staff members to execute a flawless plan to keep your kids safe. It’s hard to balance appropriate planning and realistic scenarios without frightening your kids unduly. It’s not a pleasant conversation to have at all, but unfortunately, it’s one that is needed.

Liz Pinkey is a contributing writer to the Times News. Her column appears weekly in our Saturday feature section.