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The Versatile Blogger

August 17, 2011 By

We all know how the Internet knows everything, right? So if I read on the Internet that I am a Versatile Blogger, who am I to argue? It’s true! I have been given a Versatile Blogger Award, and I am now going to bestow this same award on fifteen of my favourite blogs.

This isn’t like winning an Oscar, where you hold a bizarre figurine and thank everyone from God to your mother to the guy who lived four doors down from your uncle when you were two. No, this award is all about bloggers giving each other well-deserved recognition.

There is a certain protocol to be followed when accepting this award, which involves writing a post on your blog. In that post, you first thank the person who gave you the award and include a link back to their blog. Then you tell the world seven things about yourself. Finally, you pass the award on to fifteen blogs that you feel are noteworthy.

So here goes…

A big thank you goes to Deanne, who is an autism mom like myself. Deanne’s blog, Small But Kinda Mighty, is a fantastic resource for autism parents looking for information, support, and hope. Whether you are directly involved with autism or not, I highly recommend that you hop on over and take a look at what Deanne has to say.

Now, seven things about myself that I bet you didn’t know:

1)      I am afraid of spiders. I’m not talking about a vague grossed-out feeling that many people get. I’m talking full-on, panic-inducing arachnophobia. Other creepy-crawlies I can handle. Spiders are pure evil.

2)      I think I have shared this one in a previous long-ago post, but it’s too good not to include here. When I was trekking around in the Sinai Desert in the early 90’s, I purchased dried tea-leaves from a Bedouin Arab. I didn’t know what to do with dried tea-leaves in the middle of a desert (heck, I wouldn’t know what to do with dried tea-leaves anywhere), so me and my friends attempted to smoke them. Seemed like a good idea at the time.

3)      I have shaken hands with Nelson Mandela. Truly one of the greatest moments of my life.

4)      I’m too much of a sissy to get a tattoo, but I did get a belly button ring years ago. The guy I was dating at the time, who happened to be a couple of years younger than me, told me that I was too old to do anything adventurous. I went out and got the belly ring to prove him wrong.

5)      I have a recurring dream in which I am chased into a forest by a giant teapot. Seriously. Even I cannot make this stuff up.

6)      When we were kids, my brother and I climbed onto the roof and dropped a soccer ball down the chimney, believing that it would fall into the fireplace below. We got into a L-O-T of trouble.

7)      I met my husband in a park ten years ago, and we went home together that night because neither of us wanted the date to end. It really was love at first sight.

And now – drumroll, please – I am really excited to share fifteen of my favourite blogs. All of these bloggers have touched my life in some way, and made me a better person, a better mom, a better something. I thank all of them for the impact they have had on my life, and I urge you to visit their blogs and see what they’re all about. Here they are, in no particular order.

–          Autism Dad – This man devotes the better part of his life to caring for the ones he loves. He lives with his elderly father, and is a single dad to two stunningly gorgeous kids, one with autism. When you read his blog, his devotion to his dad and his love for his children jumps right out of the page at you.

–          Asperger Mom – This stay-at-home mom to three children writes about the general challenges of life and parenting, and the more specific challenges of raising a child with Aspergers Syndrome. 

–          These Little Waves – Galit has three children, one husband, and one dog. She also has a good heart, a big smile, some well-earned wisdom, and a great sense of humour. Her blog has something for everyone.

–          Farewell Stranger – Robin is a mom who writes about her journey through the hell of post-partum depression with bravery and honesty. She strives to raise awareness of PPD so that women who suffer from it can get the help that they need.

–          Stuart Duncan – This dad of two boys, one with autism, is truly an advocate for autism awareness. He offers intelligent, informed opinions about the latest in autism news and research, and he’s not afraid to take a stance that may be unpopular. This blog is on my must-read list.

–          Transplanted Thoughts – Bravery takes many forms. It can be a soldier going to fight for his country, or a fireman risking his life to save others from a burning building. Or it can be Amy, who sat by her son’s bedside for five months and then cradled him in her arms as he died. This is an amazing blog by an amazing mom, and you really should give it a read. But first, get out the tissues.

–          Behindhersmile – Michelle, mom of two, is an advocate for liver disease awareness. She brings to light a medical issue that is frequently brushed off by doctors, and she gives pointers on how we can lead healthier lives and keep our livers happy.

–          S Club 4 – S Club Mama has several things in common with me: she is a mom of two, one of her kids has autism, and she is a runner. A girl after my own heart! Her posts cover a variety of topics, both informative and entertaining.

–          The Alchemist – I love reading stories of this mom’s life on the other side of the world. She used to be some kind of engineering guru, then she became a mom, and now she’s finding her way as a writer. She’s awesome. Go on over and read her blog. You know you want to.

–          Mama Wants This – Alison (just one “L”, please!)  is mom to a cute little boy named – um – Monkey, although he apparently has a “normal” name as well. She has a fondness for online quizzes and her toes are funny. If this information doesn’t entice you to visit her wonderful blog, I don’t know what will.

–          Quintessentially Burrows – Asta lives in Norway with her English husband and their “wee lad”. Her blog is wonderfully diverse. She talks about parenting, shopping, paternity leave, and even the weather.

–          Gingerheaddad – Jim’s blog is one of my favourite favourites. He is Dad to three, two of whom are on the autism spectrum.  He is caring, he’s a good dad, and he’s funny. And he has red hair.

–          New Day New Lesson – Susie lives in Israel, a place I spent time in many years ago and that I will always have a special fondness for. Here’s the thing about Susie. She’s into positive thinking, learning stuff from the nonsense life throws at you, and kindness. How could I not promote this blog?

–          Julie Anne – This is a woman I can relate to. She loves to write. She loves to read. She’s a bit obsessed with social media. She has a true appreciation for the value of coffee. I started reading her blog relatively recently and it’s already on my “Blogs I Must Check Daily” list.

–          DC Blogmama – Born in Pakistan and raised in New Jersey, this mom of one is now a lawyer living in DC. Her blog offers a wondeful glimpse into her life as a parent, and I really enjoy reading it.

Filed Under: blogging, Favourite Blogs, Uncategorized, Versatile Blogger Tagged With: , , , ,
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Jon & Kate: Was TV To Blame?

August 16, 2011 By

The news is out: TLC are finally – finally – pulling the plug on Kate Plus 8. The last show will air about a month from now, at the end of the eighth season.

Not a moment too soon.

In the beginning, I had some interest in Jon & Kate Plus 8. I was not an avid fan who had to rush home in time for every episode. But if it happened to be on I’d watch it. Seeing this couple manage all of those kids made me feel alternately better and worse about the struggles I had juggling my two boys.

By the time the first season was over, though, my interest had waned. While I admired Kate’s superhuman organizational skills and Jon’s tolerance levels, it struck me – and probably most of the TV-watching world – just how mean they were to each other. This meanness seemed to escalate with each season, culminating in Kate barely saying a nice word to Jon and Jon running off to have an affair.

When Jon and Kate announced their separation, Kate was subjected to a lot of criticism over the fact that she decided to continue with the show. Phrases like “exploitation of the children” were bandied about a lot, and general consensus was that the pair of them should focus on the children during this difficult time, and not on the show.

While I agree with all of the above, I think the rot started a lot earlier. I don’t know what Jon and Kate were like together in the days before the show, but you have to assume that they were deeply committed to one another. You don’t go through the physical and emotional roller-coaster of fertility treatments with a partner you don’t see yourself going the distance with.

There’s really no way of telling whether the show itself was the cause of the problems between them, but it’s not a far-fetched notion. The dynamic of any relationship could be changed by the presence of cameras and producers who tell you to re-enact arguments to make them more dramatic and over-the-top.

Regardless of where things went wrong for Jon and Kate, I cannot help thinking that perhaps they should have put a stop to the show as soon as the problems began. If their energies had been dedicated to their relationship instead of the TV cameras, maybe things would have been better for them and their kids. Maybe they would have been able to save their marriage. Or at the very least, maybe they would have been able to part with fewer malicious words passed between them.

And of course, the question on the public’s mind is this: What about the children? How have they been impacted by the very public way in which their parents separated?

What will it be like for them when, one day, they look back at old tapes of the show and relive their family disintegrating in the public eye?

(Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/rittysdigiez/2983274366. This picture has a creative commons attribution license.)

Filed Under: Celebrities, Divorce, family, Jon & Kate Plus 8, Kate Plus 8, Marriage, Reality TV Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,
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Heaven Is Underground

August 15, 2011 By

“Heaven is underground.”

These words were spoken by my five-year-old son James on Saturday. Our discussion about death and the hereafter had been prompted by the fact that it was my late father’s 74th birthday, and we were all feeling a sense of loss.

Up to this point in their lives, my kids have not received any formal religious education. They have both been baptized in the Anglican church, but that was done partly to keep the grandmas happy, and partly to give the kids access to the support system of a church, in case they should ever need it. We did not have them baptized out of any deep-seated religious belief within ourselves.

Now that James has started talking about heaven and hell – a subject that is by no means banned in my household but that has never received much airtime – I am realizing that many non-religious parents who send their kids to Sunday school possibly do so because religion is such a great way of explaining things that we really don’t have a clue about. It is really convenient to be able to say to a child, “When you die, you’ll go to heaven if you’re a <insert name of religion here>, otherwise you will go to hell.” Without religion, it can be tricky to find an explanation that will satisfy kids, or indeed, adults.

I’ve never really been one to believe in heaven and hell myself (the nuns who were responsible for my Catholic school education would be horrified to hear me say that), but I do believe in an afterlife of sorts. There is so much energy contained within a human being, and that energy has to go somewhere when we die. I mean, isn’t it a scientific fact that energy is neither created nor destroyed – it is simply converted from one form to another? Following that reasoning, I believe that lost loved ones – like my Dad – have some kind of presence in this world.

When James told me that heaven is underground, I asked him what he meant.

“Well,” he said solemnly. “When someone dies they get buried. That means heaven must be underground because if it was in the sky, we would shoot the dead people up in rockets.”

Not bad logic for a five-year-old.

I spoke to him about the soul leaving the body, worrying that I was just confusing him further. I needn’t have been concerned – he seemed to catch on to the distinction between body and soul right away, and he launched into an imaginative description of what happens when we die.

“When you die, your soul doesn’t need your body anymore, so it comes out through your tummy. Just like when you have a baby. Your tummy gets bigger and bigger, and then your soul comes out and goes KABOOSH! And your body gets buried and your soul zooms to heaven like a rocket ship. Faster than Lightning McQueen!”

Wow. I had always pictured souls gently drifting to heaven, kind of the like the feather that flits around during the opening and closing sequences of Forrest Gump.

James’ way sounds a lot more exciting. I didn’t try to correct his version of what happens, because what would I correct it to? Who am I to say he is wrong? Maybe the afterlife is a lot more energetic than traditional religion would have us believe.

Here’s my question to all of you. How do you talk to your kids about death, heaven and hell? Do you let them believe their own versions of what happens after death, or do you try to stick with conventional religious beliefs?

(Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/aussiegall/296336966. This photo has a creative commons attribution license.)

Filed Under: Childhood, Children, Church, Death, Heaven, Hell, Religion Tagged With: , , , , , ,
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Fleeting Moments Of Babyhood

August 12, 2011 By

On my way home from work a couple of days ago, I saw a young woman nursing her baby on the subway. The baby’s father had his arm placed protectively over the mother’s shoulders, and his body was angled in a way that provided mom and baby with some privacy. Both parents were looking at their baby with absolute love and tenderness.

As I sat gazing at this perfect picture, the mom looked up and met my eye. She gave me a beatific smile, and then turned her attention back to her baby.

I went back to reading my book. I felt that I had been given the privilege of witnessing a beautiful family moment, but I did not want to outstay my welcome. I sensed that continuing to watch them would have been intrusive.

I was not able to concentrate on my book, though. Instead, I found myself daydreaming about my first few months of motherhood, almost eight years ago.

When my older son was a baby, I felt that same sense of peace and contentment that I saw in that family on the subway. There were baby blues, to be sure, and I went through the same sleep deprivation common to most new parents. But the baby blues passed, and behind the haze of exhaustion I was happy.

Thanks to Canadian maternity leave provisions, I got to enjoy a full year at home with my baby. Back then, my husband and I each had our own car, so while my husband was off at work, I would load the baby into my car and we’d go out.

Sometimes we would go to the park, and I’d spread out a blanket for us. I would nurse the baby if he was hungry, and then I would drink my coffee and talk to him about the clouds and the trees and the birds.

Other times we would go to the bookstore to browse. I would pick out a book from the bargain shelves and pay for it, and then we would go to the coffee shop. I would take the baby out of his stroller, and he would doze off in my embrace while I lazily read my book.

We went on excursions to the mall, to stores, and to mom-and-baby groups. From time to time, I would strap my son into the baby-jogger and we would go running together. We would walk to the coffee shop down the road, I would buy myself lunch and nurse the baby, and then we would take a long, circuitous route back home.

I loved those early days of parenting. They were exhausting yet idyllic. I knew absolutely nothing about being a mother, but I was happy to find my way with this beautiful boy in my arms.

When my younger son came along, everything was so different. Financial pressure had forced us to give up one of the cars, so while my husband was working, I was stuck at home with both kids. I felt a sense of entrapment that I only started to get some relief from when a friend very generously sent me a double stroller that she no longer needed. Even though it was the middle of winter, I would put the boys in the stroller and go trudging through the snow, so desperate was I to get out.

At around this time, we were starting to get the sense that there was something wrong with my older son, and I felt crushed under the worry that came with that. And to top it all off, I struggled with post-partum depression that was undiagnosed for almost a year.

When my firstborn was a baby I felt bliss. With my secondborn, I felt desperation. And to this day, I feel intense guilt over the fact that I did not do all of the babyhood things with my younger son that I had so enjoyed with my older son. I am doing my best to provide them with childhood years filled with joy, and judging by their smiles, laughter and hugs, I am doing OK in that department. But I cannot help feeling as if I missed out on a part of my younger child’s life that can never be recaptured.

Going back to the family on the subway that started off this whole train of thought, I wish them all of the joy in the world. I hope they savour that period of babyhood that is all too fleeting.

Filed Under: babies, Baby, Childhood, life, New Parents, Nursing, parenting Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
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Home Ec 101: What Not To Do

August 8, 2011 By

This morning I came to the conclusion that I need to learn how to sew.

There are some women who always keep a sewing kit handy, and more importantly, actually know what to do with it. These women have no trouble sewing on a button, turning up a hem, darning a sock, or turning a collar.

I am not one of those women. I don’t even know what “turning a collar” means.

I was educated at a girls-only Catholic school, the kind that believes that girls have to be clones of Martha Stewart in order to find a husband. And so I learned how to knit when I was ten years old, although the term “learned” is a bit of a stretch. Teaching someone like me how to knit is a bit like teaching a giraffe how to fly.

My first project – the one I got at the tender age of ten – was to knit a scarf. While all of the other little girls happily clicked their needles together to create long, tidy scarves, I struggled mightily to get the needles to cooperate, and the wool pulled and strained as I tried to loop it over the needles. Every time I completed a row I had to take a breather.

The other kids completed their scarves and started attaching the tasseled fringes onto the ends. I was still working away with my needles, trying desperately to come up with something that would go around my neck at least once. In the end, one day after school I simply finished the row I was on, and deemed the scarf to be complete. Since I had a scrap of knitted material that would barely wrap around a pencil, let alone a human neck, I resorted to artificial scarf-lengthening means. I soaked my scarf in water to make it wet and hopefully stretchy, and then I took it out to the back yard and secured one end to the ground with a croquet hoop. I pulled on the other end with all my might, and when it was stretched as far as it would go, I went to work with the hammer and a second croquet hoop. Then I went inside, blissfully under the impression that if my scarf were left to dry in that stretched-out state, my problem would be solved.

Pretty resourceful for a ten-year-old.

By the time I checked on my scarf a couple of hours later, it had indeed dried. It looked impressively long. I removed the croquet hoops and stared in disbelief as, like a strange alien creature undergoing a metamorphosis, the scarf writhed and contracted back to its original size. So much for my resourcefulness.

I would rather have set my face on fire than actually started knitting again, so I decided that the length in the scarf would just have to come from the tassels. I can honestly say that when I handed the scarf in for marking, the surreally long tassels completely took focus away from the quality – or lack thereof – of the knitting.

We will not discuss the next craft project: a knitted Humpty Dumpty. Mine was definitely a Dumpty.

Nor will we discuss the apron I made in seventh grade, that the home ec teacher awarded me a grade of 12% for.

We will just skip right ahead to this morning’s fiasco…

At Christmas, one of my gifts from my husband was a lovely light gray suit consisting of pants and a jacket. Although it fitted, it was just too snug to be comfortable. I mean, I don’t want to be sitting on the subway wondering if my pants are about to split open at the seam. So I hung the suit in my closet and resolved to wear it when I had lost a few pounds.

Thanks to the more-or-less liquid diet that I have been forced to follow of late, that day came today. I took the suit out and put it on to find it comfortably loose while still being stylishly fitted.

Just one problem – the pants were too long. I couldn’t wear them like that, because I would have dirtied the bottoms of the pant legs, and I probably would have tripped and fallen on my face in the process.

I couldn’t take them up, because – well, I just don’t do sewing. But that resourceful ten-year-old in me has never gone away, so I came up with a solution that any resourceful ten-year-old would think of.

I decided to staple the bottoms of my pants.

With my five-year-old quizzically looking on, I carefully measured out the length that looked right, and then went to work with the stapler.

At first, I couldn’t get the stapler to work properly, and I figured that I would probably have more success if I wasn’t actually wearing the pants while I stapled them. I took them off, laid them flat on the ground, and tried again. Ten minutes later, I put the pants back on, and went to the full-length mirror in the hall to survey my handiwork.

The fact that one leg was now an inch shorter than the other was the least of my problems. One of the staples wasn’t holding properly, so one side of the pant leg was drooping down sadly. On the other leg, the staple had bunched up the fabric in an intriguing manner. And my assumption that the staples wouldn’t show against the gray fabric turned out to be hopelessly misguided.

With resignation, I gave up on the gray suit. I took it off in a huff, and then stomped off to put on my blue pinstriped suit instead, a suit that was ready-to-wear and staple-free.

Now, with the benefit of several hours of hindsight, I can think of the utter ridiculousness of trying to staple pants and I can laugh about it.

But I really should learn how to sew. And giraffes should learn how to fly.

(Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/stevendepolo/4312354135. This photo has a creative commons attribution license.)

Filed Under: Childhood, Home Ec, Knitting, Resourcefulness, School, Sewing Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
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Endings And Beginnings

August 4, 2011 By

It was bittersweet, that freezing cold day in February, 2003.

I was at a conference with a number of my co-workers, which really meant that I was subjected to a day of boring talks that I had to pretend to be utterly fascinated by. The trade-off was the free lunch, and I have to give the conference venue credit: it was outstanding grub.

After lunch, we had a bit of free time before the session reconvened. I decided to check the messages on my cell phone, so I turned it on and started fiddling with the buttons to get to the voicemail. When it vibrated in my hand, I almost jumped out of my skin. The incoming call was coming from a number I did not recognize.

Gerard, calling from a payphone. At the hospital, of all places.

He was calling to deliver bad news: his dad had been diagnosed with colon cancer. There was a possibility that it had spread to the liver. Tests were underway to find out.

I whispered a few words of explanation into the ear of one of my colleagues and ran to my car. An hour later, I was giving my father-in-law a hug at the hospital. He was looking remarkably cheerful for someone who had just received dire news. Either he was using humour as a coping mechanism, or the doctors had done a really good job of giving him hope.

Much later that night, Gerard and I left the hospital and went home. While he was Googling something-or-other, I locked myself into the bathroom and surreptitiously peed on a stick.

Three minutes later, the stick told me that while one life was fading away, another one was just beginning.

At our first ultrasound a couple of weeks later, we held hands as the technician showed us our baby on the monitor. His heart was beating solidly; and even though he was about the size of a grape, we could clearly see his little legs waving around.

Everything looks great, the technician told us. This is a good-looking baby.

Gerard and I finally allowed ourselves to feel a lick of hope for the first time since we found out we were having a baby. We had suffered a miscarriage several months previously; we had not really trusted that we would actually get to the point of seeing a healthy baby. We had several weeks to go before we would pass the point at which our previous pregnancy had failed, and we would hold our breaths until then. But seeing a strong, healthy baby was something that we had not experienced.

After the ultrasound, we drove straight to Gerard’s parents’ home to see them. Now that we had gone through the ultrasound, we felt OK about telling them. We showed my father-in-law the ultrasound picture, and said to him, “If the baby is a boy we’re going to call him George, after you.”

With his eyes flashing with humour, my father-in-law said, in his characteristic Irish brogue, “Aaaah, don’t do that to the poor child!”

Less than a month later, I stood in the cemetery with snow swirling around me as my father-in-law was laid to rest. As I said goodbye to one George, my hands protectively cradled the belly in which another was growing .

As one life ends, another begins. And the spirit of the old lovingly watches over the soul of the new.

(Photo credit to the author.)

Filed Under: Baby, Cancer, Death, life, Pregnancy, Pregnancy Loss, Ultrasound Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , ,
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Running In The Rain

August 3, 2011 By

This morning I woke up to the gentle pitter-patter of rain against the window.

Actually, that’s a lie. I woke up to the alarm on my phone going off, making a blaring, raucous noise that set every single one of my nerve endings on edge.

Once my central nervous system had gotten over the initial shock of being awake, then I heard the gentle pitter-patter of rain against the window.

Damn.

I wanted to go running, and I wasn’t entirely sure that I wanted to run in the rain. Thanks to all of the dental goings-on of the last few days, it had been about a week since I had run at all. I was not in the mood for dodging puddles and having rain drip into my eyes. I was in the mood for a nice, uncomplicated run that didn’t require any actual thinking.

Who’s in any fit state to think at five in the morning, anyway?

I had a choice to make. Don’t run at all, run in the rain, or run on the treadmill.

I knew that not running at all would lead to a day filled with angst and guilt, and I had no desire to see the inside of a gym (almost a month of showering in the gym due to our dearth of hot water at home has left me a little gym-weary). So that left me with no choice but to run in the rain.

I threw on my running clothes and added a hat as a measure against the rain. Music cued, training watch set, and off I went. Following the logic that the faster I went, the sooner I’d have this over and done with, I set off at a hearty pace.

The run went surprisingly well. Not only did I find the rain to be refreshing and soothing, I actually managed to maintain the pace that I set at the beginning. Usually when I charge out of the starting blocks like a racehorse on steroids, I kind of peter out after three kilometres or so. Today, though, I finished my 5.65km in just a touch over 31 minutes, at a very respectable pace of around 5:42 minutes per kilometre.

I really should wake up more often feeling half-hearted about running. These runs always turn out to be the best ones.

(Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/angee09/2264408983/. This photo has a creative commons attribution license.)

Filed Under: Early Morning Running, Half-Heartedness, Rain, running, Weather Tagged With: , , , , , , , , ,
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Letting Go Of The Old

August 2, 2011 By

Yesterday afternoon, I found my living room floor. It had been missing for several years, buried beneath layers of toys that the kids have, over the years, played with and outgrown.

On several occasions, I have made efforts to organize the toys, painstakingly separating them into categories and storing like with like. But these toy organization systems that I have spent hours creating have lasted, on average, for about an hour. My older son sometimes copes with his autism meltdowns by picking up boxes of toys and dumping out the contents. Even as I wistfully watch my hours of work come to naught, I recognize that I would rather see my son throw toys around than bang his head against the wall hard enough to put holes in the drywall.

Quite apart from the side effects of autism, kids under the age of six don’t really get that the cars should go with the other cars, or that the Legos should be in the same container, or that the gazillion Mr. Potato Head parts are meant to stay together.

This weekend, me and my husband – ably assisted by our five-year-old son, took another crack at organizing the toys. But there was a difference in the way we did it this time.

A big difference.

This time, we actually got rid of stuff.

I thought getting rid of toys would be a nightmare, but once we had the buy-in of our younger son, it was actually quite easy. It was never going to be a problem where our firstborn was concerned. As long as he has his Lego, his gazillion Mr. Potato Heads, his measuring tapes, his alphabetic fridge magnets, and his math workbooks, he’s happy.

After a day of sorting, storing, and being bossed around by our five-year-old, we had reduced the volume of toys by a staggering amount. All of a sudden, we had enough toy boxes to contain all of the toys that we kept, without them spilling over onto the carpet. We rediscovered the concept of walking from one end of the living room to the other without getting Lego-shaped dents in the soles of our feet. It was an incredibly liberating experience.

There’s just one thing…

These are the toys that my kids played with when they were babies. The little teddy bears. The Winnie the Pooh ride-on toy. The blocks, the nesting cups, the First Words books. Getting rid of these remnants of my kids’ babyhood was like saying goodbye to a phase of my life, and acknowledging that my babies are no longer babies, that they are little boys.

As sentimental as I felt about the toys, what really made my breath catch in my throat was sorting through the little shoes that my kids wore as babies. It was the shoes that served as a physical reminder of how tiny they once were. As I held the shoes in my hands, the memories washed over me.

My older son’s very first pair of baby slippers, given to him by my Dad when he was just a few days old (no way am I getting rid of those).

Feeling my boy’s fingers grasp my hand with absolute trust as he tentatively walked in shoes for the first time.

My younger son’s face, alive with excitement, as he wore the shoes that were a miniature version of the ones his Dad wore.

My two boys laughing together as they splashed in rain puddles, wearing their new galoshes.

Their joyful oblivion as they tramped snow into the house in winter, leaving tiny wet footprints all over the floor.

The memories fade out and I reluctantly come back to reality, sitting there on the floor holding these tiny shoes in my hands. All but a couple of extra-special pairs must go. It is time to allow to the old to make way for the new, as my boys enter new and exciting phases of their lives.

Just because it has to be done though, that doesn’t make it easy.

It represents a letting go, and that is a bittersweet pill for any Mom to swallow.

(Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/ophilos/2564467134/ This photo has a creative commons attribution license.)

Filed Under: Childhood, Children, Getting organized, Letting Go, life, Nostalgia, parenting, Shoes, Toys Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , ,
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Autism And Adolescence: Preparing For The Storm

August 1, 2011 By

I was educated in the 80’s at a girls-only Catholic school that was run by nuns. The school was high on academic excellence, and a high percentage of its graduates went on to achieve some pretty impressive things. At the same time, though, the school fell flat where it came to life skills training, and many of those people who wound up in noteworthy careers also struggled in various areas of their personal lives.

Throughout high school, I frequently found myself being summonsed to the principal’s office. The principal was a mean old nun named Sister Elizabeth, and she hated me simply because I was not a clone of my cousin, who she had taught at a different school several years previously. Every visit to her office was the same, regardless of what alleged infraction had sent me there. First, Sister Elizabeth would ask me why I couldn’t be like my cousin, and then she would put on a grave face and say, “Whether you throw a teaspoonful of mud or a bucketful of mud, you’re still throwing mud.”

What the hell was that supposed to mean?

I mean, I was the shy, socially awkward kid in my peer group. I wasn’t exactly a trouble-maker, and when I did hit a difficult patch in eleventh grade, my troubles were directed towards myself, and barely caused a ripple beyond my immediate group of peers. I was never caught smoking under the bleachers, I never swore at a teacher, and I never had a pack of condoms fall out of my pocket while running down the hall. Interestingly enough, the person who all of this did happen to was never, to my knowledge, sent to see the dreaded Sister Elizabeth.

What the school laughably called “sex education” happened in the form of a couple of talks given to us by outside counselors when I was somewhere around tenth grade. The talks had the following central theme: if you have sex before marriage, you will undoubtedly go through teen pregnancy and a life of poverty and deprivation, and your child will be a juvenile delinquent addicted to drugs, and when you die you will go to hell.

We were given some very basic information about the different forms of contraception, and then told not to use any of them on the grounds that they were a sin. The only acceptable forms of birth control, we were told, were abstinence and the Rhythm Method (which, of course, was reserved strictly for marriage, because of the whole going-to-hell thing associated with sex).

In retrospect, the timing and the subject matter of these sex education talks was kind of funny. By the time we had to listen to them, most of my peers had been sexually active for at least a year and probably knew more about contraception than the people delivering the talks. To my knowledge, there was only one teen pregnancy in my peer group, and it happened after we had all graduated high school.

Things today are very different. Kids are maturing physically at a younger age than my generation did, and for the most part, society seems to have let go of the notion that teens just shouldn’t have sex. There is an acceptance that they are going to do it anyway, so we may as well equip them with the tools and knowledge to do it safely. I am all for that, although I certainly wouldn’t want my boys to be experimenting with sex until they have reached  a certain level of emotional maturity.

The question that is plaguing me is this: how do I deal with this topic where my son with autism is concerned? He may only be turning eight in September, but time flies, and before we know it he will be entering the world of pre-adolescence. His physical maturation will far outpace his social development, and I worry about the time when he will have physical drives that he will not be emotionally equipped to deal with.

And so I have decided to start seeking out resources and advice on this topic now.

That way, when the storm of adolescence hits, I may have a fighting chance of helping my son navigate his way through it all.

(Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/alamosbasement/3661120171)

Filed Under: Adolescence, autism, High School, life, parenting, School, Sex, Sex Education, Social Development, Teenage Years Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,
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Teeth Behaving Badly

July 31, 2011 By

As I sit here early on a Sunday morning, my jaw is hurting, I have just taken more pain medication, and I feel as as I am getting a cold.

That’s probably no big surprise. My immune system has taken quite a hit over the last couple of days. Extra vitamins, Vitamin C, echinacea, and plenty of fluids and rest should do the trick.

Rest? Ha! Like that’ll happen!

The culprit of all of this grief is the dental surgery I had on Friday. It had been a long time coming. Due to my absolute phobia of dentists, plus the fact that the last dentist I went to made a complete botch-job in my mouth, I had put off seeing a dentist for almost seven years. When my husband finally dragged me in kicking and screaming 18 months ago, they did all kinds of X-rays and examinations, and then produced a list of the dental work that I needed.

The list went on for two pages.

Don’t worry, they said. We’ll sedate you and you won’t remember a thing.

The idea of being given lots of drugs to knock me into sweet oblivion was very appealing, but still. I got the heebie-jeebies every time I thought of spending an entire day at the mercy of a man who had chosen a career of digging in other peoples’ mouths.

So once again, I played the waiting game.

About two months ago, I got a nasty throat infection that put me out of action for a week. It was accompanied by a fever of over 102 degrees, and it made my entire body hurt. When I went to see the doctor, I was told that this infection more than likely originated from an infection in my gums.

And that was it. The game was up. I had no choice but to go to the dreaded dentist. Except when I went back this time, new problems had arisen. The two-page list was now two and a half pages.

An appointment was made to get the work done. I picked up pre-meds a few days ahead of time, and then waited in dreaded anticipation. On Thursday night, I took three heavy-duty sleeping pills as instructed. They knocked me out, and until four in the morning, I slept not like a baby, but like a person who doesn’t have a baby. At that point, I had to wake up to have coffee and toast, and then I went to sleep again for a couple of hours.

An hour before the appointment, I took another pill, and by the time I showed up there I was well and truly zonked out. I was actually seeing double.

I lay down in the dentist’s chair. A blood pressure cuff was placed around my arm. A heart rate monitor was attached to my finger, and an oxygen mask was put over my face. I was given more drugs to take, and then I was covered with a glorious soft blue blanket.

That’s the last thing I remember with any clarity. Technically, I was conscious throughout the day. I had to be, so I could obey instructions like “open wide” and “bite down”. But I was definitely somewhere off in La La Land.

After six hours or so, I was allowed to leave. I have a vague recollection of my husband being brought into the room to receive instructions, and then I taken out to the car. Apparently a wheelchair was involved. When I arrived home, my husband gently guided me to the couch in the living room, where I lay down and pretty much crashed. I was roused now and then to eat soup or drink Gatorade.

We will not discuss the dribbling that happened as I drank.

Now, it is two days post-dentist, and I’m doing kind of OK. The effects of the sedation took until sometime yesterday afternoon to wear off, but I still have some pain, particularly at the spot where they had to extract a tooth. Quite apart from the pain, I find it very disconcerting to have a gap where the tooth used to be, and I am really looking forward to being fitted with my temporary flipper. My teeth feel very weird from all the cleaning and scaling and whatever else they did.

And just think… a month from now I get to do it all again.

Oh, boy.

(Photo credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/rightee/215391576/)

Filed Under: Dentist, Fear of Dentists, Sedation, Teeth Tagged With: , , , , , , , , , ,
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