I've Been Tagged (I think)

Okay, so Mom's Baggage (see link to the side) has tagged me, I think. I've never done this before so I am unsure how to go about it. It's supposed to be a MeMe post of Thursday Thirteens (although I am a day late), so here goes.

I am: Very happy I got an A on my final
I want: Lunch, I skipped it to go get a manicure
I have: a wonderful family, even though they are very irritable today
I wish: My house would sell soon.
I hate: When people are moody all the time
I miss: having our own house.
I hear: Typing and muffled talking (I work in an office)
I wonder: what my kids will grow up to be
I regret: not going to college right after high school
I am not: as organized as I would like
I dance: very badly.
I sing: in the car, mostly when I'm alone.
I am not always: neat
I make with my hands: meals and desserts when I can.
I journal: By blogging and Scrapbooking
I confuse: my husband
I need: a vacation
I should: be working right now :)
I start: any thing that interests me.
I finish: just about everything, it just may take me forever.

I'll tag three of the blogs I read regularly, which are Hick's, Mike's and Cathy's.

Daily Report

Teacher's comment on my Aspie son's daily report:

"Mr. 'I love mornings' ended up having a good day"

:)

Happenings

Whew it's been a whorlwind year. My oldest son got his driver's license. This is both good and bad. It's good because I don't have to do near as much running around. It's bad because I worry and because he's growing up too fast :(. He went to a dance at school last weekend and drove his girlfriend in his uncle's camero. My youngest asked me if they were dating. When I told him yes he replied "I thought they were just going to a dance" :).

My youngest son just tested for his green belt in Taekwondo. He will be so pround when he finds out how he did next week. The school has sent me a letter about a meeting next week. They want us to consider counseling for him. I'm not sure that is such a great idea. I'm scared to let them send him to their therapist who I know nothing about. At least if I turn them down, I can choose my own (if necessary) who will have experience with Asperger's. He has been doing so well this year that I'm afraid to mess it up in any way.

On a good note, I get to go Christmas shopping next weekend with my cousin and I will actually have a little bit of money. I got their big presents out of the way too so that is a big load off my mind.

Fall

I just love this time of year. Fall is definitely my favorite season. It is so nice not to have a 120 degree heat index everyday, and I love the trees when they start changing their colors and the leaves start falling. We are staying at our in-law's while we are in the process of selling our house and looking for a new one. She has a wrap around porch with a swing on it. It is so nice to sit out there every night. I've decided my next house will definitely have to have a porch with a swing on it.

We have been so busy lately. It gets this way every fall and every year I say I am going to tone it down some, but it never happens. In addition to working and going to school (me), my oldest is working, going to school, and playing football. That means two games a week because he is on the JV and the varsity teams. Six more weeks and he will be driving. I don't know if that will be a good thing or a bad thing. I won't be stressed out from all the running around as much, but I will be stressed from all the worrying about him being on the road.

My youngest is doing Taekwondo so that's another two days a week of activities. We have finally got our house on the market. No bites yet but I'm hoping it will sell pretty quick so we can start saving for a new home.

I have an exam and an essay due at the same time this Friday so I have been cramming like crazy. I guess it keeps me on my toes, but I will have to do something fun and relaxing this weekend after this week is over. It is the beginning of hunting season here so my husband and oldest son will be gone. That should make it a little more peaceful.

Summer

Boy this has been a crazy, busy summer. My younger Aspie son went to Taekwondo camp for a week. That was interesting because it was the first time he has ever been away from home.

The week after that we all went to Disneyworld and took my neice with us. We had a blast. My teenager fell in "love" for the first time (in a while anyway). Lucky for us she lives in a different state :) My Aspie son summed up the rides at Disneyworld. He rode his first roller coaster and loved it. He told his grandmother he really did not like the "It's a Small World" ride. When she asked him why he said "It's a lot of nice little people doing the same thing over and over again; they will definitely go to heaven."

My oldest son has been playing football again which takes up most of our time now. When I have a few minutes maybe I can catch up some more...

Real Life Conversation

This is a real life conversation riding in the car with my aspie son in a traffic jam:

son: "Where are all these people coming from anyway?"

me: "Well, there are a lot of people that live in our city."

son: "How many people?"

me: "Well, I'm not sure exactly how many."

son: "Well, why don't you know, they do that thing every few years where they count all the people in the world."

Busy Busy Busy

Whew it's been crazy at my house lately and it's only going to get worse from here. School starts back for me Monday so I can add that to the confusion we already have. And here I thought summers are supposed to be boring. In addition to working full time I am now in the middle of moving, starting back to school, teaching a teenager to drive, and teaching my aspie son to wash his own hair so that he can do that for himself while at summer camp in less than two weeks.

Our teenager is driving us crazy learning to drive. He was a perfect driver BEFORE getting the permit, now that he has it he has turned into a road monster. It's like ha ha ha, I passed I can do what I want, I know what I'm doing, and don't try to tell me something I already know. The first day he had his permit I decided to let him drive me around the city for a while. For the first half hour he did very well. He had both hands on the wheel, elbows out, sitting up straight and totally focused on the road. The second half hour however was a different story. He had one hand on the wheel, slouched back in the seat and totally paying attention to how many girls were paying attention to him. If I live through this it will be a miracle. My hubby came storming home with him last night and very firmly announced, "That boy is not to get behind the wheel again, ever." After the typical "he tried to kill me" and my personal favorite "he said it's everyone else's fault but his" I very calmly tried to explain to my husband that our son will never learn to drive correctly without killing anyone until we teach him how to do it. Of course, getting a teenager to believe that mom and dad do know a little bit about driving, and that maybe they don't quite know everything yet, is a whole other ballgame I don't want to get into yet.

My aspie son only has nine days to go before camp starts. I've tried to prepare the counseler as much as possible what to expect. Now I'm working on preparing my son. He is having to learn to wash his own hair because for some reason, the camp counselers don't want him to wait six days until I can do it for him :) This week he started day camp and the Y and has started testing it to see how he can get sent home so he won't have to go back. I had already prepared the director of the camp before my son started. So when my son announced the other day that he didn't know why he was acting up, that "his brain just made him do it", and that if he just got wrote up three times he could go home, the director looked at him and said "uh uh, I ain't writing you up, you ain't leaving". I think he's met his match.

Happy Mother's Day

It is almost Mother's Day so for all you other mother's out there I hope you have a very special Mother's Day. I love that we have this day to recognize our mothers and to be recognized ourselves for all that we do.

I was sitting here tonight playing Spider Solitaire thinking of when my youngest son was first diagnosed with autism six and a half years ago, only a parent who has been through it knows the grief you must first go through before you can move forward. I was having some work done on my office PC and the technician working on it had been to my cube several times before. I knew he was a christian, but I really did not know him at all that well. I mentioned that my son had just been diagnosed and I will never forget his words to me that day; He paused what he was doing as if searching for his words and he said, "God must have thought you were a special person". I will never forget that moment and when times start getting rough I think back on his words to me and it always helped me through.

I know that God spoke through him that day to me to let me know that he is there with us on this journey. To all of you other "special" mothers, and to all mothers and want to be mothers have a wonderful Mother's Day and God Bless You and your families.

Pins & Needles

Everything that ever happens to me seems to come in droves. It is impossible for things to happen individually for me. That would be too easy.

Last week I noticed a position open at work that I am interested in. I have been in my current position for six years and I am ready for a change. I applied for it in the middle of the week. They called me the very next day and wanted me to interview that day. Of course I was not dressed for an interview that day, so I rushed home at lunch to change clothes. The interview went really well and now I am on pins and needles awaiting their decision.

I have also decided to go back to school this summer. I had taken a year off because my son was having problems in school. While I was appyling for the position online, I was on the phone with the college to get re-enrolled. I went to meet with an advisor Friday and she was very rude. She asked me if I was on the twenty year plan, this was after I told her I have a full time job, a husband, two kids (one of which is Asperger's), and so on. I wanted to have some sarcastic retort, but I was not sure who she was in the department so I did not want to step on any toes that I may need to carry me later. I am so glad I kept my mouth shut because, as it turns out, she was a professor in the department and in charge of one of the areas I may need. I became so indignant at her statement that I registered for a full course in the fall. I may back out closer to time, but she really got under my skin.

So, that was how my week went last week. I have been sitting and waiting for the phone to ring and debating whether I can handle school and a new job with everything else I have going on in my life. I guess we shall see. Just when I think I have enough to handle I got a letter stating I have been selected for Jury Duty. When it rains it pours........

Summer Camp

My young Aspie son started Taekwondo two weeks ago. He's doing very well at it and getting some much needed exercise. They announced last Thursday that there is a summer camp coming up that is a week long. My son really wants to go. His instructor is supposed to get with me about him going.

I don't know what I will do for a whole week without my son. I've never been without him more than a day or two while he was at Grandma's. He wants to go so badly that he has started learning to shower himself and wash his own hair, which he has never done before. My baby is growing up.

When he first realized it was a week long without me I thought he would not want to go. His reply when he found out was "Cool! A whole week without the bad luck charm" (in other words without me).

My Garden

I have been such a slacker lately with everything. The house, work, the car, etc.... Last week I decided I would start the garden that I have been intending to start for the past six or seven years. I bought all the seeds, a shovel, a cute pair of garden gloves and I even got two window herb gardens for my kitchen. So last night, in a spurt of energy, I went ahead and planted the window garden. I planted basil, parsley, chives, oregano, thyme and lavender (in two seperate garden boxes). The directions said to use only five seeds of each but they were so tiny I just let them all fall in, so we'll see what happens.

This weekend I plan to start a vegetable garden. I will have to go get some chicken wire to put around it to keep my dogs out of it (hopefully). Of course I do not have a green thumb at all so I am not even sure this is going to work, but it will give me a hobby for a while and if it does work maybe we can get a few meals out of the fruits(vegetables) of my labor. I got corn, squash, watermelon, and some other seeds that I cannot recall at the moment, but I know they will be consumed if they do grow. I will post again and let you know how it goes (of course I'm talking to the computer since no one reads my blogs :)

It Seems to be Coming Together

Well we have had an eventful year so far. My Aspie son starting having problems in school and the school was not following his behavior plan so it got to the point where they were sending him home everyday. Then we had a meeting and they proposed sending him to a school that had no permanent teacher and would be closing at the end of this year. I refused their offer and they could not come up with another option so we ended up filing for due process to settle this in court (I proposed a private placement which they refused to pay for). I had my prayer team going and I was feeling good about our decision.

I had been warned that their attorney likes to intimidate people and that that is the reason he wins so often. We did not hear from him right away after filing so I was hoping maybe it would be a different attorney. No such luck. He had just been on vacation.

We had a resolution meeting last Thursday with the head of special education for our district, their compliance monitor (who knew us well from working with us in the past) and their attorney. They listened to our allegations and what we were proposing and then they left us for forty-five minutes while they decided what they could offer us.

They offered us an excellent school in my neighborhood that is one of the top ten in the state. I also found out from people outside the district that this school has dealt with issues like ours and worked with the kids and got them into regular mainstream classes within the same year. I toured the school that same day and was very impressed with the school and the staff. I called my attorney and we accepted their offer.

I took my son to tour it Friday and he loved it. That is the first time in years he has liked a school and been excited about it. I was a little worried that it might take some time to prepare him, but he wanted to start immediately. We had had issues before when they were going to try to change his school and I took him to tour it and we could not even get him in the door. He loved everything about the school and some of the boys in his class had asked if he could stay and play, which really made him feel good.

The school had already been advised of the situation with my son and things they would need to do in order to make this transition successful. By Friday morning, his teacher had already been trained by the behavior specialist. I took him over the weekend to get a few new school shirts and a new backpack since the zipper on his old one was busted.

Today is his first day at his new school and he went grinning from ear to ear. I'm so excited for him and I hope it goes well for him.

Kid's Say The Sweetest Things

Sometimes kids can say the sweetest things. I am going through a very difficult time right now. I am in the middle of a very heated Due Process hearing with our local school system. In order to keep my sanity I try to find the humor in things. This past Sunday we had a lot of ice where we live and our heater broke at our house, so our kids spent the night with their grandparents and rode to church with them. Later that day my Aspie son and I were riding in the car together and he said to me that there was a "weird man at church today."

I asked: "What do you mean "weird?""

He said: "He had a big nose."

I said: "I hope you didn't say this to the man."

He said: "No, I did not embarrass him. Nobody is perfect."

He then looked at me with those sweet eyes and said to me, "I think you are perfect though."

Now I went all day thinking how sweet my child was and that I was perfect in his eyes. I brought the subject up again before bed that night because I wanted to let him know that I thought he was perfect too. Here's how that went.

Me: "Do you remember when you said I was perfect earlier?"

Son: "Yeah, but I forgot about that birthmark on your arm."

Well, that's an aspie for you. At least they are honest....

Meanest Mom in America!

I am the "meanest mom in America" according to my youngest son. This is actually a step up from the "meanest mom in the world" that my oldest son used to inform me I was. I said so this morning to my youngest after he gave me my new title. He was not as amused as I was about it. I have "ruined his life."

What did I do? you might ask.

Well we are implementing a point system at home that coincides with the point system at school to deal with behavior. He basically will have to earn points for priveleges. He is thoroughly testing this with me. So far, "it's embarrassing", it "is stupid", it "won't work anyway", and my personal favorite...he "can't wait to get to heaven because he bets God doesn't use a point system in heaven." To which I noted that he doesn't know that for sure, that maybe God does use a point system in heaven.

Ah the trials and tribulations of being a parent. Isn't it fun?!? There's never a dull moment that's for sure and it keeps you on your toes.

Three Doctors and a Roll of Duct Tape

Well the stomach bug that just wouldn't go away finally met it's match, three doctors and a roll of duct tape. Let me explain....

Over the weekend my youngest DS with the bug was feeling better so I decided he was well enough to go to school. So I get him up Monday morning knowing he was going to be grumpy and try to get out of it anyway after missing basically a month of school with the winter break and having been sick. He woke up saying he felt like he was going to throw up. I made him get dressed anyway with him gagging a little bit in the process. He was still pale, but I just chalked that up to him being so sick for so long. He didn't want breakfast, which was definitely unusual for him.

We dropped my older DS off at school and then went on to his school. As soon as I parked he said he felt like he was going to throw up again. I was again thinking he just wanted to get out of going to school. As soon as I opened his door and he stood up on the sidewalk he proved me wrong. Again. And again. And again. So I sat him back down in the car and we went back home to bed. He slept a good three hours and was still sick when he woke up.

Meanwhile the doctor was trying to get him into a pediatric GI doctor but no one could see him this week. Finally at four they told me to go ahead and take him to the ER because he had been sick for so long and lost so much weight we needed to find out what it is. Well we decided to go to the ER in the local suburb around here instead of one of the several larger ones we have. Ours are typically known for their overcrowding and 6-7 hour waits. Well, we arrived at 6:30p.m. and I have to say this is the best ER I have ever seen and with two active boys, I've seen most of the one's our city has on numerous occasions. The wait was about five minutes total to get to a room. Immediately the doctor came in, it was wonderful.

Well after they took his urine they were going to have to draw blood. I expected this. I also expected an IV but was hopeful it would not come to that. It did of course. The phlebotomist came into the room and tried to reason with my son, who is unreasonable on a good day let alone when something bad is about to happen to him. She was very nice about the whole thing and was trying to reason for a good twenty minutes. Of course if she had never said "it will sting for just a minute" he might have been okay, maybe not. Me, I'm all for lying through your teeth. I would have said "it won't hurt a bit, you won't even feel a thing" and deal with the consequences later. I guess that too many people have sued for lying to patients because they never say that anymore.

After a few minutes more of trying to reason with him she left and said she would give him a few minutes. Well next thing we know this doctor comes into the room followed by two more doctors and a nurse. He said they were going to get this thing done so my mother-in-law and I answered meekly that we would wait outside. There were blinds on the window to his room and there was a tiny crack in them toward the bottom, so there I was, out in the hall peeking through the crack trying to determine what was happening by the movement of the doctor's thighs since that was all the crack allowed me to see. It was awfully quiet in there and I told my mother-in-law that the thighs didn't seem to be close enough to be holding him down. She suggested I quit torturing myself so I stood back and tried to look like I wasn't worried he was being tortured. About that time we heard a loud "owww" and then a nurse came out and said they were about done and were discussing Star Wars now.

So we ventured back into the room to see the doctor's laughing and talking about Star Wars with my DS while they were unwrapping tape from his legs and chest. That is why they weren't holding him, they taped him up so he couldn't move (wish I'd thought of that when he fights me over medicine, it might have saved me a few bruises). I'm sure it was some kind of sterile surgical something or other tape, but my mother-in-law said it took three doctors and a roll of duct tape to get the IV in. They also splinted both elbows so he could not mess with the line and of course when you cannot bend your elbows most assuredly your nose is going to pick that time to itch. Poor thing looked so pitiful trying to get his finger around to scratch his nose with his elbows stuck out straight. Well we finally found out it was a bug he picked up from tap water and they gave us antibiotics for him and sent us on our way after only three hours in the ER. This place was wonderful. I was expecting to be there at least four more hours.

Teenagers AARRRGGHHH!!!

I have decided the only reason teenagers are put on this earth is to drive their parents insane. Here's an example:

Today, being the nice, caring mother I should be, I called my teenage son who is home sick today with his little brother who is also sick. It was eleven a.m. and I was about to take my lunch. Here is our conversation:

He was asleep and answered groggily, "What?"
Me: "What would you like me to get you for lunch?"
Teenage Son: "I dunno, nothin."
Me: "Do you want Taco Bell." (His absolute favorite resteraunt that he would eat four times daily if I let him).
Teenage Son: "Nah, nothin."
Me: "What would your brother like?" (I knew the answer but asked anyway for the heck of it)
Teenage Son: "McDonald's."
Me: "Do you want something from McDonald's?"
Teenage Son: "Nah, nothin."
Me: "I could get you a fruit salad..." (Except for the Taco Bell he's a health nut).
Teenage Son: "I don't want nothin."

We hung up and I leave work to stop at an atm and get money and then get them some lunch. He calls me back in the middle of this and we have basically the same conversation. I go ahead and get him the fruit salad anyway and go home. I put it in his room where he is playing with his brother. I ask him again if he's sure he doesn't want me to get him anything else and he says no. Ordinarily I would not go to this much trouble but he is sick. I leave and go through and get my lunch to take back to work to me. As soon as I walk through the door to my building my cell phone rings...

Teenage Son: "I'm hungry and we don't have anything to eat."

I'm expecting the men in the white jackets to show up anytime for me.....

Invaded by the flu

The stomach flu invaded my house last Friday. My little one lost six pounds this week. Poor thing. It's made him grumpy too. He does not like bland diets, let me tell you. We had to visit the nurse practitioner on Tuesday and I could tell she was apprehensive about asking for a urine sample after the last visit. Here is the reason why...

About a month ago he had to go for a sinus infection. While he was there I mentioned that he seemed to drink a lot more than other kids. The nurse wanted his urine checked. The medical assistant handed him a cup. He looked at her like she was crazy and she said: "I need you to to pee in the cup." My son sat back and looked at her and said: "I refuse." She looked shocked (as I'm sure I did) and said "why." He said. "That's just gross." She told him he wasn't old enough to refuse yet. I took him into the bathroom to do his business and he tried to tell me the same thing. I told him that I had the grossest part because I had to hold the cup. This made him happy so he went about his business without even a mess.

Things did not go so well this time. I had to beg, plead and then threaten to have them use a catheter on him. This time was messy.

Ah the life of a parent. Never dull.