Weekend Updates with Meredith

Tomorrow I will officially start my real job. No more easy orientation where I can act like I am still in school. I feel like I haven't explained what I will be doing. Basically the children I will be working with have some kind of mental health diagnosis. Instead of being in a normal school setting they come to our site- called day treatment- to have a day filled with therapeutic help to get them back on track.

I will actually be in the classroom with them and have contact with them all day. The kids don't do their academic work with us- just therapeutic activities. During the summer it seems like we try to have some fun with them also. They take them swimming, horseback riding, skating, etc. Now I am trying to prepare myself to deal with children who, I know, will try to test me since I'm new.

On Friday I finally got to go see the site where I will be working and I got to meet the other girls in my classroom. I also got to find out that I will be in the high school classroom. That is making this week seem even more scary to me. Everyone who works there claims that the elementary age kids are more violent- but it is a lot easier to hold your own with a 5 year old then a huge 16 year old teenager.

At least our classroom will have three adults (including me). The other ladies seem very nice but they are very black and white in personality. They are almost what you think of as "good cop" and "bad cop". One is very tough love and the other seems like a softy. I am not very good at having confrontations but I think I may be somewhere in the middle of their personalities.

I know I can handle if these teens cuss me out, or really anything verbal. I just hope nothing ever gets physical because that would probably freak me out. Now that they realized I have my provisional therapy license they may also use me to run therapy groups with any of the age groups. That would be fun for me. 

And big life news- the countdown is on- we move next weekend! I cannot wait to move. I usually hate the process of moving but I am so excited to get there that I don't even care about that. I have gone IKEA crazy trying to make sure we have enough furniture.

First I got a coffee table and TV stand:

Yesterday my best friend and I went out to IKEA again and I gave in to a big bookcase. Our dining and living room area is going to be one big space. I have been looking at this bookcase for a month now to use as a room divider.

I guess I finally gave in!

Of course next weekend when we are having to put all this furniture together we may not like it as much!  I have heard that it is not always easy to put together IKEA stuff.

It may be a busy week and I may not have time to post. If not I hope everyone has a great week and an even better fourth of July! Next week I will post pictures and news about our move!