Dear Blog,
I am missing you. Haven't seen you for a few days. When that happens...it makes me a little sad. You are in many ways one of my closest friends. The one I tell my secrets too...for all the world to see. (Wait a minute...that's an oxymoron.)
Why have I been away you ask? Well guess what? I've had a few hellacious days with my lovely children. I don't know if it's the full moon...the pull of the earth...anxiety flying around in the atmosphere? Maybe it's the holidays approaching and all of the stress that comes along with this "Most Wonderful Time of the Year?"
Christmas used to be my favorite season you know. Two straight weeks of parties, events, dressing up, sleeping in. Now it's a month's worth of work! Preparation, shopping, decorating, sending cards, cooking, deescalating meltdowns, refereeing fights, cooling anxieties. Oh and let's not forget pulling teeth to get my husband to help me with all of this. He is the official Grinch who stole Christmas. He's always a little bit grumpier around this time of year, because of the work that's involved and the money that we spend. Bah Humbug! For some mysterious reason, he always disappears for at least 2 business trips right before the holiday.
So Sunday was the biggest day from Hell that I've seen in quite sometime. It started off with Red going off and being rude for no apparent reason, other than "We all make him so mad!" This was by the way...during Church. Isn't that lovely. Hell...during church. That is...church right here in our living room via internet. He is usually gone to HIS church during this time, but he slept in today. Lucky us! So he decided to disrupt our service.
He finally pulled it together and actually reached out to his Pastor who invited him to come to a youth event at church that evening. He showered up and pulled out his video camera and off he went. I believe they prayed with him while he was gone. One issue down...check!
Once we get Red calm...Blue decides to have a meltdown or 2 or 3. I'm not even sure what they were all about, but it went on and off all day long, no matter what I did to try to sooth him. Warm baths, yoga, comedy shows on t.v., baking cookies.
We haven't seen him act like this since before he started taking any medication. Actually, we were trying to make an adjustment to one of the meds. (Big Part of the Problem) We tried reducing it, because it appeared to be making him tired. Well he completely fell apart. Have I told you lately how frustrating this freaking medication issue is? I HATE IT! It makes you feel so completely helpless when things go wrong. You question your decision to give it to them in the first place. You blame yourself, and curse the fact that they actually need it...no matter how much you don't want them to.
It's so disheartening to watch your child go through such pain and frustration. I have a tendency to get a side order of sympathy anxiety myself when one of them is so upset. Why can't I just watch it like a bad movie and not actually feel every inch of their pain? I guess that comes along with the package of being their mother.
Anyhoo...I'm glad to come back to see you dear Blog. Not only are you a dear friend...you are my free therapist. Thank you for being here when I need you. You don't always solve my problems, but you are a wonderful release valve.
p.s. Readers...no time to edit this writing. Hope you get the picture. Not much time available for beautiful writing during this lovely season.
I am missing you. Haven't seen you for a few days. When that happens...it makes me a little sad. You are in many ways one of my closest friends. The one I tell my secrets too...for all the world to see. (Wait a minute...that's an oxymoron.)
Why have I been away you ask? Well guess what? I've had a few hellacious days with my lovely children. I don't know if it's the full moon...the pull of the earth...anxiety flying around in the atmosphere? Maybe it's the holidays approaching and all of the stress that comes along with this "Most Wonderful Time of the Year?"
Christmas used to be my favorite season you know. Two straight weeks of parties, events, dressing up, sleeping in. Now it's a month's worth of work! Preparation, shopping, decorating, sending cards, cooking, deescalating meltdowns, refereeing fights, cooling anxieties. Oh and let's not forget pulling teeth to get my husband to help me with all of this. He is the official Grinch who stole Christmas. He's always a little bit grumpier around this time of year, because of the work that's involved and the money that we spend. Bah Humbug! For some mysterious reason, he always disappears for at least 2 business trips right before the holiday.
So Sunday was the biggest day from Hell that I've seen in quite sometime. It started off with Red going off and being rude for no apparent reason, other than "We all make him so mad!" This was by the way...during Church. Isn't that lovely. Hell...during church. That is...church right here in our living room via internet. He is usually gone to HIS church during this time, but he slept in today. Lucky us! So he decided to disrupt our service.
He finally pulled it together and actually reached out to his Pastor who invited him to come to a youth event at church that evening. He showered up and pulled out his video camera and off he went. I believe they prayed with him while he was gone. One issue down...check!
Once we get Red calm...Blue decides to have a meltdown or 2 or 3. I'm not even sure what they were all about, but it went on and off all day long, no matter what I did to try to sooth him. Warm baths, yoga, comedy shows on t.v., baking cookies.
We haven't seen him act like this since before he started taking any medication. Actually, we were trying to make an adjustment to one of the meds. (Big Part of the Problem) We tried reducing it, because it appeared to be making him tired. Well he completely fell apart. Have I told you lately how frustrating this freaking medication issue is? I HATE IT! It makes you feel so completely helpless when things go wrong. You question your decision to give it to them in the first place. You blame yourself, and curse the fact that they actually need it...no matter how much you don't want them to.
It's so disheartening to watch your child go through such pain and frustration. I have a tendency to get a side order of sympathy anxiety myself when one of them is so upset. Why can't I just watch it like a bad movie and not actually feel every inch of their pain? I guess that comes along with the package of being their mother.
Anyhoo...I'm glad to come back to see you dear Blog. Not only are you a dear friend...you are my free therapist. Thank you for being here when I need you. You don't always solve my problems, but you are a wonderful release valve.
p.s. Readers...no time to edit this writing. Hope you get the picture. Not much time available for beautiful writing during this lovely season.
Logging you in...
Adelaide Dupont · 285 weeks ago
And for those of us who knew and appreciated these points in high school to a greater or lesser extent - always good to have a refresher and feel them through the current and future generations who we survived to be able to see.
I especially appreciated points 5, 7 and 10.
And young women not settling or settling down yet is a good thing.
"It's never too late to live our dreams" - but it may be too early for some of them!
And 8 of course.
nicole · 243 weeks ago
Risa · 230 weeks ago
LAH · 221 weeks ago
Maira L. Coral · 216 weeks ago
I was looking for information for my Multi-Genre Disability Research Project from my Early Childhood Special Education class on the web, when suddenly I came across your blog. I started reading this out of curiosity and I want to tell you that as you said yourself, you will not be Amanda Gorman, but you managed to make me shed some tears, perhaps because I felt totally identified with your words, especially in the part that you speak of your son. My son also has Asperger's syndrome, he is 19 years old and he is in the second semester of College. Also like yours, he takes classes from home, likewise my eldest daughter is also taking college classes from her room. At the same time, that I work as a preschool teacher from my kitchen through a computer, my husband sleeps in the room during the day because he works at night. Also in the afternoons I myself take virtual school classes. I am a 51-year-old Latin woman who began to learn the English language as adult, so maybe you find some deficiencies in my writing, however, I was very moved by how proud you express yourself about your son. Referent your mother, I liked the humorous tone that you give when your talk about her, so I did not want to miss this opportunity and stopped my assignments for a moment to let you know that your words do make a difference, since they reach the heart of at least those who have opportunity to read you. I want confess you that is the most long I have written to someone I don't know, because your words inspired me, thank you...
Gavin Bollard · 209 weeks ago
Thanks for this post. I've been very distracted of late and so this was how I found out about our friend Kate. Kate's struggles were very real but they were so constant and so wide-ranging that it was difficult for people around her to address them. I think it's going to take a while longer for me to process all this.
I learned so much from Kate because she was always quick to point out the many injustices in the world. In her glory days, she was very much a crusader and she cared for everyone. Over the years, as her situation took its toll, I came to realise that it was the fact that she couldn't be put in a single specific category, that made the system fail her. She needed help that they weren't set up to provide.
She needed more care and she needed to be less alone. I'm so sorry that this has happened.
For a long while we were corresponding almost every day but a couple of months ago, I realised that she had become so stressed that nearly every interaction I had with her was starting to trigger her. I backed away to give her a bit more space. She only had a little time that she could stand to be online and there were too many things that she wanted to do in that time. I thought that by taking a step back, she could reach out to more people who might be geographically closer and able to assist.
Kate was a beautiful soul and she will be sorely missed by all of us.
diyalabs6192603 11p · 192 weeks ago
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Spoil your cat · 121 weeks ago
Many of these living arrangement aren't good, and many of the people who run those places really don't have the residents' best interest at heart. Those places are like old age homes and foster homes, where you sometimes hear horror stories. They're hard to trust. But then there are good ones, of course.
The best thing for an autistic adult is either to go on living at home or working and renting an apartment and living independently, but that isn't always an option.
Duncan · 112 weeks ago