No more preschool. This is why ...

I thought I was doing the best thing for all of us when I pulled the twins from the sitter's and sent them to a formal preschool two mornings a week.
They loved their sitter and she still took them one morning a week, but I needed more consistency and I felt they needed more social interaction.
Their sitter is a neighbor's nanny.
Whenever the neighbor's children were sick, she had to cancel. Whenever, she was sick, she had to cancel. Whenever our kids were sick, we had to cancel.
Then there were vacations to deal with: hers, ours and the parents of the other children.
I don't need a lot of time to focus on my writing, run some errands and get a little cleaning done. Nine hours a week is plenty right now, but I really need that nine hours. Even six will do. Heck, when I'm desperate, three is better than nothing.
At the preschool, they would stay home only when they were sick and they had seven other children in their class along with an assistant. The school promised help with potty training, drinking from cups and following directions.
It sounded great, it was highly recommended and the twins enjoyed the tour.
They were reluctant that first week, but by the second week, they were happy.
Sort of.
Compliant was more like it.
So I pushed that nagging feeling further back in my mind and labeled it "mommy guilt:" guilt over the fact that I had placed my twins in a formal school setting at only 2.5 years old, something I never would have considered with my older kids.
But an incident today finally opened my eyes.
Matthew had dropped his sippy cup in the parking lot. It slid under a car. He wasn't supposed to bring it into preschool anyway, but, like any toddler, he was devastated by the thought of leaving it there even for a few minutes.
While I tried to retrieve it, Jonathan ran into the parking lot.
Not good.
So I coaxed them inside with Matthew crying.
I explained the situation to the teacher and tried to tell Matthew I would get it and come right back to show him. He wasn't buying it. The tears flowed harder and that triggered a waterfall from Jonathan.
Ten minutes passed and the teacher did nothing to help me.
In the end, I had no choice, but to leave with the twins in tow. The teacher smiled and offered words of sympathy, but that was it.
As I buckled Matthew and Jonathan into their car seats with tears flowing down my own cheeks by now, something occurred to me. That teacher did not know these boys as Matthew and Jonathan.
She knew them as the Identical Twins.
Just last week, she told me that she couldn't see any differences between them. I took a few minutes to point out physical differences and then behavioral differences. She shrugged. She just didn't see it.
Now, I don't expect people to be able to apply the differences to the appropriate children, especially if they see them only in a classroom setting twice a week. But I would expect that after a month or so, this woman would at least see that there were differences.
She could have if she had tried.
But she didn't care to try.
So when I got home, I picked up the phone and I called their sitter.
I apologized for pulling them in the first place and begged her to take them more often.
"They slam the door in my face and say 'Bye, mom,' when I leave them with you," I said. "You don't need name tags and you never have. They adore you and I feel like you care for them," I told her.
She didn't even hesitate.
Matthew and Jonathan start their new schedule tomorrow.