Wow, taking Jacob to camp turned out to be hard on all of us. We drove to Austin on Sat & ended up getting a room there. We made the mistake of trying to take the boys out to eat. Didn't turn out well, let's just leave that at that. Anxiety was getting to us all.
So anyway, we got up Sun morning & went to Trudy's for breakfast, yummmm. Happy Father's Day to Brett. Then drove to the Guadalupe & swam in the river for a bit, right by Rockin R&R. As it got closer to time to take Jacob, the tension was rising. Jacob was back & forth, I think, between excitement & anxiousness. He would ask questions, & I would answer them in detail. Didn't want any suprises. We got to the camp about 4:00. There were people everywhere & everyone looked happy. The camp is beautiful, huge, & very well kept. We checked him in & there is a disco ball, with lights, in the gym, plus curtains & lights on the stage. We go outside & Jacob points out the flag pole. I told him I figured they would put one up every day & take it down at night. When we got to his room, I was pleased to find a schedule which included flag raising & lowering ceremonies, every day. Right up his alley. So he picked his bed & we started to get him set up. This is where I was struggling to hold back tears. Brett tried to hug me, but I knew that would make me lose it, didn't want that in front of Jacob. So we all gave him hugs & kisses & his counselor took him into the room to play cards. We walked out of the building & Luke started to fight his tears, & he said, "I'm really gonna miss Jacob". This made Brett & I cry more. Then Ryan stopped and said, "Wait Mama, where's Jacob?" I said, "Jacob's staying here. We're going to come get him in a few days." This made Ryan sad. So we kept walking & then Ryan fell down & scraped his knee. I picked him up while he wailed, "I want Jacob! I want Jacob!" So at this point, we're all 4 crying & trying to just get in the car. We left the camp with only Ryan holding it together. He's 2, they get over things quickly, lol. So the drive home seemed like forever, although it was 5 1/2 hrs, with lots of tears, but we made it. Luke was so sweet. He told me that if I talked to him about it, he would just get sad again, so we talked about all kinds of other things. Ryan did get sad and ask for Jacob one more time on the way home, but not for long. Once we got home at 10:45pm, Luke walked in the house & said, "Oh, now that I'm home, I just remember that I miss Jacob so much." I put on his pjs & put him to bed through both of our tears. He did finally get distracted enough with his movie, & of course he was tired enough, that he fell asleep. The next morning, Luke came into my room & I asked him how he was feeling. He said, "Good. I've only gotten sad about Jacob one time." So we moved on with our day, went to a friend's pool to swim & everybody was fine.
So today, I talked to a counselor & he said that Jacob is pretty homesick. Not really what I wanted to hear. He did say that it only seems to be on Jacob's down time. After meals, during rest time, when Jacob has time to think about it, he gets sad & cries. He also said that once the next activity starts, Jacob does participate & they're not having any behavior problems or anything like that. So hopefully by the end of the week, he'll be doing well. We want him to have fun & to want to go back next year. It's a very good growing experience. For all of us. We can't wait to see him on Friday, & I'm sure he'll be excited to see us. I also wonder how different he will be, maybe a little bit more grown up....
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