Everything Would be Easier with a Secret Handshake

You'd think after a number of years parenting a child with behavioral special needs, I'd know a thing or two about how to approach another mother in a similar situation.  But I don't. 

There is a little boy and his mom that attend the same "gym" class Little Bro and I attend.  It took very little time for me to figure out that the no-need-to-attempt-participation approach the mother took to circle time and the stuck-like-glue helicopter mama approach she took to free play was a finely honed survival routine meant to maximize her son's freedom and enjoyment while protecting him and others from his behavioral challenges.  THAT was easy to spot, since Little Bug and my finely honed survival routine is like second nature now.  For the past few weeks, I've gone out of my way to smile and interact with this mother and her little boy, simply because it's clear others are learning to steer clear.  But she's too busy helping her son have a positive experience, and I'm too busy chasing my fearsomely fast younger child around the gym to have a conversation that extended past the most basic of pleasantries with her.

Last week her son took a younger kid down.  Hard.  It happened so fast she simply couldn't stop the movement.  I saw all the moms (and the teachers) momentarily pause in horror before trying to pretend they didn't see anything more than a little "oopsie" between two buddies.  Worse, I saw the "how dare you" glare from the younger boy's mother before she could compose herself.  But what made my heart hurt most was the look on the mother who had been so vigilant and patient and determined to make sure her son was able to have a normal gym experience. She seemed so defeated in that moment that she had failed her son by not protecting him from himself.

And I can identify with that feeling with every fiber in my body.

For the rest of the class she kept a wide berth from everyone else.  Her son exhibited some behavior during his restraining time out that likely embarrassed her more, not just because of his screaming and thrashing, but having had to do it myself a number of times, having to hold your child in a restraining time out is a pretty awful thing to have to do in front of strangers who don't understand. 

After class, I loitered a bit.  I wanted to reach out to her in some way, to express in some form that I understood and that Little Bro and I were looking forward to seeing them again next week.  I wanted to let her know that I understood how hard to is to take your child to an environment where they don't excel or fit in, where the protective buffer of understanding and accommodations isn't there.  Where their challenges tend to be highlighted more than their many strengths and strides.

But I didn't know what to say.  "Hi, I noticed your son clearly has special needs.  Mine does, too.  So...yeah" didn't seem like a great pick up line.

It felt wrong to force her to further acknowledge her son's challenges, and it felt wrong to invade my son's privacy and reduce him to "another special needs kid" just to make someone else feel better. So I just caught her eye and said good bye to them both by name.

But what I wish I could have said to her was this:

I know what it feels like to have your child struggle to have everyone else see what you can see...the amazing, strong, special child who just wants to be friends but isn't always able to show it the same way others do.  I know what it feels like to have to be a mother other people secretly judge for being over-protective, too strict, unfun, and low-key because that is what your child needs to stay balanced.  I know what it feels like to watch your sweet, loving child accidentally hurt another child in a way that doesn't look accidental.  I know what it feels like to have so much progress derailed by a moment.  I know what it feels like to see your child picked last, or not at all, in the toddler game of life.  I know how it feels to dread going into another day of battle and to see your child miss opportunities. 

And I know what you know...despite (or rather, because) of all that, you're a lucky mama and your son is a soul anyone would be lucky to call friend.

Valentine's Day

It's no secret that I'm not a crafty or particularly creative mom.  I struggle with inventive and ambitious and out-of-the-box.  But one of my resolutions for 2012 was to change that by starting small and specific...holidays. 

This year I wanted to celebrate each holiday with my kids in a memorable way.  I wanted to begin a tradition of whimsy and fun and celebration year round.  I can rock Christmas, but the rest of the holidays are pretty bland around our parts, so I'm focusing on decorating and doing something special on the actual holiday.  Nothing big really, but just a little pizazz to liven life up.

For Valentine's Day, I decorated with tacky glittery hearts, candy hearts, and some other little trinkets.  I doubt my toddlers noticed any of it, but it made me feel like I was at least attempting to acknowledge the holiday. They did, however, acknowledge the bright red pancakes I made for breakfast and the heart-shaped pizzas they got to make for dinner. The pink milk was a little off putting for them, however. Simple simple things on my part that made a big impact on them.

So I encouraged by managing to provide some interesting aspects of Valentine's Day for my little ones.  It was fun for all three of us, and I can see it easily becoming a tradition to make heart-shaped food each year.

Next up: St. Patrick's Day.  I've already got my tacky glitter items ready!

11

Dear Little Bro,

Yesterday as you and I laid quietly in your warm bed as you were waking up from nap, we started counting.  You can count to 10 in a million different ways (fast, slow, monster voice, scream, whisper, etc.), but 10 was your cap.

So I told you the next number after 10 was 11.

You rolled the number around on your tongue, tried it out in sing-song and loud variations, and then let it loose with a super fast 12345678910......11!

And just like that, you learned something new.  Something you will never, ever forget. I find that fascinating. One thing I have learned over the past few years is to never take the miracle of learning for granted. So to watch it happen, something so memorable as a number, was neat for me.  It's one of my favorite parts of being a mom, and your zest for learning is so exciting to experience.

Just wait until I let you in on the mind-blowing news about a certain number 12!

Intentional Mothering

I've written and rewritten this post four times over the last week.  I'm not sure why it is so hard for me to articulate what has been screaming inside my head.  So, I'm taking a stab at just winging it without framework.

I've been an unequal mother to my boys recently, or perhaps ever since Little Bro came home.  With Little Bug in school for most of the week, Little Bro gets full days of Mommy time.  Little Bug, however, comes home from school and has to share the time he does have with me with his little brother.  I mean, obviously brothers spend time together with their mom.  But Little Bug...that became all the time he got with me, shared time.

Our home life is such that evening schedules are critical and must be done together.  Little Bug needs an early bedtime, he can't occupy himself independently while I put his brother down to bed, and truly, he loves his brother so much that he doesn't want to be without him.  We even do Little Bug's home therapies as a group. Simply put, we function in nearly every moment between school and bedtime as a unit of three.

Before Little Bro came home, I would pick Little Bug up from school and take him out to dinner at least once a week.  There we would sit, just the two of us, watching trains go by and "talking" about our day.  I think back on those moments and realize how special they were, and how much I miss that with Little Bug (I still have it with Little Bro).

When Appa comes home for the weekends, we try to soak up every moment with him and consequently, do very little not as a family unit.  And although this is a good thing, it once again shafts Little Bug from quality one-on-one time.  One of us taking him to the grocery store to relieve the double duty is hardly quality time.

I guess I just realized that Little Bug needs and deserves a little time with his mama without having to share her with anyone else.  I'm shocked at how little of this precious time he has actually gotten in the last months.  It makes me feel really crummy, actually.

But I have two kids and only one me, and the truth is having more than one kid really does make it very hard to have quality time alone.  For me, the first step was realizing one of my kids was getting less and determining what I considered to be (and not to be) quality one-on-one time.  The next step is hardest: actually making the time.  Because for our family, it doesn't come organically.  Little Bro doesn't softly plod off to play some educational game in one room while Little Bug and I can snuggle and whisper secrets to each other or play a game on his terms at his speed.  I have to manufacture an activity for Little Bro and devise another activity removed from Little Bro's activity.  Then I have to sell them both to my kids.

How is that working?  Not super, but I am getting there.  I don't love turning "Jake" on the TV for my 2 year old simply so he will leave me alone for a while. But when I have managed to get Little Bug alone and give him my special attention, he had blossomed.  I attribute it in small part to some of his recent developmental successes, and I have definitely noticed an increase in his affection and desire to snuggle since I've made the effort to give him special time.

This matters.  I can see it in his smile and his eyes and his off-handed or deliberate kisses and hugs.  Having me matters to him.  Even just the five minutes a night where we play a puzzle or take silly pictures on my phone make a difference to him and make him happy.

Sometimes I forget that I am the most important person in my kids' lives.  It seems sort of pompous to go around thinking that you mean more to them than anyone else in the world, but really, it's true.  My five minutes are worth hours of other peoples' time to my sons, and I need to start valuing my time the way they do. Intentionally.

Perspective

Today I was dragging Little Big and Little Bro through a long hallway in a children's wing of a large hospital.  They had been woken from naps early and were tired, cold, and grumpy.  Even grumpier was me, their seriously sleep-deprived mama (my own fault for deciding on a whim this week to paint our kitchen after bedtime), who was pissed off that we had to add yet another weekly therapy session that required me to shlup both my grumpy kids around at a really inopportune time of day.  Classy and big girl, I know.

Bottom line, it was a three car frowny train barreling down that hallway about 7 minutes late.

A man and woman stood about 3/4 of the way down the hallway fussing in agitation over a large jogging stroller that was facing away from us.  They seemed stress and unhappy and resigned, just like me.  My thought as I approached them was literally "Man, I know how you feel.  My kids are being pains, too!"

Then I reached the point where I could see their child in the stroller.

A child probably 3-5 years old with a trachea tube whose fragile looking body was having what looked like a seizure as her parents tried to keep her safe and comfortable in the moment.


Dear Me:
Shut the hell up.  You have two healthy children who have every chance in the world to live out all the dreams you had hoped for them. Children whose needs are predictable and isolated and generally not impeding daily life. Get over yourself, hug your babies, be grateful, and send a prayer for quick peace for that family who just reminded you what real strength and challenge looks like.

He's Got This

The past week or two has sucked for Little Bug and for us.  His behavior hit a low point, and it took a lot out of us all as we tried to crawl back to balance.  Luckily we managed to isolate a couple of the trigger factors and modifying those things helped Little Bug a ton in being able to regulate himself.  That makes me nearly sob with relief because as hard as it is for us to deal with, you can see the frustration and helplessness in his eyes as he loses control. He hates these periods more than any of us.

But I realized today that one of the factors I hadn't considered was definitely at play; a developmental growth spurt.

Little Bug is a plateau-er in his development.  He takes a long time to build up to a new stage in development, and then sits there for a long time until he just leaps up to the next level.  I can imagine that would take a lot of of a little mind and body.

But last week my son could only get the end letters of the ABCs down, could count to 3 and then again from 7-10, and had only a couple songs that he could sing all the way through on his own.  He could focus long enough to match five colored circles to the five colored squares only with significant help/prodding/forcing.  These feats took him a very long time to achieve, and I was so proud of him.

Tonight he can count to 10 confidently without skipping a number, he can sing the entire ABC song by himself without any help (although he hums through some of the hard-to-pronounce letters, but I know it's in his head), he sang not one, not two, but our entire five song bedtime routine on his own without help (including a song in Korean), and his new favorite game is a color matching folder with 12 colored squares that he rocks the lamination off.

Proud?  Appa and I are practically drunk on it.  I'd have him bow, but he is slumbering peacefully and will be for the next 10 hours because he does that again now, too.

The funny thing about parenting a child with developmental special needs is that although I know I am a part of his development, I can't explain why one day he didn't have it and the next day he does.  There is rarely an "ahhh!" moment when it all just clicks for him.  For nearly a year I have spent a portion of nearly every day working on color matching with him, and it usually ends with me privately freaking out that my 4 year old is never going to be able to match colors.  And then one day, poof, he does it no big deal.  Then again, I suppose that is how most kids develop; his longer times between skills just make it seem like he is developing different than other children, when really he isn't.

He's just marching to the drum beat that works best for his mind.  Which, if it was a red drum on a small laminated square, he would now totally match to the large red square. 

No big.  He's got this.  Just like he will get the next skill and the next skill and the next.

I'm lucky, so very lucky, to get to witness this sort of development.  The lows are low when parenting a child with special needs, but holy heck, the highs are high, high, high.

Mama Bear Doesn't Care About You

Today Little Bug walked up to watch a child at the children's museum play with an activity.  He gently reached out to touch the toy boat and the child, who could not have been more than 4 himself, swatted his hand away and yelled "No. You are a bad boy."

Oh hell no.

In the back of my head, my mama bear roared, but out of my mouth came a smiling, sweet, quiet mama voice that cooed "Oh, he isn't a bad boy. He is a good boy."


Because he is, and he was being a good boy.

The kid's response was an even more aggressive "NO.  He is a BAD boy."

H.E.L.L  N.O.  Did I mention his mother was sitting right.next.to.him and never so much as flinched.  What do you do with that?

At that point, I was done.  I calmly repeated that he is a good boy and told Little Bug we were moving on to another activity.  I kept a calm, smiling face at all times.

And that mother had the NERVE to glare at ME as we walked away.

As I later recounted the tale to Appa, he asked if I said something to the horrible mom.  And the fact is, I didn't.  Here's why:

I try to use social interactions to teach my kids how to act, like we all do.  In this case, my only concern was for Little Bug.  I wanted him to know he was not a bad boy, and everything I said to that little boy reinforced that to Little Bug.  He isn't a bad boy, and it isn't acceptable for anyone to call him that.  But I wasn't going to say anything to the mom because I don't want Little Bug to learn that escalating a problem is a good idea.  She didn't say anything to me, so me saying something to her would have been an offensive move.  I want Little Bug to feel comfortable and calm enough to remove himself from a situation if he needs to.

But most of all, I don't give a crap about that mom or her kid.  It's not my job to teach her kid manners or to teach her how to raise a child to not grow up as an @hole that no one likes.  It is my job to teach my son how to be confident in himself and his ability to protect himself when he has to interact with said @holes.

I am his teacher and I reserve myself for him and him alone, and that is her and her son's loss.

PS: Screw you, lady.