Ah, shit. No, no, really. Shit.

All right, I've had some radio silence here about a student I mentioned awhile back, Nsima. For the longest time, I've just been too disturbed (and irked) about the situation to write anything down about it, but today was kind of the icing on the cake. The shitty icing. On a shitty cake.

I don't know what it is about this class, but they can't keep what's within from coming out. It's not my homeroom, it's the other class I teach. They have had more puking incidents, RIGHT ON MY FLOOR, than I even want to recount here. Smelly puking incidents that the custodians were too busy to come in and clean up for, oh, an hour. Can you study Main Idea while there is a pile of hot, steamy, reeking puke two feet away from you? I didn't think so. Me neither.

Anyway, this didn't happen in my class (it's about time), but rather in my co-teacher's room. I saw some of it with my own horrified eyes, and she filled in the rest.

Nsima asked to go to the restroom in the middle of a lesson. This is a common ploy on her part to wander off. Our standard practice is to tell her to wait until break or at least until the lesson is over, but if it's an emergency, she can go. Only, she didn't go. Well, actually, she DID go. Just not to the bathroom. Yet. She instead crapped her pants. Anyway, she ended up in the restroom and no one had quite figured out what had happened yet. Fast forward to her skipping back into the classroom, carrying something in her hands that was dripping water everywhere. And with, um, messy pants. "What's that in your hand, Nsima?" asks her teacher, while the other students are starting to catch on and freak out. "Oh, that's my underwear!" the cheerful, unabashed response. Turns out, Nsima had some diarrhea and decided to wash her panties out in the sink and return to class. Her teacher sent her down to the nurse and threatened the students with DOOM if they dared speak a word of it further. Then, during the restroom break for the whole class, they got to survey the carnage in the girls' bathroom firsthand. Nsima had let loose all over the toilet and stall, and when she washed her panties in the sink, left several obvious deposits in said sink. All of which I was privileged to witness. Jen, the class' bathroom monitor, is a studious, gentle, mature girl. She gagged, looked at her watch, and told the teacher, "I just can't! I'm... I'm on my break now!" and exited the bathroom.

The punchline (or something) was when Nsima came literally skipping back from the nurse's office in new pants, her wet and soiled panties in a clear plastic bag that she was merrily swinging around. She was absolutely chipper. "Sorry for disrupting your class!" she sings out. She got her things to go home and skipped away, just as gleefully.

Now here is where I quit laughing. This child is so desperate for attention that I honestly think she let loose on purpose. All eyes were focused on her for a time and she is constantly aiming for this state of affairs. I have fears and suspicions about this little girl's life that are too nebulous for me to call in help, but distinct enough that I know something is going on. Something bad. I have called CPS numerous times in my two years with my own classroom, but I can't call until I have something concrete. And I hate feeling like I'm just sitting here, waiting for a tragedy to reveal itself.

On a somewhat related note to the story, when I took my class to a different set of bathrooms for their break, the boys entered their bathroom and immediately started screeching. I walked in and someone had flung shit onto the ceiling. I told the boys I was impressed and to try not to stand under it in case poo flecks fell down from the heavens.