Back to square one

Last year was a breeze.

This year? Not so much.

Report cards came home today. For reading, of 10 assignments he turned in one. One. And that one assignment was late. Also for reading, he was supposed to turn in 6 book cards. He had turned in one by conference time when they were due. He was allowed to turn in the rest late for reduced credit, but his report card says what he turned in was incomplete. His writing is still illegible. Needless to say, he got 1s in reading and writing. He got 3s in everything else (4s in science and PE). He got mostly Occasionally for all of the Effort items, and Rarely in Independent Work Skills.

Honestly, it was entirely expected.

But then there came the UNexpected. A call from the school that Oldest was caught trying to shoplift a book from the bookfair. When confronted, he lied about it. Off to problem solving he goes.

When I tried to talk with him about it this afternoon, he went into one of his self-deprecating, black moods. He insisted that we just take everything away and that he was just going to go run away. He tried to blame everything on his siblings. I had to physically stop him from leaving. His poor Middle Child was terrified and crying. I finally got him to go upstairs, and after 30-40 minutes he cooled down some. Eventually he came down and did his homework and helped with chores.

It’s terrifying, though. I don’t know how we’re going to get through the next ten years.