Thursday, February 4, 2021

Gym

Report cards came home for the second quarter.

I don’t think it was mentioned here that Olivia was on the honor roll for the first quarter. All As and Bs. That’s pretty awesome, don’t you think?

The second quarter was much the same except…well, in the first quarter, she had health class.

Health was replaced by gym in the second quarter.

Care to guess what she got in gym?

Let me just say that she didn’t fail gym, which, honestly, I think was probably generous of the gym teacher.

She ‘earned’ a D- in gym.

All the rest of her grades were As and Bs again. But gym class was a struggle.

Tom was pissed, by the way; not at Olivia, but at the gym teacher for giving her a D-.

I laughed. I mean, come on. It’s gym class. Who even cares about a D- in gym class.

Tom was worried that the D- would demoralize Olivia.

Hello, m’Dude, have you and I not been living with the same child for the past fourteen years? She could not possibly care less about grades, in gym class or any other class for that matter. Grades do not motivate her. Honor roll, schmonor roll.

And let’s be honest here, it’s not as if Olivia is in the running for valedictorian. I don’t say that to be mean, it’s just the truth. Even if she didn’t have 5p- syndrome, she doesn’t care enough about grades to be bothered with something like that. That kind of status means nothing to her.

I gently reminded Tom that when it comes to gym class, Olivia is incredibly uncooperative. She will not participate. I don’t know if she can even force herself to do so. But she doesn’t even try.

So, D- is most likely fair in a class where participation is the bulk of the grading criteria.

He was still pissy about the whole thing. When he walked away, Olivia and I shared a look. I whispered to her, “We don’t care about gym, anyway, do we?”

She grinned and shook her head. See…at least two of us in this house are on the same page. Too bad it's not always the same two.

Wednesday, February 3, 2021

Narcissist

peaking of FB, my niece (my sister’s younger daughter) recently posted on FB something like, “It’s so hard to have a mother who is a narcissist and who has bipolar…”

The post went on to explain how her mother makes her feel small and inadequate and never quite good enough.

I didn’t reply because, well, I don’t know my niece very well and I honestly don’t know my sister all that well either and it’s not really any of my business.

My sister’s other younger sister (not my sister) did reply with something along the lines of: I love my sister but don’t ever let anyone make you feel small. You are deserve better.

My brother (the brother that is also my sister’s brother) also replied. He told Niece to not let anyone, not even her mother, make her feel bad. Just love her kids and blah blah blah.

So, yes, her cry for help was heard and she got the replies she was looking for.

Okay. So. My sister has always hated her mother. Her mother has been dead for decades now but Sis never had a nice thing to say about her mom. If you ask her, she’ll tell you that her own mother is a narcissist and was never a good mother.

If I had been inclined to reply, I might have said something about how I hoped that Niece would break the cycle of bad mothering. That if she felt her mom was a bad mom, maybe she, Niece, could do better by her own children.

But that probably wouldn’t have come across as helpful as I’d have liked.

So instead I just went and asked my husband if I was a narcissist. I mean, I don’t want to be a narcissistic mother. I really hope I don’t make it all about me all the time.

Wait.

Tuesday, February 2, 2021

It All Started with a FB Comment

It All Started with a FB Comment I belong to several groups on FB. I mean, don’t we all? I belong to two that are for cancer survivors, one is dedicated to those of us who had triple negative cancer.

I belong to that one where we all pretend to be ants. Don’t judge, it’s cute and fun and I joined during my six week quarantine in the beginning of this never-ending pandemic.

The others, the ones I’ve actually belonged to the longest are for parents of kids with 5p- syndrome, aka Cri du Chat.

It was on a post in one of the 5p- groups that I commented.

The original post was written by a writer with a niece with the syndrome. This author is writing a story with a character who has 5p- syndrome. The question the writer asked was whether a high-functioning 14 year old would be able to read a young adult story and understand it.

I was probably the 30th comment when I wrote that Olivia would absolutely be able to read and understand a young adult book. I explained that Olivia is high functioning, reads at above grade level and is able to understand everything that she reads.

My comment received almost immediate replies from a couple of parents with similar aged, similar capable daughters, asking if Olivia would be interested in communicating with their daughters. As we started talking back and forth, we all noted that our girls don’t have typical friends their own age. They just don’t seem to connect with their typical peers in a way that fosters friendships.

We exchanged phone numbers and Snapchat info. And so far, Olivia and I have spoken to Rosalie and her parents on the phone and O plans to do a video Snapchat call with her soon.

Olivia spoke really, really well on the phone. I was really proud of her. The girl we talked to sounded a lot like Liv, which was awesome. The parents and I compared notes and found that our girls have very similar stories. Their daughter was diagnosed at a younger age than Olivia but their early symptoms, their early health issues are eerily similar. So…this should be interesting.

Monday, February 1, 2021

Nicknames

Nicknames Way back when I was at my old job, we had a new guy, a young man, start working for us. He was probably in his early twenties.

He had the same name as one of the guys who’d been with the company for centuries.

In the beginning, everyone called the new guy “New J” and the one who’d been there “Old J”.

Alas, the seasoned employee did not actually appreciate being called “Old J.”

Someone suggested the younger, newer employee be “Little J” which would make the older employee be “Big J.”

Do I need to say that he didn’t like that one either?

I finally suggested that we call the older, longer employed guy “Real J” which caught the younger guy off guard because, as he pointed out, that would make him “Fake J”. Well…duh.

Luckily, in the end it didn’t matter because the Js didn’t work in the same department and so were never really near each other and they didn’t really share close co-workers so if someone called for ‘J’ most people knew who was being summoned.

But yes, the whole ‘real’ and ‘fake’ monikers amused me greatly, as anyone who knows me would expect.