Bite the bullets

Hey. how come there aren't any bullets in the bar any more? Now I suppose I'm going to have to figure out some secret html code or something...

I dropped by R's school last week. I called ahead b/c I wanted to touch base with the principal. She was waiting for me, and prepared to have the 45 minute conversation we ended up having.

I, with supreme diplomacy and dignity (I'm not kidding. No tears. No raised voice, even) raised holy hell.

When the meeting was over, she was on her way down the hall to deliver what was apparently an apocalyptic ass-chewing.

At least according to THE GOSSIP THAT WAS ALREADY CIRCULATING WHEN THE BELL RANG.

But the ass she chewed was not the classroom teacher's. She aimed right at the sp. ed. teacher.

I agree that the main service provider needs to be the interface and train the classroom teacher, but at least the main provider was TRYING.

Sadly, however, she got her ass chewed.

And she's actually very sweet.

Classroom teacher, on the other hand, is a pompous, pea-brained metrosexual without clue number one about the conditions of learning. He actually makes me feel a little oily after an encounter.

Sigh. But I seem to have solved the homework problem.

Do you think this is libelous?

struggle, struggle

Latest message to Rose's school:

Hello,
Rose reports that she is alone at a table in the lunchroom every day. She says the other children are "scared of her." As you recall, this was not a problem last year, because the tone set in the classroom was warm and welcoming of whatever contributions Rose could make.

Obviously this is heart-breaking, and I think probably a relatively easy fix. I'm pretty sure that social skill development is part of her IEP.

I have consulted other parents on the Parent to Parent Listserve. This is a great resource for parents of children with developmental disabilities. I know there are several educators who are members as well, as it keeps their finger on the pulse of parent-teacher relations in the special ed community.

Anyway, here are some of their suggestions:

My son has autism and with that comes behaviors that discourage other kids from wanting to be near him. 2 years ago we tackled that same lunchtime problem. At first kids in his class were assigned to be his lunch buddies and then the speech therapist sat with him too. She kept conversation going and encouraged other kids to laugh and "play" while they ate. It really helped! My son will still pinch, hit, and grab other kids food at times. But they still sit at his table because he also likes to "play" funny lunchtime games during lunch that the ST taught him and his peers to enjoy. A few times I've gone in at lunchtime and watched kids "save" a place for him. Not sure if it's their idea or an "assignment" but in my opinion it doesn't matter. The perception is that they want him to sit by them. The thing I like best is that it's not always the same kids and that he's never alone. Good luck.

This breaks my heart....not sure what grade your daughter is in, but I know someone who has IEP goals of socialization. So, they created a "group" for her...it's a popular thing because whoever eats lunch with her daughter gets to go and do something fun....like make bracelets, play cards, play games .... with just her and a few other kids. It is all facilitated by the SPED teachers, but reg. ed teachers totally support it. This girl gets to pick who she'd like to have lunch with, after kids sign up....there are plenty of kids to choose from because a lot of them want to.

my son's school also did the lunch group all the way through middle school. He always enjoyed the group experience but somedays he didn't want to eat lunch with the group. He wanted the down time and just wanted to chill either in the cafeteria or the SPED staff would let him eat in their room where it was quiet.

We continue to believe that XYZ SCHOOL is a good place for Rose. This year has been rough, due in part to the changing social dynamics of her classmates. However, as evidenced by the parent suggestions, it can be surmounted regardless of the age. I know the team will respond with deliberate and active programming. Please let me know what the plan will be for helping Rose have buddies.

Thanks,
Laurie and Peter

Angry?

Well. Usually the anger comes after the others:
fear
confusion
pain
humiliation
doubt

Two of my friends made stunning advances in starting or adding to their families, on the same day that I had a few serious concerns about the size of my own. I kindly refrained from telling the truth about parenting teenagers.

But I'll tell you: try to avoid it if you can. If that's no longer an option, institute some serious self-care in advance. Get addicted to exercise, form a tight support network, find a creative pursuit, and learn to say no to commitments you don't think will pay off. Then steel yourself for the most bewildering ride of your life.

Work is Love Made Visible, or, The View From The Other Side

Well. Whatever that bug was, you don't want it. (Although I think some of you have had it.)

News here at the house, because life goes on...

Sometimes I forget that the tasks in front of me ARE my life. What I mean is, life won't start once the work is done. The work IS life. I can dread and resent it, or value it for its own sake, and for the rewards it yields. In the dark of winter, with the ice, the flu, the ear infections... tasks can seem almost insurmountable, and certainly unrewarding.

But then occasionally I get a sudden glimpse from the other angle. It is abundance beyond measure to be able to donate my time and efforts. Nothing will ever be more precious than these children, and I can never, ever devote enough energy to them. It is worth spending a little time looking at life from this angle.

We are all working hard on a fund-raiser for the preteen's Japan group. He takes Japanese culture and language classes every week, and works at various enterprises to raise all the money he will need to go to Japan for 5 weeks in the summer of 2008. This month, the big event is a silent auction. One family got a band to agree to perform free of charge that evening. Another family's hip-hop and break dancing club will entertain. Frontier Airlines is donating two round-trip airfares FOR A DOOR PRIZE!!!

It's in a really funky old Victorian building here in Northwest Denver. ( I think this staircase looks like the one at the Mollie Brown House.) The event is next Sunday, so the push is really on.

We are soliciting donations of food for the event and of items for the auction. OH, and selling tickets to the event. (Anybody in the Denver area want to check it out?) I am making a big poncho, and two tabletop moss gardens for the auction, and also offering a spring migration birding excursion.

(I have never led a birding excursion before, and I'm pretty excited!)

Yesterday, I decided to expend some of my returning energy by getting some overdue books back to the library. (I considered asking if there was some kind of flu amnesty.) Well, Rose overheard my plans, and winningly proposed that she be allowed to come.

I don't often take her on outings because she is so easily overstimulated. If she gets all giddy, she runs away. She's too big for me to control physically. I explained all of this to her, and she promised she wouldn't run.

She was SO GOOD. I let her check out her own books, and she was so excited to hand over the library card that she forgot to give the librarian her books! Then she quietly jumped up and down while waiting. No running, though, and no defiance, no noise.

Sooo, in a fit of blind faith, I took her to a gallery and then out to tea. The gallery is in an old church, with some wide open spaces, and she did finally break into a run in there, but recovered nicely.

The tea room is a tiny, packed with dainties and frills kind of place. She got her own cup and saucer. She was enchanted with the little sugar bowl and spoon. She HAD to use the tiny china salt and pepper shakers. She gently touched the beaded lampshade on our table lamp. Bless her heart, she was too excited to eat her (beautiful) food, and coped by sitting on the floor, facing the wall and reading her books. We brought her food home.

I was very, very proud of how she held it together. (By the way, her kindergarten teacher called one night last week, and said that she was sure that the misbehaviors recently were attributable to the sickness and the antibiotics. She assured us that all is well. WHAT a huge comfort!)

So. I'm sure if you put on your "life is hard" glasses, you can see the challenges and exhaustion. If you, like me, are trying to look at it from another angle, you can see that I have no reason to feel sorry for myself.

Fretful

I am a worrying parent. That is no secret to anyone who knows me, and it's no secret to me. As I mentioned a few days ago, I started looking for a kindergarten for our Dandy at least 9 months in advance. As I mentioned yesterday, I practically had Andy in the ER for an appendectomy, and it turns out he is fine. (I packed a suitcase that night. Really. I have ridden to the hospital in an ambulance with him, wearing pajamas and without ANYTHING to comfort him or me. I have never been that unprepared again.)

I have told you that I worry so much about Rose being able to stay at her school. We love it SO MUCH.

They called today. She had intentionally bitten someone. By the time I got there, again, they had analyzed it: it's 100s day and very overstimulating. The little girl (victim) next to her was hyper and annoying. Rose doesn't know how to communicate well enough to negotiate. Biting is a primitive response to being overpowered. I appreciate all the comfort they tried to give me. But some things are just completely unacceptable, and biting is one of those things.

It is very discouraging.
I again had to lean on my teammates. I again had to leave very abruptly and my students' behavior is reflecting this unpredictability. I had to explain why I was leaving to my colleagues. I feel embarrassed, angry, panicky, discouraged.
Should I excuse this because of the DW? Is it just her Taurean personality? Is it both? Should I put her back into a weighted vest? Back into private OT as well as her school therapy?

I want her to be happy, contributing and accepted.

Home Alone... and 6 Weird Things

Home today with the little sickie. We got to the doctor ASAP. Doctor barely looked into the ear and said, "Oh, yea," and whipped out her prescription pad. Rose's ear infection, like so much about her, is completely over the top. Turns out that, in addition to the more familiar swelling and fluid of the classic ear infection, she has a BLISTER ON HER EARDRUM. Could that be any more horrifying?

Well, yes. Because, in addition to this skin-crawlingly, disablingly painful condition, they ascertained that a certain pansy-ass mother had neglected to get her daughter vaccinated against influenza this year.

I don't think I need to go on.

Fortunately my teammates at work refused to entertain the idea of me showing up today. They are handling everything. I love them.

Now, at the risk of being practically NORMAL compared to Cally, (scroll down. Jan. 28. I don't know how to link directly to the post.) I offer you this:

1. I have a phobia about collarbones. It's a visceral, shuddering thing like fingernails on a blackboard. I particularly can't stand to have my own touched or referred to, but collarbones in general are just better left unmentioned. (My cruel older sister once winningly made me some salt-clay clavicles for my birthday. Very clever.) In fact, this focus on the topic is making mine hum with that psychic discomfort that you get when someone stands in line behind you a little too closely.

2. I take my astrological characteristics beyond the twosome. I'm more like the sign of... the... CHAMELEON. I just channel other people. Their aesthetic, their gestures, facial expressions. I'm not saying I'm great at impressions or anything. It's more of an absorption. Especially when I was younger, I had to be very careful around anyone with an accent, because I would unconsciously adopt their speech. This, as you can imagine, comes in handy on stage. Otherwise, it just makes me somewhat suspect.

3. I made myself little sanctuaries in dark closets when I was little. I still long and long for sensory deprivation in extreme moments, and have seriously considered dedicating personal, ADULT closet space to a black box. At my daughter's special preschool, they had just such a cave, lined with foam rubber covered with black jersey, with black curtains over the front and pillows on the floor. Get all Freudian if you must. Personally, I prefer my fall back position, which is that all of us are somewhere on the autism spectrum.

4. Case in point: I find it VERY soothing to gently, rhythmically and persistently hit myself in the head. Not with a hammer or anything.

5. I can't stand lotion. Well, actually I discovered just this last year that it's not LOTION that I can't stand. It's COLD lotion. I've taken to filling the basin with hot water and dropping bottles of moisturizer and body lotion into it before I get in the shower.

6. Well, now, I don't know. I think I'm going to have to think about this one. I know! Number Six can be a sort of teaser, like "previews from our next episode" or something. Because I can think of GROSS things about myself, and EMBARRASSING things about myself, and things that are frankly just TOO MUCH INFORMATION. But I'm really trying to reach the level of fitting my whole fist into my mouth. Surely there's something in my past that qualifies.

So tune in next time.

Parenting and Artistic Ambitions

Yesterday during a workshop, I kept my hands busy with my "fake" (a.k.a. spool) knitting. I used flat, narrow tape. It comes on a spool where the yarn is- chubby kind of cardboard spool like craft cotton or crochet thread. Very pretty, rich, jewel tones, multi-colored and kind of gleaming. I just kept at it, and passed out a few lanyards for peoples' name tags.

I also used it to "knit" some thin copper wire, with blue glass beads and silver balls appearing to float throughout. This made a beautiful necklace for a dear friend of mine, although there were no findings on it. She said she would take care of it, and left it on for the afternoon. There were twanging wire ends sticking out on the back of her neck. It looked terribly uncomfortable; I hope she didn't leave it on for my sake. The FRONT of it looked so pretty on her!

So. I guess at this point my artistic ambitions are, well, humble, but productive. It feels good.

Miss Rose was up most of the night last night with an earache so profound that she simply didn't know what to do. She would get up and go kneel on the floor, resting the side of her head against the cool wall. Then she would whimper and stretch out on the floor. Finally, the ultimate concession: she announced that she needed a shot. My god. I can hardly stand it. We are going to the doctor at 10:00.

Meanwhile, I have delivered instruction to my own students 4 times out of the last 8 days. My plan is to just pop out to school after the doctor, Rosie in tow, teach for two hours, and come home at the bell. This is the reality of the supermom myth.

I Aint' Got Nuttin'

Hey, I'm not complaining. Madame Librarian AND her sis both have something that is making them hack up their lungs. I? Well, a recurring headache, I think due to an obsolete contact lens prescription.

What else ain't I got? I ain't got no pictures of my WIP. And, I ain't got no idea where my camera is.

Latest is a missive from the genetics department about our Dandy. There are all kinds of subordinate tests they can run, now that they've ruled out 8 things and found her cyst. We originally went on the fishing expedition (read: blood test and MRI) because we thought if this WAS genetic, she should certainly know about it when she is a young woman and thinking of becoming a mother. But let me tell you, hauling her in to strange doctors, having strange procedures done, and getting her STUCK WITH A NEEDLE are experiences that I can hardly face- and I'm not talking about HER reaction. So, Daddy and I will have a conversation, and I'm sure we'll decide we should pursue the testing. Hey, we are contributing to the body of medical knowledge for the rest of the Dandy population. Maybe.

I know it must be like this for all parents, regardless of the issue. If it wasn't a brain cyst, it would be something else.

Here is your duck du jour: ( think it's canard en francais...? Cindi?)



This beauty is a northern pintail. Larger than our goldeneye, but smaller than a mallard. (Pretty close, though, and with that long neck, he has kind of a goosey profile). A dabbler. A recent drop in numbers here in our part of the continent. We usually see them only in the migration seasons and in winter. They nest further north. Look at that beautiful buffy flank! and such a sleek head.