My son Charlie is 9 and is growing into a fine young man, he is the eldest of three children, his sisters are Pippa who is 8 and Hope who is 3 years old and has Down syndrome.
Charlie is a wonderful brother to both his sisters but is extra protective of Hope, Charlie, will sing to Hope, and comfort her when she is scared, will tell people she is special and won’t let anyone say a bad word about her, and Hope loves her big brother she sees him as her best friend and protector.
Last week was wear your odd socks day to raise awareness on Down’s syndrome, Charlie’s school didn’t do anything for the day but Charlie decided he would wear his odd socks in honour of his amazingly strong and brave little sister.
Charlie is forever telling people about how awesome Hope is, he went into school wearing one grey sock with a green toe and a green line running around the top of the sock and one grey sock with a slightly different grey they are the same type of sock but a different pair, Charlie didn’t want to go to the extreme as the school has a strict uniform policy of only plain grey or black socks.
The school have just called and said he will have to stay behind for an hour after school today for breaching the schools uniform policies last week, I explained his reasons behind this and that he has a sister with down syndrome, but they stated that they cannot bend the rules for one child, and the policy is there for a reason.
I mean come on! He hasn’t gone in wearing a neon tutu or coloured his hair, his socks don’t affect his learning or distract others in the class, the only colour on show was one green strip.
What would you do? Collect him at 3 as usual or let him sit through an hours punishment?
