All Gawdess All The Time

Snort!

2009-11-05T19:45:00.000-08:00

Dragging my ass through what may or may not be the swine flu - survey says - probably not, but still our household has ground to a very slow motion version of its usual busy self. Three of the kids are flat on various couches and the youngest is unusually unbouncy.

Surprised myself with how worked up I have been over the h1n1 thing - done my usual thing of going into research mode and I feel a little better having plowed through a bunch of different articles from a bunch of different sources and cross checking those sources.

I am no more afraid of the vaccine than I am of any other vaccine - which is to say that I have a healthy respect for it and its possible side effects and yes I do believe those to be rare.

I am grateful that my brood does not seem to have any of the underlying conditions that would put them at greater risk.

Blurt!

2009-11-05T11:29:00.000-08:00

Some things that have been on my mind:

socialized medicine in the U.S.:
I live with socialized medicine and I love it. Not because it is perfect, it certainly isn't but it does mean that as a society the majority of people in my country have decided that don't put a price on human life.
Yes, I know that sounds simplistic but in a very general way I believe it to be true.
If my kids or husband get hurt or sick, we simply visit our doctor or go to the emergency ward - I make sure I have my wallet with me before we go because I keep my health care card in there.
In the past four years we have been to emergency with my youngest daughter and a mild concussion, seen a gastroenterologist and had a gastroscopy for my oldest daughter, and I have had two colonoscopies, mole removal, and a visit to a dermatologist to have a largish section of shoulder skin removed and checked for melanoma and this does not include the various visits for checkups and for prescriptions for all six of us. And it cost us nothing.
Well actually it did cost us money in the form of taxes but that is fine by me.
I am happy that my neighbors, my friends, strangers and even people I don't like can all go and get medical care when they need it.
It keeps us as a society healthier, physically, medically and morally.

Lately we have had some experience with a system that seems more like the privatized american medical insurance system - but in my family it is with therapy. We are using therapy a lot right now. My husband has quite good benefits from his job for that, but ONLY if we use the therapists that the insurance company wants us to. And we don't want too. Our kids have very good, trusting relationships with two play therapists and don't think it would make sense to try and disrupt that and start again. So we are paying, a lot of money every month, and trying as hard as we can to convince the insurance company to reimburse us. It is a pain in the ass.
If this is the "choice" and "control" that some Americans think is the best for them - I don't get it.

More later.

And so we roll along

2009-03-28T21:18:00.000-07:00

We still have four kids:
-Oldest son is 18, I cried some on his birthday for all the time that has gone by and all the mistakes I have made and in joy for having him - he is a fine and thoughtful young man with a hilarious sense of humour and he is deeply connected to his brothers and sisters
-Oldest daughter is 15, the road is so rough sometimes for her - as sadness and self doubt grab at her and leave circles under her eyes but we grown ups know that this is a tumultuous time as bodies grow and hormones flow and we do get the other side when she shines and sparkles and laughs and shines. She teases her youngest brother with a truly gentle affection and wraps herself around her youngest sister both physically and emotionally to try and offer her comfort from the hurts of the world both big and small
-Youngest son is 13 and truly a joy, if that is a word that can be applied to someone who points out that he is gaining on me in height in hourly updates, rolls his eyes like they are loose in their sockets, can stretch out a whine for hours, his voice cracking, and make me laugh while he does it and flips his bleached hair out of his eyes as he leans in to hug me good night as he does every single night - he is ours, he is mine
-Youngest daughter is 9nearly10, oh so nearly. If you ask her right now she can tell you how many days it is until her birthday, they are dwindling away quickly and she is growing and maturing so much. Smart? Oh that child is smart! And strong! I tell her how tough and strong she is all the time and also try and let her know that she doesn't have to be all the time, that is a job she can share with me and her Dad. The other day she told me that her thoughts know that I won't leave her, it is just that her feelings aren't sure yet. That is big stuff for her. We still have some serious stuff to try and figure out around birth family and especially birth Mom - right now we have decided to put that stuff in an emotional box, away from us and take it slow and just deal with it a little at a time.

We are happy and lucky to have two good therapists to work with, the Play Therapist that has been with Youngest Daughter since she first came to us is still there every second week and their relationship is a good one and a helpful one. Family Therapist is a newer find in the last Year or so and has been very useful to the rest of us, singly and in groups. I think of him as being on retainer for us for the next few years and am very grateful that we can afford him - appointments with him help smooth the rough patches in life and really show the kids that their Dad and I take their feelings and our family very seriously and that is priceless.

Birth Grandma still shows up, either by phone or in person, usually about every six months or so. That will probably be her pattern in the future too. There is upheaval when that happens but it is worth it because the youngest kids really do appreciate the contact, she is a touchstone of who they were, where they came from and I think it reassures them that we welcome her and embrace her as much as possible - it shows them that we care about where they came from too.

Birth Brother - we don't know where he is, we haven't heard from him since before Xmas, when he blew out of his placement in the first foster home he has had since he was 12 (he has been in group homes since) and it was with the fosterMoM that he had at the time - he is now all of 16 and both my youngests were terribly upset during his birthday month - and probably are even now...

BirthMoM is a tough subject for me right now. The last letters we rec'd were in January and the one to our youngest daughter triggered some difficult behaviours and I haven't been leaving the house much on my own since then. Before my eyes, YD became the cold, emotionally distant 7 yr. old who moved in with us and OH how powerless felt to stop the transfomation! I have yet to write the letter that I need to write to her, I have been putting it off but the time is coming soon. I want to do it right. BirthMoM needs to understand that although five years may not seem like a long time to an adult for YD it has been over half her lifetime and that things cannot be picked up where they left off, it doesn't work that way and it is unfair to YD to expect it to.
But I have to, and want to, say it in the nicest....no....in the most productive way possible and with input from YD, YS and therapists - hopefully I can.

So that is where we are right now.

I am afraid for my children in the future, at least a little, but most mothers probably feel that way...I want to protect them from hurts, big and small and at the same time let them grow and find their way...
I don't write here anymore for a couple of reasons, the biggest one is that I am trying to allow them to be themselves and not characters in my story.
And I have been exploring other parts of myself, the artist, the athlete, the writer, the woman who realizes that 42 IS the answer to the ultimate question of life the universe and everything (thankyou Douglas Adams) and I want to make sure that every number afterwards is too.

I still would like more kids.
Really and for true.
A baby lifts my heart into my mouth, any baby and I look with yearning eyes at my husband.
Toddlers have the same effect, okay almost all ages of child do....but it wouldn't be fair to the family we have right now, there is enough on their plates...but maybe someday this bigger family will become bigger still.

calm -ish -

2008-07-27T08:59:00.000-07:00

Three months since my last update...
the fallout from the Birthmom package and the subsequent Birth Grandma visit, was somewhat constant until just recently.

Hardest was definitely Youngest Daughter with stunning flashes from Youngest Son and the upset was tough for everyone.

There were flashes, the tiniest flashes of time when I really wondered if I was going to be able to ride it out, if there would be an end to it all.

Most of that had to do with realizing how tenuous my bond to my youngest daughter could be in some ways and wondering how much farther it could stretch and not that I was afraid it would break off but how scared I was that maybe she couldn't love me.

Those were the darkest moments though, the scariest, the hardest - thinking that I was pouring so much of myself and my love into what was a black hole but one shaped like a little girl with huge eyes - and realizing I didn't have a choice, that I couldn't turn it off, that even if her attachment was broken and she could not love me back that she was MINE and that it didn't matter and that would be sad.

Thankfully there were times, far too brief as some points, where she did reach back, where it did not feel fake or for an audience or manipulative.

It has been somewhat settled and what I guess is real life kind of relatively happy normal - but I do feel the urge to erase that, after looking furtively behind me to see if I have just alerted the trauma winds to our presence.

I have not written because I also hate the idea of the one sided representation that I give of our family, of my children, of myself.

It really is unfair to give what is only my perspective and only from that chunk of time and present that to world as what my family is really like.

My kids are great, we do have so many great days and they forgive me sooooooooooooooooooo much and deal with my struggles to be a good parent...
and we laugh.

I am so thankful we laugh.

Too often I don't sit down to write about my youngest daughter's burgeoning sense of humour, her sly puns, her growing and strengthening relationship with her sister and her loss and fear and confusion as she sees her brother, my youngest son, begin that journey of becoming a teenager and in some ways leaving her behind.

You haven't heard about my youngest son's increasing periods of cuddling, of curling up against me of giving me kisses on the cheek, of cracking up so hard over something funny I said that he is a danger to himself if he is eating or drinking.

Older daughter is emerging slowly but surely, shaking out and drying those fragile, damp butterfly wings of who she is. Knowing more about how to handle things like the dark waves of depression, having more insight sometimes at 14 than I have at 41.

Oldest son is almost easy to take for granted because he is there and does what is needed and is both older than and younger than his years in surprising ways. He accepts with dignity and equanimity his place as oldest child and often takes on more responsibility than he needs to or should. He is a fine young man.

Finally I wonder about my right to my children's lives.
They are mine, with every breath and beat of my heart, they are mine but very importantly, I must recognize and respect that they are their own and their stories are their own and how I traverse that awareness and the need to share my story, is something I have been struggling with.

They all know about my blogs, this one and my photo one, and I don't think they read them on their own and ....

I don't want to put aside this blog, it and my other one Building The Bigger Family, mean so much to me and have brought me friends and an important support system, but posting will not happen much until I find the right way for me to do it.

Of letters and feathery things.

2008-04-25T15:40:00.001-07:00

Our canary, Izzy, is currently alive and well ( that is the sound of heartfelt and vehement knocking on wood that you hear).

In face, the avian vet (thanks for suggesting that fosterabba, he was worth every penny of the $72 exam) says that he is actually quite a big and robust canary.

The vet also figures that he probably won't drop dead just from being exposed to me.
(This is good to hear because I was, you know, beginning to wonder.)

Our air quality report ($140) came back and we rated as average for fungus and bacteria - most of it probably brought into the house from the outside ---- but since I ran out and bought a true hepa filter air cleaner ($120), I'm going to darn well believe it has improved.

Bird lady has been kept up to date and is calmer. Yay!

AAAAANNNNDDDDD, screechin in on the heels of that fun stuff ---- in other news....we just received a package of letters and cards from Birthmom.

Our first ever direct-ish contact with her.
Between just you and I?
It freaks me out.

She calls them her angels, our youngest daugher is her princess, she wants them to write to her and to send them pictures...and she wants to see them in less than a month and I don't want her to be in their lives that fast and that intensely and......I sound a little resentful and whiny don't I?

Probably, because I am, a little.

Birth Grandma gave me a heads up that the mail was coming and I sent a three page letter and pictures off to the government office that deals with this....
now I will send off another short one with better pictures...

and try and deal with the fall out, obvious and not so obvious that is shaken loose for my youngest two.

Having contact is the RIGHT thing.
It is the only thing - as long as the kids are not at any kind of actual physical risk - and I don't think they will be...

but oh, I wish I could protect them and me and us and...

I'm a little afraid, because I feel like, especially with our youngest, that we are so tenuous so much of the time...we are just beginning to really connect...

Big, calming breath in.
I'll spend a few minutes getting over myself (hah! or years) and go and make dinner.

For the birds...

2008-04-15T18:41:00.000-07:00

Currently we have:

2 dead canaries buried in the front garden

and

1 live canary in the house

and

1 very unhappy,elderly bird woman who wants the live canary back now so that we don't "kill another one of her birds"

and

four children who are attached to the only bird that was robust enough to live and are afraid that if he goes back he will die and that don't want him to go back anyway because they are attached to him. (His name is Izzy by the way.)

and

two very painful phonecalls with a fair share of spiteful recriminations and tears thrown in

and

now I will be calling an air quality inspection place to come and moniter our air quality and send the results to her to try and mollify her

and

one woman who would cheerfully pack up the sweet little bird who is still alive and drop everything in the bird woman's lap and not look back except for the aforementioned four children

and

their eight fear filled eyes that are watching my every move

and the moral is, and of course there is a moral -
don't get animals from a possible animal hoarder, and if you ignore your inner warning bells about it, then be prepared to deal with the consequences which may be even bigger than...
dead pets, heartbroken children but may also include -

not attending your camera club because bird lady is a member

and

make your running club awkward because one of your running friends is how you met the bird lady in the first place

and

feeling like throwing up,

a lot.

after the weekend

2008-04-07T06:41:00.000-07:00

Morning, before the kids are up and things are....a little better here than the last time I posted.

Then, it was nearly midnight and I was hunched over my laptop at the top of the stairs, trying to make sense of how two tiny creatures in MY care had died and how I was going to deal with that fall out with my kids.

I don't think I had yet realized that I had to deal with my own feelings about it all and I really did.

For better or for worse, I am a care giver and no matter what else has happened in my life I have clung to the belief that I am the best I can be when it comes to doing that and that by now, I'm pretty good at it - at least when it comes to pets.

Complacency can really bite you in the butt in a very HARD way.

I should have done the research on Canaries first, before they ever crossed the lintel into the house.

I should not have expected the research I had done on finches and the experience we did have with a cockatiel and the information provided by the hobby breeder lady who gave them to us to be enough to go on.
From everything I have learned in the past day, through that research that I should have done in the beginning...my best guess is that the poor little critters keeled over from stress. That the same conditions that they lived in at the Bird Lady's house just didn't work for them here.
At her house, they all live in small cages, usually with more than one bird to a cage and although that works for her, it is highly unusual for it to work for most canaries because other than in the breeding season, they are highly territorial birds and they don't want to be near each other.

The last and final canary, the one that was brought over only two days after the first male died...is actually doing very, very well. He is thrilled to have his own, big cage and sings and sings and sings and is the very freaking picture of unstressed health - eating well, drinking well and flitting and twittering and generally charming the heck out of the household.

About my littlest girl.
Sometimes she is better, there are times, minutes even where she forgets to be a princess made of solid ice. It is just the run up to her birthday is sooooooooooooooooooooooooooo excruciatingly difficult for her and therefore on every other person around her.

There are times when I am horrified to say that I don't like her, even a little bit.

I LOVE her but oh, I don't like her. She is not at all likeable, except of course in front of other people.

If my husband did not see and recognize that she is crazy making and manipulative - I would likely go nuts because every other adult sees this adorable, cute little person that I am lucky to have.

It is hard to have a kid that you don't like, that you sometimes, briefly wish had never become your problem, because you just don't feel like you are making any headway.

It makes you take hard looks at parts of yourself you just never want to see.

But maybe this crisis of a weekend was a good turning point for her.
Saturday, she was unbelievably quiet and restrained and Sunday, she was very much like a normal kid would be.

Maybe it is because her birthday is tomorrow and we are nearly over that terrible time.

Maybe it won't last.
Maybe it will.

Thanks for all your kind comments. They helped.
A lot.

without wings

2008-04-04T22:27:00.000-07:00

Tough day here.

At shortly before 3pm, I loaded my two youngest into the van to take them to the park and take pictures and play. My cel phone rang before I could pull away from our front curb and I could hear my oldest daughter's panicky voice talking about her pet bird having just fallen off her perch and was dead.

This is the second bird in as many weeks.

We are a bit shattered and in no small part because we just don't know WHY.

Four weeks ago we got a pair of canaries for my oldest daughter, two weeks and a hundred and thirty dollars in emergency vet bills later, the male died. We couldn't figure out why. We went over everything again and again.

The lady who gave us the pair, brought over another little male a few days later and gave us detailed instructions on helping the new pair - and she went over everything that might have caused a problem too - there was nothing any of us could figure out.

They were kept clean, they had fresh water and food everyday, they were covered at night, they were warm enough, had fresh veggies, played them classical music....

My poor girl.
She is so devastated.
She had just been sitting and watching them for an hour or so, when the little female gave an odd sound, fluttered her wings and fell to the bottom of the cage dead.

Now we have one.
I want to send him back to the Bird Lady he came from, I am so fearful he will die too.

Normally, I would say we are good with pets. We love them, we don't stint on their care, they are a huge part of our lives but right now I feel a little like we have been cursed.

It was made even more awful by my youngest daughter, who can not stand to have attention given to anyone else much of the time and now, as we lead up to her birthday she is barely holding together emotionally. She struggled desperately to make the drama all about her.
And I am already sick to death of her because she is caught up in making sure I don't go anywhere without her and if I do she makes everyone else (particularly her siblings) suffer till I come back. She stares at me and follows me constantly except when we are out at a social function and then she acts like I don't exist. I must be under her control at all times and I must prove over and over again that I won't leave but she is going to do everything in her power to make me miserable so I will leave.

And we lowered her ADHD med dosage so she is far more unfocused and impulsive, because she wasn't sleeping hardly at all and looked like a zombie for the last few weeks.

Her bio brother is taking his cue from her and they are winding each other up into high pitched, frenzied giggling behaviours that go on and on and have no point or meaning.

Oh and our guinea pig has cancer.
Seven years old, which is like incredibly freaking old for a gpig.
BTW, a vet checkup, xray and antibiotics for a guinea pig, that is 270 bucks that was Wednesday.

Sigh.

Same old, same old - just really intense right now.

Did I mention that I am training for a 50k run.
Because I am nuts?
But if I don't train for it, I think I will go nuts that much faster?

Not all bad, not by a long shot.

Just tired, and sad and tired, and rubbed raw and tired and overwhelmed by a world where little birds die for no apparent reason, little girls are left behind by their Moms and don't/can't even begin to process it.

Deep

2008-03-05T20:24:00.000-08:00

It says so right in my sidebar: "lots of anxieties".

That about sums me up for the past month and a bit.

Thinking about parenting, forgiveness, relationships, change, trauma and coping.

A very long time ago, I accepted that being angry at either of my parents for the things (physical and emotional abuse, mild neglect and being left in the care of se/xual predators) that happened to me was pointless, useless and self destructive.

Unfortunately knowing all of that still doesn't make dealing with the fallout that much easier sometimes.

It creeps up on me, and often I don't see it coming at all.
Sometimes I can be in the middle of ....sadness or anger or exhaustion or some other emotional reaction and be just a bit more over the top than is absolutely reasonable for the circumstance and...I will suddenly figure out that in part I am reacting to something from a completely different time. Other times? I don't figure it out until well after.

For me, I think that is the hardest part of all.
Knowing that I probably will never fully be able to prevent that from happening.
Things were stolen from me when I was small and powerless, and although I am big and strong now, those thefts have left an indelible mark on me.

Yeah.

2008-01-31T10:59:00.001-08:00

I am still in my pajamas!
It is one minute before noon.
They are pink flannel pajamas with cows and moons on them, the shirt part has a cartoon cow with a night cap on and the words Pasture Bedtime on it.

Three of my kids are in the basement playroom.
I have no idea what they are doing, except that a moment ago, Oldest Son came up and said, "Hey, OD and YS are bonding in the basement."
After turning that over in my head carefully to make sure that he hadn't said that there was "bondage" going on - I said "Oh...is that a good thing?".

He gave me a weird look and said that yeah of course it was and then back down he went.

The fourth kid, YD is on the computer playing something, I'm not sure what and I really don't know if I am going to go and check, and has been for an hour.

I have done absolutely no working out, but I did eat a delicious poached egg on toast with a goat cheese bechamel sauce, and I have no plans to make lunch anytime soon.

It is oddly contenting (I know I made it up and no it doesn't mean camping with convicts) to know that I have nothing to do for the rest of the day.

Okay, yeah the kid's bathroom upstairs really does need some work but I don't actually have to leave the house until about 5:45pm.

Ahhhhhhhh.

I don't actually want to think about going out tonight.
In keeping with my theme of all glamour all the time, my husband and I have an appointment with our marriage counsellor - wooohoooo.
It's been going okay, at least up until the last session two weeks ago.
During which the therapist got all "you are a traumatized person" on me.

Like, I know - I was the one who told her.
I've done the tour - out patient, month long every day intensive group therapy, followed up with 7 months of weekly one on one.
Been there and relived that and it isn't the kind of thing that you forget.

Besides what being a traumatized person has to do with me talking about something that my husband does that drives me crazy - other than make me feel that what I am saying isn't valid and that everything that goes wrong in our relationship is all my fault - I don't know.

Seriously though it knocked me for a loop and hard.

I know a fair amount about who I am and why.

I don't like people touching me, unless I really know them and feel we have a trusting relationship.
I don't deal well with being startled by loud noises or being bumped into, it takes a huge amount of control to manage my flight or fight impulses in those cases.
I NEVER want to live that life of being powerless and victimized, ever again.

I also want everyone to like me and I want to make everyone happy and I want to inspect everything and every interaction completely and exhaustively to make sure that I am not the cause of other people's unhappiness. I am way too hard on myself because I think that somehow being perfect or as close to it as possible will give me some sort of a sense of control over my life. Which I know is artificial but that is where it is at.

A blog post, only not here

2008-01-28T11:08:00.000-08:00

"But we have to go out to the park this afternoon, don't we?".

You have to forgive her, Oldest Daughter only just got up, yes, it is ten minutes after noon, but that is just the way it is.

Nope. We don't have to go anywhere today. Not when it's minus 30.5 C before you even factor in the windchill, and you should and the roads are still a disaster from the storm yesterday.

She sighs a big, breathy gust of relief.

A good sign.

She is even supportive of this picture and post over at my 365 blog (a photo a day for the year).

Maybe you will be too.

Regular Programming

2008-01-23T13:34:00.000-08:00

My husband took the story book I had just read to the congregation, out of my hands - as I was on my way down to teach Sunday School.

He smiled a happy, little smile as he looked from it up to me and I shrugged and left it with him.

Last night, he brought it into the kitchen where our 14 year old daughter was poking about and asked her if he could read it to her.

"DAD!!" She said in that loud, aggrieved way that only teenagers in the centre of the heart of darkness can.

"Just a page or two," he begged, "and if you really can't stand it, that will be it...okay?"

He told her about how when he saw it at church, it brought back so many memories of him reading it to her when she was little and that she was still his little girl and he would like to read it to her again.

Perched side by side on the tall stools in the kitchen, he carefully read each page - "Katy was a beautiful red crawler tractor. She was very big and very strong and she could do a lot of things." Then he would tell our daughter how he loved that description and it always made him think of her.

Sitting on the couch in the living room, I could overhear all this
and
I
was
so
moved.

That this man realizes the gift that he has in his children and takes the time to show them how much he loves them.

How lucky they are and how right this is.

Blog For Choice LOOK AWAY! But isn't that the problem right there in a nutshell?

2008-01-22T07:25:00.000-08:00

How many years ago was it?
I know actually, how many years, how many months, how many days - I am not stupid and despite what I was told from the beginning, I have never been stupid.

I have been young, ignorant, unaware, overwhelmed and in over my head - struggling with the fallout of being sexually, physically and emotionally abused.

I spent too much time trying to find my value in what other people thought of me.
But I didn't know it at the time.

I thought that was what I was supposed to do, try and make other people happy no matter what it cost.

That is what I had been trained to do.

I have been pregnant when I didn't want to be.

And I made choices as to what to do about it, that were based on everything I knew about myself and all my experiences.

No one else could do that. No one else should do that.
The presumption that anyone else could or should, is about controlling and owning someone else's body and that is slavery.

Be it an individual who wants to do that or a church or the state.
And that is shameful.

I don't see abortions as shameful.

Private, yes.

Emotionally excoriating, yes.

But so have each of the times that I have chosen to have children.

Even if I had grown up in the most supportive of families and societies, with love and support and knowledge of risks and how to stay safe - even if I had been that woman - perhaps a woman like my daughters will grow up to be - even then -

the decisions about my body should be mine.

I'm glad it was, I will fight for it to be that way for other women now and in the future.

respite

2008-01-20T19:37:00.000-08:00

I would give my eye teeth (whatever they are, I will look it up sometime) for respite care.

Or some other not completely essential part of my anatomy could be put to the cause.

But I won't send my kids out for it.
I can't.
I have nothing against families and providers who offer respite in their homes, it is just not the right fit for my kids and my family.

So that leaves us with in house care and I just don't have that.

Or rather I do, My friend N. is experienced and capable and likes the kids and knows them and they know her and are comfortable with her - but she is not available and probably won't be for a while because of family issues.

For now we will just have to hold steady I guess and try and forge ahead.

We even have funding for it, that it isn't a problem, which is nice of course - it is just trying to figure out where to find someone who meets all the above criteria.

It would be great if that happened sometime soon - before I get stretched too thin.

Good Morning Mom

2008-01-19T08:36:00.001-08:00

When my youngest child calls those words at me down the stairs - my inner response is usually one of irritation, or anger or resignation.

Sick? Yeah.

But if that is what you're thinking, you probably don't have a kid with the gaping holes in her attachment like mine has.

At least, I think it is mostly the attachment troubles that are at the root of most of her manipulative behaviours.

For my daughter, the good morning almost never seems to be a genuine greeting. More, it is a throwing down of a gauntlet. Sometimes I get the sense that she is angry or annoyed that I am up and downstairs, possibly spending time with someone other than her.

A big chunk of it could be all in my head too - I know that and I want to work on it some more except that sometimes I also just don't want to have too.

Deeply moving and thoughtful post, huh?

A step forward

2008-01-17T11:05:00.000-08:00

Last night was something of a near miracle for my house.

My youngest daughter managed to get to sleep and stay asleep through the night - and this after a phonecall from Obie. He was calling from jail, he is in solitary confinement right now.
His phonecalls often have an upsetting effect on YD.
She is frustrated beyond compare that he hasn't clued into drugs and alcohol are bad things and get him into trouble.
The first time she realized that he "used", her mouth dropped open in shock. "Didn't he learn anything from what happened with our birth parents?!?".

When she woke up this morning, she told me that she was very upset and angry and wanted some "couch time" with me to help her talk about it.

Wow.

That is amazing.
And it didn't stop there.

She ended by saying that she was so glad that she could talk about this kind of thing, because she didn't think it was good for her or anyone not to be in control of their emotions.

Remember folks, this is the kid that I could barely muster up any "like" for last week.
I will hasten to repeat what I said last week, I LOVE her, just had trouble "liking" her.

Darling Boy

2008-01-10T07:30:00.000-08:00

I am full of contradictions about him.

I wish I could have held him from his first moment, yet how he came to be my son is an important story and journey wouldn't want to change.

He is mine.

And now he is twelve years old.
A year and a half and the second birthday since I met him.

"Next year, I will be a teenager Mom!" Grinning slyly, dancing around me.

"No you won't! Not if I refuse to accept that, now shut up and don't talk about it anymore! You are my little boy!" Turning my back to him, or leaving the room.

He wants to be a cook, to move to another province, another country, to travel to learn - all when he "grows up".

But, "I will come back Mom, I will only go away for a little while at at time."

He'd better.

Because I can already see, in the set of his twelve year old shoulders and that strong chin that he is going to keep growing up.
No matter that I haven't had him as my child for anywhere near long enough.

I am so proud of him.

Happy Birthday my bright eyed boy.
Oh how I love you.
Don't grow too fast, okay? We have time to make up.

joint's a jumping

2008-01-08T20:47:00.000-08:00

This morning, I left the children in the waiting room and dashed into the playtherapist's office, flung myself on the overstuffed couch and demanded that she tell me whether or not my littlest girl was one of the most manipulative creatures on the face of the earth or not.

Pathetic of me, I know.

But I don't care, because when she laughed and reassured me that it was indeed the case, I felt a weight lift off of me and I was able to, almost immediately, become a better parent again.

So few people get it what it is like to swim with a shark 24/7 when everyone around you is cooing at it like it is a baby duck.

And after a while, my coping technique of "screw 'em and feed 'em fisheads" just doesn't cut it.

So at breakfast time, I didn't like the kid, didn't know how I was going to manage for the next ten minutes without snarling at her or running away from her and by lunch time was capable of not just loving her but liking her too.

That ain't a bad thing.

Youngest son is winding himself up, his birthday is Thursday and that would be an intense time for anyone who has been through the fostercare/loss of birth family warp that he has - except his is even more intense because it is also the 4th anniversary of his bmom going AWOL and he and his sister being taken into fostercare.
He is holding up pretty darn well, considering - even using words to come and tell me about his fear of losing everything that hits him hard around this time each year. What a kid.
Anyway, I figured out that going out to a photography club meeting on the evening of his birthday might not be a wise idea and when I checked that out with him today, his eyes went very wide - "I would freak RIGHT OUT!".
Yeah. I get it.
I am staying home.
No skin of my nose.

Having both the older kids home is ssooooooo damn nice.
Love it, don't know if I will ever be ready for them to be gone away again.
Hoping to make more time to spend with them on a weekly and daily basis.

Oh and I did okay on the not yelling anymore thing, except, um....on Sunday night when I ended up shrieking at my husband.

So, so far 0 yelling at the kids, 1 yelling at the husband.
Sigh.

And I gained two pounds.
Dang it.

But like, it doesn't actually matter either.
This weight thing does weird things to my brain.

Okay, I think my brain was kind of weird to begin with.
But I want to stop buying and eating products with aspartame in it.
I don't think it is good for me.

Hopefully going for an outside run tomorrow, if it all works out.
Husband had his first day of teaching students at the local post secondary institution today.
It was a big deal for him and I am proud of him.
He is sort of the professor to my gilligan.

pinging someone else's bandwidth

2008-01-06T20:14:00.001-08:00

Is it wrong to catch a free ride on someone else's wireless internet connection?

Okay, so I am doing that right now, if I wasn't I couldn't post at all - ours is down, for whatever reason, and until and if the repair person shows up tomorrow - we are without.

Except um, there are unprotected networks all around me...
and I am thinking about it as I opportunistically blog away.

And since I am asking ponderables, does it count calorie wise, if you chew a food, say milk chocolate covered almonds and then spit it out?
Not that I have done it or am even really and truly considering it - just wondering, you know, if anyone has ever had a research grant for this kind of thing?

Another thing, where is my self control at anyway? I have been looking around for it and it just isn't here, not in the kitchen, not between the couch cushions....very annoying - especially as I really could have a used it last night when I snorfed down an entire (170g) bag of gummi candy.
If you are keeping count that is 10 points over my actual allowed amount of W8 watcher points!
Tomorrow is my weigh in day. Urgh. Will those gummies come back to haunt me?

Ooooh. And guess what I am listening to?
Go ahead, guess.
No.
Okay, Cyndi Lauper sing Torch Songs from her album At Last.
Oddly compelling, she can sing and with an accent.
Sometimes I find some of her interpretations of these standards kind of annoying, but I am in just the right mood for it today and have had it on extreme replay.

What have you been listening to lately?

Status

2008-01-05T13:14:00.000-08:00

There is a weepy, adolescent girl lying on the couch beside me.
Last night she called in tears because she was feeling ill and didn't know what to do and felt guilty about leaving her brother to do dog/house sitting on his own.

Cabana Boy went and bundled her home.
She has the flu and she was homesick and hadn't been sleeping well the last few nights.
Now, I think her weepiness is a combination of hormones and low blood sugar (because her stomach and hurts and she feels barfy, so she hasn't been eating) - I have been wondering about hypoglycemia and if that could be a problem for her. Something to look up.

On Monday I will be trying to set her up with a new therapist.

My youngest daughter has been much on my mind lately.
Sometimes I worry about where she is really at.
How much of her behaviours are organic?
Is she Fetal Alcohol Spectrum disordered?
Is it learned behaviours? Coping mechanisms?

There are moments when she is staggeringly bright, asks thoughtful questions, comes out with astute observations and others where she seems - I don't know - utterly and completely locked into being four years old on all possible levels.

The four years old part makes a lot of sense, because that was the age she was taken into care at.

It is hard because I just don't know.

Of course it being the holiday season, it isn't exactly the best time to be expecting her to be at her best.

Cause, you know, I'm not, particularly hitting all my spots either.

The youngest son is doing well, he got a little wound up yesterday after Obie called to tell us that he had been thrown out of his motel (the home that the government has provided him with) and so now he has to go back to jail.

Yeah.

He is fourteen years old.
And I feel so damn helpless.

Our sixteen year old called this morning, he is feeling gross, so Cabana Boy went over to stay with him.
Armed with Pepto Bismal, acetaminiphen and ginger ale.

small plans

2008-01-04T07:18:00.000-08:00

No yelling yesterday...although it is still too early to make any promises about this day.

Truthfully it would have been difficult to yell yesterday given my choices. My two oldest children are still away dog/house sitting and oh! how I am looking forward to them coming home in two days - for many reasons but even just because their two dachshunds will then no longer take up all the room on my bed at night.

My youngest daughter was up barfing late on Wednesday night, so much time was spent lying about in her pjs and robe and staring at Sesame Street dvds. The old shows that I remember from being a kid. She wasn't up for doing much that might cause me to yell at her. Although I did try to bribe her 5 buck to wake Dad up from now on, when she is sick in the middle of the night - she just laughed at me.

Youngest son was quiet and low key, his highlight of the day was watching more Have Gun Will Travel episodes with Dad and I, and there was popcorn too.
He will be 12 so very soon.
Seven days to go, I think. When he gets up this morning, I am sure he will let me know.

My hope is to spend the next hour getting organised, our schedule is filling back up again and then get the kids up and feed and medicate them.

A picture of light and snow. Two things that I love about where I live.

Oh Woe Isn't me.

2008-01-02T11:50:00.000-08:00

No laptop of my own since the black screen of death.
Waiting to hear back from the apple store to hear what the diagnosis is.

No place to download my pictures to. Especially since I have been playing with my new flash!

Consoling myself with vietnamese food and good company.
And warm puppies and the insane game my oldest daughter gave me for use on the Wii and the the Dance Dance Revolution Game that Santa brought.

It has been odd with my two oldest children literally living away from home for the last week as they dog/house sit. I miss them and find to my slight surprise that they are managing just fine - thank you very much.

I didn't mean to blink and miss it when they became capable and nearly utterly independent.

Things are going fairly well on the not yelling front, of course we do have a house guest so...um...that kind of limits me in an artificial way.
Hopefully it will continue on anyway after his departure.

Ran a bit today and signed up to try and run the 50k again in May.
Up to 17lbs on the weight loss scene.

I still don't think I look different but one of my running friends mentioned to me this morning that my running tights, um, aren't tight.

Being me, I now worry that I will continue to whittle away, my legs and butt becoming thinner and thinner and my large shoulders, chest and mid section staying the same and I will become the frightening wedge shaped woman.

Okay, I have better things to do than imagine this kind of thing.
Happiest of New Year tidings to you all!

Mostly about tp holding

2007-12-31T12:15:00.000-08:00

On yelling- if I do my posts first thing every morning, I should be able to truthfully say that I haven't yet screamed at anyone that day.
Honest but very carefully fine tuned.

On toilet paper roll holders-these type seem very popular wherever I go-heh- you know kind of like a bent thick wire mounted on the wall. They are pretty enough to look at, I guess, you know, if there isn't any reading material available...but I don't know, I can't seem to get the hang of them. Anytime I pull off any of the necessary paper, the whole darn roll goes flying across the bathroom and then bounces and rolls. I don't know, maybe it is just me.

Actually this one I got a picture of is quite pretty.

Using Google to try and find a picture yeilded quite a few that weren't quite as sartorial.

Fer instance:

High fashion shouldn't really have anything to do with toilet paper roll holding but I can see why this picture popped up:

black screen

2007-12-30T18:50:00.000-08:00

I almost actually yelled twice today.
Volume went up but I managed to get it under control - which was good because I was barking up the wrong tree and it is a lot easier to come back from doing something like that when you haven't been shouting.

Now I can't guarantee that I will not be yelling for the rest of the evening.
My Mac*book just went to the black screen of death.
The good news is that it is under the extended warantee so any repairs are free - but they will take time and I don't know if I will have all of the material on it when it comes back.

I do have a back up that is a few months old but not new enough to keep me easy in my mind about the literally hundreds of photos that I don't have copies of.

So anyway, I have a headache now and a trip to my local Mac dealer in the morning.

I am using my darling husband's laptop to post.
We are watching the first episode of an old western tv show Have Gun Will Travel.
My older kids love it, I think my youngest son will too...but I am not so sure about how my younger daughter is doing with it.

Ahh, she just went and got paper and markers - not a bad coping strategy when it comes to sitting through a show she isn't quite understanding.

She is the one that keeps me guessing as to where she is at.
I think she keeps herself confused too.

The older daughter is doing all right.
She and oldest son aren't home much right now, they are staying and taking care of some lovely dogs of one of my running friends.
Big screen tv, lots of food and they get to take the wii game system with them too.
And if the dogs are happy and healthy at the end of my friend's vacation and given all the attention and affection they are getting, why wouldn't they be - my two will be richly compensated.
Not a bad gig if you can get it.
And good for my kids to try their wings out in the world a little without their Mom hanging over them all the time.
I have actually been surprised by how easily they are managing.

I see the future.

No More Yelling.

2007-12-29T06:23:00.000-08:00

Just because I haven't been writing, doesn't mean I have been thinking about writing.

It is just that when all my posts seem to start with "I am a big dork", it is a little disheartening.

No, there isn't an interesting or comedic story to go with that "dork" statement - just my personal state of being.

I turned 41 this past Dec. 25th.
Nothing wrong with that, but like many, many other people I find this time of year HARD.

Having a birthday in the mix often doesn't help.
All that reflux of past years, all the reminders of what I wish could be, of what I don't have.

Don't I sound like someone you would want to hang out with by the lighted tree?

Now having said that, I must also say that this year has been possibly the one I have coped with the best in possibly all my adulthood.

I have done more actual thinking than wallowing.
And more thinking than being angry.
Both items to be marked down on the plus side of the ledger.

So although I am still sad and conflicted and wishful about:
-my dad and brothers having Christmas with their families, five miles from my house, as I gape in open mouthed wonder at how my Dad, the physically, mentally abusive alcoholic that he his, managed to pull off being the one who somehow managed to keep my brothers loyalty and affection and I didn't - despite feeling like I was the third parent.
-my Mom and her husband choosing to go to Las Vegas for Christmas, despite now actually living close enough to celebrate together for the first time in 23 years
-none of my family (of origin) phoning to wish me a Happy Birthday (or alternately, to beg my forgiveness for all they have ever done wrong (real or imaginary) and to throw themselves on the absolute heartbreaking beauty of my compassionate mercy (of which, need I even say it, I have copious amounts that I use generously)
-why do I even make myself nuts over this stuff, when I have a perfectly lovely family of my own to spend time with?

Wow.
The list is a little whiny but still I am glad to have put it down in writing, it makes it all feel a little clearer and less hidden away in the murk recesses.

It is what it is.
Wishing it would go away isn't going to work.
Shining a light on it might help though.

And it might help me with my big old New Year's Resolution too.
I want to stop yelling at my kids and my husband.

One of my natural gifts is a natural ability to PROJECT.
I am LOUD.
This does have certain uses in crowded situations and that kind of thing.
It is also absolutely something I use to express my anger.

I think I am a bit of a bully when it comes right down to it.
And I want that to stop.
So far this Christmas I have subjected each of the people in my house to my shrieking in rage or frustration.
Not proud of that, it embarrasses me and I want to stop.

I am thinking of using this blog as a tool to try and track it, when I do it, when I don't, why, that kind of thing.
We will see how it works out.