The 8 Very Real Stages of Back to School (for Parents)

Last week, my kids returned to school for what I hoped would be the chillest back-to-school season yet. With Boy Wonder ruling the school as a hot shot 8th grader and BooBoo nestling into the middleness that is 3rd grade, I just assumed we’d ninja our way back into academia with ease.

And it seemed to be going that way, at least until Boy Wonder discovered a very dead lizard and a very alive black widow guarding her nest of killer eggs in his locker. Suddenly, it no longer seemed to matter that we stood on familiar asphalt or that we’d gone through these (em)otions before. Ready or not, the back-to-school frenzy was upon us, unfolding in the same eight stages it does each and every school year.