Meanwhile, Life Keeps Happening

When I’m not sitting around symptom spotting, life goes on. Alyssa has a Homecoming dress, Olivia has homework that needs to be nagged to death in order for it to get done, there are dentists to be seen, the floors need to be mopped and laundry is at a constant level of tragedy.

But seriously, those dentists. Liv has had three appointments in the last six weeks with her dentist (yes, the girls each have their own dentist…what do you mean your kids don’t see different dentists?) The first visit was to have five baby teeth pulled in preparation of orthodontics which may or may not happen in the next year or so. The second was a cleaning that was a couple of months overdue. This last one, that took place on Wednesday, was to put sealants on some grooves she has in order to prevent future cavities.

Yes, Liv’s dentist loves us.

Speaking of people who love Olivia, I got an email from her teacher the other day. I suppose this is a record. It’s the first email of the school year and we’re four whole weeks in.

Her teacher was sharing her concerns that Liv isn’t working independently on things like spelling and reading. These are subjects that are usually fairly easy for Olivia, so when she’s fighting even those, we worry.

I talked to O myself, trying to figure out what’s up with her. It’s like pulling teeth to get answers from her. She shrugged and said, “Spelling is boring. I read the book my teacher told me to read but I didn’t like it, so I didn’t read it all.”

Yeah, she’s a stubborn little wretch. She’s also smart enough to just stare blankly at her teachers and aides and that sometimes gets her out of doing the work…at school. Sadly for me, that means the work gets sent home where I have to badger her sometimes to the point of tears to get the work done. Sigh.

This girl…she just wants to do what she wants to do. Why are all the adults in her life so obsessed with things like reading, math and spelling? Life would be so perfect for her it we’d all just shut up and let her watch YouTube and play games on her tablet.

Alas, we’re evil and want her to be able to do basic addition and subtraction. We also think she should be able to tell time using an analog clock. There’s also that whole reading comprehension thing. YouTube comments doesn’t count when it comes to daily reading requirements. Damn it.