Personal

I had a long diatribe written about my husband and my marriage and realized...until I can say these things to him, I need to keep them to myself.

Until I give him the chance to defend himself, I need to stop airing all my grievances for the world to see, especially when I know he won't see them.

So I'm actually going to keep some things to myself today.

I know...what a novel idea.

For something better than I could ever write and yet hits such a chord with me, go to http://irretrievablybroken.wordpress.com/

Getting a Kick out of Life

Olivia has entered that stage of social development where she's discovered the fun of being naughty just for the thrill of seeing/hearing other people's reactions to her behavior.

Actual conversation this morning during the three mile drive from our house to my mom's:

Alyssa, whining, "Livie, don't kick my backpack."

Me, thinking, OMG, give me a flipping break, "It doesn't really matter...oh, Livie, don't kick your sister's backpack."

Olivia, softly, with just a small grin in her voice, "Can I kick her butt?"

Me, stifling laughter, "No, you cannot kick your sister's butt."

Olivia, the grin in her voice bigger now, "Can I kick her leg?"

Me, not bothering to hide my own smile, "Of course not, it would hurt her."

Olivia, having decided that this game is great fun, "Can I kick her lips?"

Alyssa decided to join the fun at this point, pretending to be agast at the idea of her lips being kicked, "She wants to kick me in the lips!?"

I laughed outright at this point, "Livie, you can't kick your sister in the lips. It would hurt her and she might cry."

Olivia and Alyssa joined me in laughter and we pulled into my mom's driveway.

That? Is my idea of the perfect way to start the day.

Perspective

Like my girls, my second experience with PUDM was even better than my first.

I like to think my speech this time around was better (Julie?) and just having been to two others as a Riley parent made a difference.

I was even approached by several of the other parents of Riley kids.

Our first time there? One mom (not counting Julie, who...duh) approached me after my speech to tell me that a friend of hers had received a 5p- diagnosis prenatally. She said that her friend's doctors told her that her child would be blind, would never walk, never talk, would be unable to eat independently. She chose to terminate.

This is not a bash on that woman. Who knows what her doctors saw on the ultrasound? Who knows what was going on? But also...who knows what that baby might have been capable of?

It was one more time when I was grateful that we didn't receive Olivia's diagnosis until she was two years old.

Anyway, this past weekend, I had actual conversations with no fewer than four parents of sick/special needs kids.

What a great opportunity to feel connected.

One mom, whose daughter has Down Syndrome, talked about how lucky she felt to have had her special needs child first. She went into parenting with no preconceived ideas of what was going to happen.

She was also grateful that her child had such an obvious diagnosis. (She joked that her daughter would share some of her extra chromosome with Olivia since O is missing part of a chromosome.)

I thought it was wonderful that she and I connected even though our perspectivesare so different.

I am grateful that I didn't know Olivia's diagnosis right away. I am grateful that Olivia was my second child.

Alyssa was a text-book child. She had her fussy moments around 4pm - 9pm every night for about a month when she was about four weeks old, just like the books suggested she might.

She wasn't the best sleeper, but then, text book babies usually aren't. She crawled early (before she even sat up one her own,) she walked early, she was speaking in full sentences when she was 15 months old.

While I knew that you shouldn't compare one baby to the next, I knew that Olivia not holding her head up at nine months old wasn't normal, or even on the slow side of normal.

Because I had Alyssa as a model, I was able to get Olivia the early intervention she needed even without a diagnosis (also thanks to the gentle prodding of most excellent friends.)

I knew that even late walkers were walking by two years old. Olivia wasn't, at which point, I started pushing for a diagnosis.

One of the greatest things our developmental pediatrician told me was not to research 5p-. She said that the data is old. It's based on children who'd been institutionalized. She told me to take Olivia home and let her show us what she could do.

Five weeks after we received her diagnosis, she was taking her first independent steps.

She's been showing us ever since that we can't stick her into a mold that says "5p-" and expect her to stay there, doing (or not doing) all the things others before her had done or not done.

She's very much an individual and I'm grateful that I was able to get to know our Olivia before knowing anything at all about 5p-.

Yet, I can respect the perspective of that other mom, the one who took her sweet, sick baby home from the hospital armed with a diagnosis and a plan of attack. She knew what she was facing but still knew that her daughter was an individual who would also carve her own path.

I feel so lucky to be able to watch this little girl and my own show us the paths they want to take, to be able to follow as they mow down the stereotypes and show the world that they are more than their chromosomes.

Dance, Dance, Dance

Ten months doesn't seem like much. It's just about 40 weeks. Hmm, the length of a full-term pregnancy. Almost as long as Olivia gestated (she lasted 41 weeks and two weeks.)

This past weekend A and O and I attended the Purdue University Dance Marathon. We were last in West Lafayette about ten months ago, also attendeding a dance marathon.

At the last one, Olivia was just a few months into being three. She'd been walking for, oh...a year and a half.

She hated the bounce house. HATED it.

Alyssa loved it so much she bounced for six hours straight.

This time? Ten months later? Six'ish months of gymnastics classes under her belt? Olivia LOVED the bounce house. I almost couldn't drag her out of it. She bounces and jumped and fell with a purpose. She loved having other kids in there, even college 'kids.'

The only kid she avoided was Mickey, who tends to hug a little too tightly and tickle without letting up. Mickey is also about 13 years old and outweights Olivia by 75+ pounds. So when Mickey was in there alone, Olivia stayed out. But if there was even one other person in the bounce house with Mickey, Olivia was in there too.

She's small but she's quick and if she saw a hug coming her way, she could scramble either behind the other kid or out of the bounce house.

Also in milestone news, Alyssa said an entire sentence to my lovely friend Julie, whom Alyssa has known her entire life. She said (probably snippily, I wasn't there to hear the tone,) "My mom said I have to get an orange."

So...a full sentence. She's working on that shyness thing. We're working together. Baby steps, like the ones Olivia took to brave the bounce house.

Our whole house is about baby steps. I'm going to try and take baby steps toward self-acceptance while I continue to encourage Alyssa to take baby steps to overcome her shyness. And we'll all cheer Olivia on as she takes more and more baby steps toward full independence.

Bounce...bounce...bounce...goes the orange her mom told her to get.

She's Shy

I was a shy kid.

I hated talking to adults. I always felt so small and stupid and childish.

My mom was a shy child and so she was very patient with my shyness.

I think I'm patient with Alyssa's shyness. These days our only rule is that if someone speaks directly to her, she needs to at least answer with one word (such as "Thanks" or "Yes", "No", etc.) She sometimes just nods, though, which, while exactly adhering to the rule, it's at least acknowledging that someone has spoken to her.

Hey, big news, she now waves goodbye to my dad when he leaves after a visit. I know! And she's not even eight yet.

Anyway, lately, Alyssa's said wistfully, "It's boring being shy."

Ohhh kid, I so get you.

It is boring being shy.

I didn't really come out of my shell until my senior year of high school.

I started breaking out around my sophomore year, but that last year was AWESOME because of the sudden letting up of my almost crippling shyness.

I will forever be grateful to Mr. Don Riley, the greatest teacher to ever teach. He was the band director at my high school. My sophomore year he promoted me to the drum major of our school's marching band. That put me up front, in the limelight, in charge of the entire band and while it terrified me to contemplate it, I trusted his judgment and went with it. And it was so much fun. I loved being the leader, being up there where everyone was watching me.

That single decision on his part prompted me to go out for the fall drama and the spring musical during my senior year even without the support of my best friend, Roxann, upon whom I'd always relied to take away the spotlight, to create a shadow into which I could slouch and hide.

She didn't want to act in the plays, so I did it myself and to this day I'm proud of the gumption that took.

So...this leads me to Alyssa.

What can I do to help her with her shyness? She obviously wants to overcome it. But I don't want to push too hard too fast. I want to follow her lead, encourage her to make decisions that will put her out there, help her overcome the shyness, help her find out who she is when the shyness isn't there to discourage her.

Gymnastics has helped a lot. She's out there, enjoying the class, talking to the other kids and the coach.

She's excited about the recital that's still four months away.

School has been wonderful too. I always knew I couldn't homeschool Alyssa. Not only am I totally not organized enough to benefit her, I knew she needed to be out there, with other kids, strange kids who aren't cousins or close friends. These days, she's just another kid in the class full of second graders, goofing around, playing games at recess, answering questions when called on in class. For this, I am eternally grateful to the public school system.

I'm glad she's started to acknowledge that her shyness is getting in her way. I know from experience that only she can do the work necessary to overcome it. But I'm here for her, applauding every step she takes to break out of the shell, that harness that holds her back and keeps her from having fun, taking part, being one of the gang.

Esteem

What is it about weight and physical appearance that makes us (women) so hard on ourselves? Why does the number on my scale determine whether or not I think I am worthy of being respected by my husband, my co-workers, myself?

It's so stupid to feel this way.

Yet...I know that if I were thinner, in better shape, I'd be way more likely to stand up to my husband more often on issues that I tend to just let go these days because...I'm fat. And because I'm fat, I feel gross.

When I'm thin, I feel like my quirks are cute, or just, silly, or whatever. But those same quirks, when I'm fat? They're just creepy and gross.

It's not just my confidence in my abilities as a wife that suffer when I'm overweight. My confidence at work plummets. I feel slow and stupid and I hate that.

This is all so ridiculous.

If one of my friends were to say these things to me, I'd tell them how wrong it all is. It's so wrong to think that because I'm fat I don't deserve a good, healthy relationship in which both partners give and take equally.

I'd remind my friend that no matter what she weighs, she's still the same person, the same giving, loving person who deserves the same in return.

Why can't I be that kind of friend to myself?

Why does my self-esteem have to be tied into the number on the scale? Or the size of my pants? Why? Where did this come from? How can I stop it?

I don't know. But I'm going to try and figure it out. If nothing else, I need to do so for my daughters, so they can see that they deserve a good partner, a good life, no matter what size they are.

I have to get a grip for myself, for them, heck, even for my husband, who has no idea that I'm even feeling this way. Because I don't talk to him about it, because I'm fat and I fear hearing from him the same thoughts and feelings that flow through my own brain.

So stupid. So wrong.

So true.

I Scream

Last night, at 8:50, Alyssa asked me to get her some ice cream.

Never mind that it was ten minutes until 9 and she should have been asleep 50 minutes ago. I'd told her she could stay up and watch Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer, which, why is this show on so late on a SCHOOL NIGHT? Why? Why can't they show it when the kids are actually on break the week before Christmas? Seriously?

But she asked for ice cream.

And...I hate getting ice cream for the kids. I hate getting it for anyone. I hate getting it so much that I don't eat it at home because the chore of scooping it out of the tub, and then STIRRING it, because, duh, my kids don't like it to be hard when they eat it. They want it like soft-serve.

I hate every single part of that. And quite honestly? The pleasure they get from eating the ice cream doesn't take away a single moment of the frustration I feel when I have to get it for them.

I know. I'm on a roll here for parenting failure moments.

Whatever.

It gets worse.

See, because when she asked for it, I didn't just say no and leave it at that. Oh heavens no, that would have been the mature, maternal thing to do. Just say, "Sweetie, it's kind of late for ice cream. Maybe tomrrow after dinner."

And leave it at that.

I'm a terrific mother in hind-sight.

In reality, though? I'm not so good at this parenting thing.

She asked, "Can I have some ice cream?"

And I looked pointedly at the clock and said, with a decisive snip in my voice, "Really? It's almost nine o'clock."

She shrugged, as if to say, "Big freaking deal, slave woman, get me some ice cream!"

Which, obviously, is my perception at the time and not what she was actually thinking. She's seven and not particularly evil.

So, being mature and all, I suggested, "How about a Reeces cup instead."

Because a Reeces would mean way less work for me and duh, Reeces have peanut butter, which is so much better for you and ice cream. Right? Right.

But she didn't want a Reeces cup, she wanted ice cream.

So I bitched and I moaned and I slammed the freezer door open and I bitched some more about how much I HATE getting ice cream and I slammed the bowl on the counter at least two times and I stirred and stirred and stirred that hard-ass ice cream into soft-serve and I handed the bowl with a scowl and thought, "And you better freaking eat it!"

And...about half way through the ice cream I'd given her, she declared she didn't want anymore.

And I was so frustrated. With her and myself. I was over reacting and I knew it. I wasn't mad at Alyssa.

I was mad at Tom over an issue we'd discussed earlier in the evening and poor Lyssie was the one who was there to deal with my tantrum.

And I apologized and I hugged and kissed her goodnight and promised her that today would be better.

And it has been...so far. If she asks for ice cream tonight, I'll get it without complaint. I'll be the grown up, the mother.

And yes...marriage takes a lot of work but when one partner feels as if they are doing 90% of the work and the other partner is, sometimes, putting in his/her 10%, it even tougher than those marriages where it's a little more equal.

But perhaps that's a topic for another day.

Today I'm just a mom who didn't make the best choices last night. I'm hoping to consciously make better choices in the hours, days, weeks, months, years to come.