Discussion Board: Primary Schoolers

My daughter has been clingy since birth. She has had time at childcare as a baby where she settled well after a while. Her brother was born when she was 17 months and that caused no problems. Kindy at 3ish was a bit of a nightmare and continued to be off and on until she started school May last year. She is not your normal every day clingy child. She loves school and is doing well. She sleeps well at night and is learning age appropriate. She has no problem at lunch time etc playing with other kids. Her problem is separating from me. If I leave her and walk away she follows. If she cant follow she cries but the minute I am out of sight she is fine. That sounds workable but it is very stressful and is making the kids make comment eg "why do you cry all the time Molly" etc. She is a "cup half empty" type of personality (please understand I am NOT Labelling her). She is always worried that someone has more than her, or better than her etc etc etc. Please if anyone has some ideas on how to help I am very very worried about her.

Have you sat her down and talked to her about it? Told her that it makes mummy sad when she cries like that? She knows you are comming back and that she will have fun when you are gone. My oldest did that at Kindy. He was fine then he got all clingy like that. once I sat him down and told him how it made me feel and how it made me not have a good time when we were apart he stopped it.

My DD1 was clingy throughout kindy and for nearly the whole first year at school. I would walk her to her classroom and she would hold my leg or clothes when I tried to leave. Sometimes her teacher occupied her so I could leave, sometimes that didn't work. When she started Year 2, I would drop her off at the gates and let her walk in herself. I prepared her for this all holidays and it worked! I could occasionally go in and she wouldn't be clingy anymore. I think it's something they grow out of eventually.

Post a message in this thread