Barnmaven

Badass Dentistry

Here's where I admit yet another of my many failures as a mother, try to give you some bullshit excuse and then tell you how I've oversome it and now I'm a really awesome parent.

(When I was in 4-H many years ago while dinosaurs roamed the earth, they told us always to present a topic to your audience by telling them what you're going to tell them, then tell them it in detail, then summarize what you just told them.  Personally I find that boring as hell, but a little preshadowing never hurts.)

I believe my insane fear of the dentist is well into the public domain.  When I wrote that it had been two years since I had been to the dentist, what I didn't tell you is that it had also been two years for my children as well.

I know, I suck.

Its not easy to take your kids to the dentist when your own bad experiences overlay everything that's going on.  Its not easy to take them when you remember like yesterday your toddler having to undergo general anaesthesia because she couldn't handle sedation dentistry.  Its not easy to take them when your youngest child has been so anxious and afraid he screams whenever the dentist tries to look in his mouth.  No, its not impossible.  Its just not easy.  And for two years I've been hovering over them while they brush, threatening them with descriptions of what they'll be like wearing dentures in their twenties as a consequence for poor dental hygeine.  Oh yes, I'm a wonderful mother.

This year, though, I decided, would be THE YEAR.  My daughter has mostly overcome her issues with the dentist and I was more worried about the extent of the damage from the two-year-haitus in dental care than anything else.  But I was really, really avoiding having to deal with the little man and his anxieties.  Not looking forward to it at all. 

To put teeth in my resolve, I scheduled dental appointments for everyone in the family.  SG and I both had our exams and cleanings and are still in sticker shock over the anticipated costs for the crowns we both need (gritting your teeth when you are stressed is by all evidence a very bad thing to do).  The kids' appointment hit some conflicts and had to be rescheduled twice, and each time I breathed a sigh of relief, thinking, "Oh thank GOD, I can put this off a little longer." 

I kept waiting for a good excuse to reschedule a third time, but life refused to cooperate, so I showed up at the dental office with a little bit of determination and a whole lot of apprehension.  In keeping with our reward-based behavior mods for Race Car Man, he had been promised some DS during free time if he let the dentist look at his teeth. 

Not being one to aim low, he went for the gold.

Not only did the doctor get to examine his teeth, he let the hygienist clean them and give him a flouride treatment AND he got both bite-wings and a panoramic x-ray. 

It was a raging success.

While I think the kid-friendly open seating and movie screens (with headsets) helped, the most important factor was the dentist and his staff.  He introduced himself to my children:  "Hi, my name's David.  What's yours?"  And from there it was just marvelous.  He said we would let my son set the pace and they would not do any procedure he didn't consent to.   He then spent a good five minutes just chatting with each of my kids, asking them about their interests and their schools and their friends, and he didn't ask them to open their mouths until he had really earned the right to do so.

C:  "Why are you wearing that mask?"

D:  "I want to cover my mouth.  I have to talk sometimes when I'm working on your teeth, and sometimes when I talk a little piece of spit might come flying out of my mouth.  If your mouth is open at the same time, my spit might go in your mouth and man, that's just GROSS." 

Badass.  If the man wasn't already married with about 10 children, and if I wasn't so damn much in love with SG, I would have kissed him.

The hygienists were equally as badass.

They let my son feel the rubber cap on the cleaning tool.  They let him watch other kids have their x-rays done so he would understand the process.  They gave my daughter purple sunglasses because she's sensitive to the overhead light.   When my son wanted to get up and look around the room, they allowed him complete freedom.  They had screens on the ceilings above the chairs and nice padded headsets for them to watch movies.  They answered their questions. They explained things very factually but in terms that were not frightening.  They treated them with respect.

It was clear to see that this was not their first experience with special needs, and it was equally clear that the comfort of their patients is their number one priority. 

While its still true that in my heart of hearts I'm no fan of the dentist, in this one case, I may have to make an exception. 

Dentistry for kids.  Totally BADASS.

The little boy who could

 

Some years ago, in one move or another, I lost my original Golden Book story of The Little Red Caboose.  That was one of my favorite stories as a kid, probably because in at least one of the illustrations there were horses.  Fortunately, those books never go out of print and I was able to get a copy of it for my own children.  For a time it was also one of Race Car Man's favorite bedtime stories, mostly because it has trains.  WE LOVE TRAINS.

The Little Red Caboose wasn't ever going to be a big black engine, no.  Not even a coal car or an oil car or a box car or a flat car.  But as it turned out, The Little Red Caboose had tremendous value just being a caboose.  He saved the train, you know.

My son's "official" diagnosis arrived in the mail on Friday.  Yes, he has an autism disorder.  The scales are both meaningful and not, as things go, because the spectrum is quite wide.  He is not severely disabled, he scores in the high end of the 'mild to moderate' range.  He will not struggle with the ability to speak or read or to do the things many neurotypical people are able to do.  Other things will just be a lot harder for him to learn, things like having relationships, getting along with others at school and eventually at work.  Learning how to modulate his emotions and behaviors.  Taking proper care of himself in terms of hygeine and dress.  Being medication-compliant so that his anxiety disorder doesn't overwhelm his ability to function.

None of those are terrible things, or really even bad things.  They are just things about him.

There are other things about him that are really important.  Things he can do.

He can, by himself, assemble a Hot Wheels racetrack and put every single one of the 57 different stickers in the right place.

He can, by himself, dissasemble any mechanical or electronic piece of equipment.  Sometimes he can even put it back together, although it might not function the way it did before it was turned into a pile of disparate pieces.

He can find the proper screwdriver to open the battery compartment of anything that uses batteries, determine what kind of battery it needs, and replace said battery or hound mama until she loses her everloving MIND to go buy the correct type of battery if we don't happen to have it in the house.

He can play a mean game of checkers, and I suspect it will not be long before he will be playing an equally mean game of chess.

He can do math.  A lot of math.  Quite well.

He can ride a scooter and dig in the dirt and line up his Hot Wheels cars in a perfectly straight line.  He can take a Lego kit and build something entirely new and possibly even better than the picture on the box and the instructions indicate.  He can sing.  He memorizes songs and he sings them all the time, and he has the sweetest voice.  

He gives great hugs.

Unlike many 7 year old boys, my son does not want to be president.  He will probably never BE the president.  But I am pretty sure he will help engineer the president's state-of-the-art rocket ship for when he travels to address the citizens who colonize Mars.

Its my job to make sure he has all the tools he needs to pursue his dreams.

The snow fell and I right along with it

Finally, it came.  Boy, howdy, did it come.  We got a good six inches between Tuesday night and Wednesday morning.  School was delayed, meetings were cancelled, we pretty much didn't leave the house except for putting the kids on the bus and getting them back off. 

The kids had a blast playing in the snow.  All Wednesday it was the perfect snowball snow - fluffy, just wet enough to stick together to form a ball.  Race Car man quickly got over his aversion to socks when he discovered how cold his feet got in his snow boots without them. 

We found out Wednesday night that school was cancelled for Thursday and the kids were beside themselves with the excitement of playing outside all day long.

We woke yesterday to a light freezing rain that continued all day long.  It left a two-inch layer of ice crystals on top of our snow and coated every tree, fence, mailbox and vehicle in a sheet of ice. 

I did leave the house, though.  Had to.  We we were out of dog food and milk, two things that in this household are required to keep the earth revolving around the sun.  And then, I had the followup appointment for Race Car Man's evaluation.  He had to retake one test series, and then we met with the psychologist.

I answered a lot of questions.  My son answered some questions.  The doctor was kind, measured, and very patient.  As he interviewed me, he completed an evaluation.  We clarified some questions.    He will compile his report and send it to us, probably in a week.  But of course, as a parent, you want to know the answers to your questions, even if you think you know what they are. And so I asked him.  And he very kindly and gently shared the results of the evalution form he had just completed with me.

I've had to learn some new phrases about myself over the last couple of months - some easier, some harder.  I've had to learn how to say "I am a wife" after a few years of wanting to be anything but. 

I had to learn how to say "My brother is dead" and saying it still causes a surge of anxiety and pain that feels like its going to break my sternum in half.

And as of yesterday, I have one more to add.

"My son has autism."

 

 

 

 

Today's post brought to you by the wonders of cold medicine

I shudder to think of what I'd feel like right now without the bubbly goodness of Alka Seltzer Plus cold medicing roiling through my tired veins.  Even on the sauce, my nose is running, I"m sneezing like someone's sick idea of a cartoon joke and every time I blow my nose, the goop in my left nostril tries to exit via my eyelid.

I managed to make it to work, though.  I'm sure my coworkers appreciate the plague I'm spreading via every doorknob.

Image courtesy of  US National Library of Medicine

Once when I was in high school I had a sinus infection that spread into my eyes.  It wasn't pinkeye, it was a sinus infection, and every time I would blink my right eye, a think film of yellowish-green goo would spread itself over my eyelid, almost completely obscuring my vision.  So attractive.

In a way, I'm grateful for the fuzzy wooziness of my brain right now.  It provides an insulating blanket between me and life. 

I just managed to get a new evaluation appointment set up for my little guy with a psychiatrist in a couple of weeks.   That's unheard of around here, this doctor and most of the others have a 3 month wait for new patients, but we managed to call right after somebody cancelled so we got lucky.  Lucky is a rather dubious term, but lucky it is, to get in before the end of year while our deductibles are all met, lucky to see the doctor who already knows him because he treats my daughter too, lucky to have a teacher who communicates so well on what she sees in the classroom so that there's no disconnect between what we think is going on and what is actually happening during the school day.  He's still struggling.  He's in the right place, no doubt, but still struggling.  And the teacher is kind of surprised that he doesn't have a certain diagnosis, because behaviorally he is so similar to the other kids in her class that have that particular issue.   I had ruled it out before because there were a couple of symptoms that didn't seem to be a match, but looking at it more than a year later with kindergarten behind us and current behaviors in our face, I'm shocked it didn't stand out for me before now. 

I don't want to put it out here yet, because with kids a lot of issues that might seem like one thing can actually be something else.  So I'm going to try to just be patient and open-minded and see what the eval results tell us, then we go forward from there. 

All I really care about, ultimately, is that we know enough to provide him the right kind of  support.  It doesn't matter whether he has diagnosis A, B or C -- it is what it is, all that changes is how we help him cope.

I spent the obligatory hour on the phone with three different people at the insurance company yesterday, only to end up with a referral to a psychiatrist who, as it turns out, doesn't actually do pediatrics.  But that landed us with the resident psych at the center who does, and we already know him, so that should be good, right?    Still, its frustrating.  We're also being assigned to a dedicated team by the insurance company who are supposed to provide me with as many local resources as they can find for me within a week. 

Fortunately, my wine rack is well stocked right now, its a Friday night,  and the kids are at their dad's for a few days.  I have some time for a pity-party before I need to lift my chin up and buckle my seat belt.  Of course, with the cold medicine I'm not really sure I'll need the wine, and with a clogged schnozz I probably wouldn't enjoy it anway. 

 

 

Picking Scabs

I find myself circling in the center of the room, holding patterns, avoiding the loss swept into the corners.  So much pain there, so little of it truly resolved.  I pushed it away to forget it, and this new life keeps asking me to sift through those painful memories and feel them all over again, this time really feel them, so I can grieve them and let them go.

I like the center, I like the pretending part where even though I was hurt, I was tougher than the hurt and the pain didn't really touch me.  I like the middle of the room where I imagine that these things today are not monsters I helped create but that they are all somebody else's fault.  I fear getting lost down the rabbit hole of black, jagged edges where everything I was supposed to be able to trust in wasn't ever really real.  I don't want to be confronted with those feelings yet.  I wanted to wait to deal with them, wait forever as if that's all it would take to make them less painful.

That's the tricky thing about them.  You would think that time would blunt them, burn down the hard and sharp parts, soften the clout to the side of my head and ease the squeeze of the fist on my heart.  And then I find that no, there has been not one iota of change in those feelings of helplessness and grief and anger and excruciating pain.  Not one shred of lessening of the feeling that it wouldn't have happened if I had been better, if I had less ugly, less messy, less self-absorbed. 

Thousands of miles between you and I and there's no comfort to be found, no shoulder to hide my face in, no enabler to help me pretend the past isn't real and that now and the tomorrow is all there ever was or ever will be.  No strong hand to hold to reassure me that this time its different, that you are not the other one.  Every shattered nerve, every thread of anxiety that loops itself through my gut adds more miles to what already exists between us.  But really, its only me putting them there. 

Where do I find the balance between unfocusing enough to make the time pass more quickly and crawling into the hole with old grief and letting it burn its way out of my core?  How do I keep myself from dropping - no, throwing down - the lines of connection so that we can still be reached?

Trust comes so hard for me.  No, you are not the other. I know that.   Never have I had any reason to do anything other than trust you. But the ugly voice from the corners reminds me:  There was a time when I didn't have any reason not to trust him, either.  Open and transparent-seeming eyes looked straight at me, reasonable voices comforted me, soothed me and fed me buckets of steaming lies.  Which part is the part where I can distinguish between the real and the construct?  

And so I avoid the corners.  Let the things swept there lie a while longer.  

This smile

Last year it was not uncommon for me to answer my cell phone in the middle of meetings or to pick up my deskphone even when I was eyeballs-deep in the middle of monthend accruals.  Last year was so hard, those first months of school, when it seemed like at least every other day I had to get back in my car, abandon whatever I was in the middle of, and go rescue my son - who could not cope with school. 

The nurse at his school was his safe person.  If his teacher absolutely could not deal with him or he was having too hard a time, they would take him to the nurse's office and she would talk to him if she could, soothe him as much as possible, and if she thought he needed to hear mom's loving voice or needed to go home, she would call me.  She was such a big help to me last year, and she was so dedicated to my son.  She really made a big difference to us, and when he moved schools this year she was one of the people I felt a twinge of regret about, because she really does care for him and I hated that he was losing that connection.

Yesterday I was in the middle of a meeting with one of the floor supervisors at work, problem solving and information-gathering, and my cell phone rang.  For the first time in a long time - possibly the first time this school year - I answered my cell phone because it was from the school district number. 

It was our nurse from last year.

She was at my kids' new school substituting for that school's nurse and she had gotten to see my son.  The reason she was calling was...

...to absolutely rave about how mature and calm and happy he was and how delighted she was to get to talk to him. 

I am flooded with emotion.

Gratitude for teachers and staff who genuinely love my children and care about their interests and needs. 

Fierce pride in my son.

Love. Joy. Hope. Anticipation.

Its one of those moments that more than makes up for the times when we struggle, when things go wrong, when its hard to just take any more steps forward.  This is the kind of moment that recharges the batteries and makes everything seem possible.

The smile on my face will last for days.

 

Embracing uncertainty

The combined lessons of my adult years, when viewed through the lens of history, have an intricate and consistent similarity.  This creates with within me a tendency to agree with those who believe that our life cycle and the challenges we face have a very clear purpose.  I'm also inclined to think that the people who believe we create our own reality have a certain inside line.

If there is one quality I've lacked abundantly, its been patience.  Read Mom's anecdotes in my baby books if you don't believe me.  Better yet, spend a day or two with me when I'm running full-tilt at a project. 

Impatience has dogged me in every facet of my life, from school to work to relationships to parenting.  I've spent more years than I like to think about wondering why does this have to take so long?  What's the big wait for? 

I wrote about the big schedule change with SG, then I wrote that no, there wasn't a change.  Except that now there is another change and so at this point I'm just going to stop writing about it because it seems that the life of a Road Tech is nothing but uncertainty and I am too busy dealing with the knot of anxiety that's currently twisting my small intestine.

I just can't plan my life, and the more I try to plan it right now, the more it resists being planned.  I'm certain there's a lesson in here for me, an opportunity, and I know the longer I spend being wracked by stress about something I can't do a damn thing about the longer it will take me to find the good parts. 

But I'm going to take a few minutes longer to wring the last bit of drama out of the stress.  If you need me I'll be hiding in my closet.

 

Skyrockets in Flight and What I Look For in People

        Image Credit

Yesterday on the brilliant green grass at a local soccer field, against an azure blue sky, we sent rockets into the air.  One, two, three - and then again - and then again.  I've never set off a rocket before.  I can't wait to do it some more.

What kind of man buys rockets and motors and fuses and everything for his girlfriend's kids?  What kind of guy spends time thinking about activities that will enrich his girlfriend's children and get them off the computer and into the outside?  (Its not that I don't think about how to get them outside, but I'm somewhat less...um...creative.  Go outside and playis about as much as I seem to be able to manage.)  What kind of man patiently shows two very sensitive, obstreperous and distractible children how to put the wadding and the parachute and the nose and the motor and the fuse and the plug into their rockets?  MINE does.

The other best part about setting off rockets is having two hyperactive and overstimulated children around to run around and pick up all the parts from where they landed and bring them back to you.  It tires them out.

~*~*~*~*~*~

I was thinking a bit about the post I wrote earlier this week about the snobby people at the party who didn't think I was good enough to talk to.  Then I thought about other people at the party who I might not have tried to talk to either, and wondered if that made me just like the people I was sort of lambasting for being rude, self-entitled bastards.  Naturally no one wants to be thought of negatively, part of becoming a mature and self-actualized person is accepting that not everyone you meet is going to like you and you do not have to wrap yourself up in a pretzel trying to make them see just how wonderful you are.  But another part of becoming a mature, self-actualized individual is reviewing how you treat others and determining whether your actions are in line with your core values.  And since I value being treated kindly, is this something I give to others?

 

                    Image Credit

I was at ComiCon'11 in San Diego a couple of weeks ago.  "Crowded" falls woefully short of even beginning to describe the mob scene I encountered there.  The entryways, the escalators, the stairs, the eating lounges, the convention hall floors, the hallways between the session rooms - all were most of the time so shoulder-to-shoulder with people that if a fire had broken out the death toll would have been horrific.  And I like people but I hate crowds.  I hate being jostled and pushed and shoved and unable to easily navigate the fifteen feet between me and the booth I want to visit.  I hate not being able to take a clear picture of anythingbecause there's no way on earth you can make that many people stop walking between your camera lens and the giant Perry the Platypus bus they set up in the pavilion hall.  So when its me and that many people, I'm not bloody likely to be smiling and friendly.  Much, anyway.  But every time I was in line for something or stopped and sitting somewhere, I managed to find someone to talk to.

I like to have someone to talk to.  I don't necessarily want it to be the homeless guy who smells like old booze and possibly urine, but if he's my only choice?  I'll probably talk to him.  If its the girl who got on the plane and sat down next to me looking like Barbie but who is a real-life full-ride-scholarship law student who spent the summer in Croatia, I'll talk to her, even before I figured out that her cover didn't even begin to describe the book inside.  Pretty much if you make eye contact with me and don't throw something at me or rush away with a frown on your face (why do people do that?  Do I look like Quasimodo?), I'll probably at the very least smile at you or say "hi."

Sometimes at parties I have to breathe a little bit and I'll pull back to the outskirts and observe people.  I like to watch what people do in a group, watch the hierarchies develop and figure out what people are like.  Sometimes I'll seek out the person who looks like they're feeling left out or afraid of the crowd and I'll try to engage them.  And other times I'll want to be on the middle of the dance floor or in the center of the conversation with a big group of people.  And when I say "sometimes" I mean in the course of just the one party.  On a day when I'm feeling normal, I'm all over the map. 

But there are times and for certain reasons (I'm stressed out, I'm uncomfortable, I'm not on my game, I don't feel well) when I don't talk to people.  When I feel singled out.  When I'm new and don't know anyone yet.  When I first started working at my current job, I hated walking into the lunchroom when everyone was on break.  I didn't know people's names yet and I'm not good at remembering the ones I've already been told, and I don't like feeling like everyone's trying to figure out who I am without actually talking to me first.  And so I would kind of sneak in, get my water or my hot cocoa or wash my dishes, then leave again without making eye contact with anyone.  And so I imagine that the guys sitting around the table might, without being able to read my mind, get the impression that I was standoffish and cold.  (Four years and four Christmas parties later, they know better.  They've seen me play beer pong and make a fool of myself on the dance floor.)

And I think of the times I've been somewhere and avoided meeting the eyes of the homeless guy begging for change or the soccer team selling candy bars or the guy in the white suite and red hat asking for donations for his religious charity.  And I know I pretended I didn't see them because I didn't want to talk to them.  I don't want to buy whatever they're selling and I don't want to donate money to a group whose objectives I disagree with, and I need the $10 in my wallet because I'm a single mom who is fighting to make ends meet and I wish I could give it to the homeless guy but I can't.  But is that reason enough not to at least look at them and be friendly?  No.  Its not.

I imagine that maybe people who have money get hit up a lot by people they don't really know but who want something from them - a job, a hand up, a loan, a ride in their fancy car.  And I suppose that might make them naturally suspicious about people.  They may meet more people who want something from them than people who are just being friendly.  And maybe they're reacting to me the way I'm reacting to the homeless guy because they don't know me at all and they don't realize that I'm not asking them for anything, I just wanted to be friendly.  But still - just as its not a sufficient excuse for me, I think its not a sufficient excuse for them.  Because we all need to be better not just at being human but at being humane. 

I'm not better than the homeless guy.  I'm more fortunate.  Maybe he's not a nice person, but I don't know that until I meet his gaze and say hello. 

 

 

Lost in the spin

In case you can't tell from my last couple of blog posts, I'm having a hard time right now emotionally.  This is stressful, this digging into the final death throes of a marriage that's been dying for a long time.  The worry over what will or won't happen, the not knowing how things will shake out in the final dispensation of our lives together, it gives me over to the brittle, acid edge of panic.  And of course life doesn't stop just so I can have anxiety, so it wraps its tendrils around everything - work, parenting, tending animals and working horses - until all things seem fraught with emotion I'm not dealing with well. 

Thanks to my particular versions of "stuff that's wrong with me," anxiety is a long-term companion.  If anxiety were a person we'd have had a common-law marriage years ago.  As it is, you would think that I would be used to the physical and emotional repercussions of our partnership, but somehow I never am.  I'll start to obsess about one thing, anxiety sets in, and as the dark stain of adrenaline spreads, I'll start applying the fear to things that don't even belong to it.

Maybe someone will cross the line on my way to work today and I'll die in a fiery wreck.

Something will happen to one of the kids, something horrible.

My house will burn down.

Something will happen to one of the cats or one of the dogs, and God knows Juliet's already gone through two of her nine lives what with the whatever thing that bit her and she almost bled to death and the stuff that looks like she got rolled by a car...or one of the horses will get sick or one of the chickens will get eaten.

SG will figure out how really super fucked up I am and run for the hills

I'll lose my job

My car will break down

And so on.

Its like dancing handcuffed to someone who won't let you sit down and breathe.  And I keep dancing because if I don't, if the wheel stops, if I take a minute to breathe, I'll fall apart.  So I move forward and sideways and around in circles and I keep going because the anxiety, there's no victory over her, just coping and getting through it.  The only way through it is, frankly, through.   Medicating is not an option, the kind of medication I'd need to cut through this thick skein of feelings would drop a horse, and I just can't do that, not what with the 45-mile commute and the parenting and the things needing doing.  Can't.  So I cope.

The light at the tunnel is that this prom date with my evil muse is only temporary.  Once the material things that are whipping her into a frenzy are done with, she'll sulk off for greener, albeit temporary, pastures, and I"ll enjoy a much needed vacation from her attentions.

Much.  Needed.

Extended Resource Room

The IEP team met today to plan for next year.  It was a full house today.  C's dad came, and aside from his teacher, the school psychologist and the resource room teacher, we also had a teacher and psychologist from another elementary school, the vice-principal, the occupational therapist and two representatives from the district who had observed my son in the course of the year.

We all discussed our observations of how he has been doing, and not one person in the room disagreed that a general education classroom would be appropriate for him next fall.  The next question, then, was where should he be?

Our district has a group at a different elementary school called the Extended Resource Room.  The kids in this group, all 11 or so of them, are mostly kids with Asperger's, sensory issues, or if not formally diagnosed, still clearly on the spectrum.  All of the kids in the group are extremely bright, but their reactions to their environment and their social behavior seriously interferes with their learning. 

C will join this group in the fall, and as often happens in my life, random strings of connectedness bring me to the knowing that this is the right path.  I already know two children in this group, but from entirely different areas of my life.  A woman who was on my team at the last orienteering ride has a grandson in this program.  And, as it turns out, so is SG's niece.  Go figure.

There is one teacher and two para educators for this group of kids.  They use daily task charts and a reward system to assist them with structure and expectations, and as they improve their behavior and become ready for academics, they will either receive academic instruction within the small class, or if they are ready behaviorally, they will join the general class for periods of time during the day.  He will have transportation, and he will be in an environment where the adults know how to cope with him when the inevitable setback occurs.

This scenario is exactly what I was hoping for and I couldn't be happier that the district and the school are working so diligently to meet my son's needs. 

Today is a good day.