Mondays are the day I write from home. I’d just dropped off the kids and rushed through a quick walk with my best friend Nance when my phone rang. And by some miracle I actually picked it up to hear my thirteen year-old say with a mix of chirp and shake in her voice, “Mom, there’s a bomb scare at school. I’m fine. Please come pick me up. I’ve gotta go.” Then she hung up.
***
I pride myself in being calm, cool, and collected until all the information is in, but at that moment I was a few degrees left of totally freaked out. I’ve had a cold, I’m tired, and MY CHILD MAY BE IN DANGER. Reverse that for priority, but my point is I can’t sort through reason from emotion. While driving (sorry officer), I checked my messages. Sure enough, two minutes before my daughter called the principal of her school left a message saying:
“This morning at 7:13 am we were informed of a threat made against the school. We do not believe this is a credible threat, but we are taking precautionary measures to ensure the safety of students and staff. If you don’t feel comfortable with your child staying in school today, you can come to the back gate by the gymnasium and sign them out for the day. The children are safe with teachers on the blacktop. Again, these measures we are taking are precautionary, as we take all threats seriously. We will update you as more information is available. Thank you.”
I was nauseous. I just published an article titled Why Your Smartphone is a Nuclear Football, which details the ways lives get blown up with via text and social media. And now I sat gripping the steering wheel sorting out the degree of risk this Twitter-originating bomb threat had for my little girl. I was deadly calm outside with great potential for hysteria on the inside.
This has not been an easy three years for me. It started with my dad dying, the one witness to my life that was unconditionally loving and supportive. I managed his estate from 1,000 miles away amidst brutal family turmoil and a challenging lawsuit. Then my stepmother was diagnosed with cancer and underwent six months of horrific treatment before she died last summer. And while driving across the Mojave Desert to her deathbed, my mother was picked up by the police wandering demented and alone in a terrible neighborhood near the Mexican border four hours from home. I’d spent the past year desperately trying to convince her to let me get her treatment, only for her to refuse and being told by experts that I’d have to wait until she demonstrated true incapacity. It sucked in layers of suck. Not only was it a heartbreak to lose three parents at once, but to be responsible for tangles of legal and accounting nightmares. I can’t express how soul wrenchingly painfully exhausting it all was. Since then I’ve gone on to get conservatorship, secure her placement in memory care, and manage her estate, which included storing her belongings and selling her house. And that’s only half of it, but enough for you to get the picture. I was shouldering piles of emotional and time-consuming stressors with little opportunity for escape.
To make things more complicated, during this three-year drama my oldest daughter was struggling to cope with her involvement in the Isla Vista shooting and the loss of two young friends to freak violence. We have consistently worried about her safety away from home, because her privileged university neighborhood has been plagued by assaults, kidnappings, and burglaries.
In the midst of this personal turmoil, I continued my family and professional life while launching GetKidsInternetSafe.
You may be asking why in the world would I launch a business during such a difficult time? My answer is, “because I needed it.” I needed to be passionate about something that could make a big impact on a lot of lives. It simply made me feel better. While writing and setting up some impossibly complicated tech issue, I could shelf my pain and focus on something other than my emotional strain. It was the learning addiction I needed for true respite.
As my stressful projects are starting to wrap up, I’m grateful because I’m aware I need to heal from working too hard for too many. I’m getting my free time back and soaking in my blessings. And yet, life hasn’t gotten the memo. A bomb scare! Really? How many emotional and financial resources is Twitter costing us anyway?
After waiting in a long line to pick up my baby amongst tightly wound parents trying not to armchair quarterback about the school’s handling of the incident, I got her back. My blonde, gangly brilliant brown-eyed girl walked to me and giddily announced she and her friends want a beach day. Bomb scares come with perks it turns out.
Just like that, my fear evaporated. I brought her home and jealously watched as my oldest spontaneously planned a sisterly shopping and beach adventure, wishing I could go but knowing their bonding was bigger than my selfish need to join in the fun.
So now I’m doing what we psychologists call “emotionally debriefing” and writing to you, meaning I’m reflecting on my feelings and the situation that surrounded them wondering if I’m alone in the world or if others can relate. And I have to share with you guys that I’m still a little scared. Despite my optimism about people and our amazing kids, I have real concern that the power of screen media is taking us to places we’ve never been before, like middle school bomb scares. And maybe we are not doing enough.
I’m the mom psychologist who will help you GetYourKidsInternetSafe.
Onward to More Awesome Parenting,
Tracy S. Bennett, Ph.D.
Mom, Clinical Psychologist, CSUCI Adjunct Faculty
GetKidsInternetSafe.com
Photo credits:
Time bomb by Dirk Knight, CC By-NC-2.0
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