"Nap" Time

Olivia’s cough from last week worsened over the weekend. She never had a fever or any other complaints but the cough always got worse when she was active.

Sunday morning, Tom insisted she sit with him and rest. After lunch, he suggested I take her upstairs and try to get her to nap.

Olivia hasn’t napped in at least two years, probably more like three. But I was game for trying. Trying to get Olivia to nap meant I could nap, right? Right!

So right after lunch, after giving O her mid-day dose of antibiotic, off we went to try and sleep. She was happy to climb the stairs on front of me, grinning as if we were on a big adventure.

While we were in the bathroom for a pre-nap potty break, Olivia found a baggie with a button in it. It was from a pair of pants I’d bought the week before. She asked me if it was an imaginary button. I told her it looked pretty real to me.

She asked if she could have the button. She was fascinated by the idea of a button in a baggie. I said she could absolutely have the button. She carried that button into the bedroom and climbed into bed with me.

We snuggled beneath the covers and I quietly told her to close her eyes just for a few minutes and try to sleep just a little.

She said okay. Then, she played with her new treasure.

I set the alarm for about an hour and a half later, figuring even if she didn’t sleep, at least she was resting.

And…she didn’t sleep. We snuggled beneath the covers and Olivia whispered, “Are we taking a nap?”

“We’re trying,” I whispered back. “But we can’t be sleeping if we’re talking.”

She giggled. Then she got her button stuck in a plastic toy brush she’d been holding too. I had to get the flashlight that resides on the bedside table to get it out.

She tossed and turned and an hour in, she declared she had to pee again.

We managed to stick it out for about an hour and a half before she finally asked, “Is our nap done yet?”

I managed to not laugh and told her it could be done it she was ready for it to be done.

She jumped out of bed and started to run toward the stairs. I reminded her that running makes her cough worse and she slowed to a fast walk.

Tom asked how our nap was. I informed him that one of us might have snoozed a bit here and there but it wasn’t the one he’d hoped would do so.

H agreed with me that the hour and a half that she rested in bed with a half-sleeping mommy was good enough.

We put in The Simpson’s Movie and Olivia sat, entranced, on the floor for another couple of hours.

What won’t we do to limit our kids’ physical activity?

Weekend Projects

Each Friday, I gaze into the coming weekend, planning all that I’m going to accomplish, all that will get done, all the cleaning that will happen, all the playing the girls and I will do and by Sunday evening, I feel good if all the laundry is washed, dried and put away.

Let’s face it, two days are not enough to get it all done.

But I always think it could happen.

This coming weekend, I’m hoping to get the carpets in the living room and family room shampooed. I also hope to clean the tubs (Iron Out is my friend even if it does smell horrible.) The fridge really needs to be cleaned out. Not sorted, no, it needs to be emptied and scrubbed. It’s nasty.

I’d like to take the girls to the park because these lovely fair weather days are numbered. I can almost smell November in the air.

We will make it to the library because that’s what we do on Saturdays. Groceries will be purchased and put away. The family has to eat, don’t you know?

I will lay out the girls’ and my own clothes for the coming week because there is nothing more annoying than standing in front of a closet with a six year old at 6am and arguing over what is weather appropriate. We’ve never done that and I have no intention of starting. No, I lay out clothes for each day and that’s what she wears. No discussion, no arguments, no stress.

I do also hand five outfits a week for Alyssa but she’s a big, bad fifth grader now so she doesn’t actually HAVE to wear what I pick. Since I buy her clothes (mostly, Gram has some input) there actually anything inappropriate in her closet. Weather-wise, she’s pretty averse to being uncomfortable so no argument there. Which…yay!

I would like to get the toy room organized but…that’s a huge project. Definitely not a weekend job. I need to start it, though and each weekend, I think I’ll get in there and tackle just one box. So far? It hasn’t so much happened.

Alas, the weekends go by way too quickly and I never get quite enough done. But if everyone is happy come Sunday evening as we snuggle in and read our books, I call it a successful weekend.

Calls from School

I love the school the girls attend.

I’ve received two calls from the school in the past week regarding Olivia and both calls were good. As in, they weren’t calling me to discuss disciplinary problems or potty accidents or concerns.

They were calling because school has been in session for a whole month and they wanted to check in and let me know that Olivia is a delight in class. I know, right? Can you even stand the sweetness of that?

The first call was from her actual teacher. She told me that O is talking to her and the aide in the class. She said that Olivia doesn’t always talk but she does actually reply to direct questions. Ladies and gentlemen, we have progress.

She also said that Olivia is right on par with her peers academically. I can’t tell you how much that warms my heart. I know Olivia is smart but I also know that she doesn’t always show it to everyone.

The only concern is that Olivia doesn’t test well. She especially doesn’t test well on timed tests. She gets flustered and stressed and her processing slows way down and she just sort of shuts down completely.

But you know what? There are a lot of really smart people out there who don’t test well. We can work around this.

The other person who called was O’s special ed teacher. She spends about fifteen minutes each morning and a half hour each afternoon with Olivia and this is her third year working with O. Which means that Olivia knows her, has built a sense of trust with her and TALKS to her. This teacher also said that Olivia is right where they want her to be academically.

Olivia is actually reading to this teacher and answering questions about the stories they read together.

That’s my girl! I’m so proud of her. I can’t wait to go home and hug her and tell her how great she is. She hears that a lot but it will be nice to be able to tell her that I know this because of the calls, the confirmation from her teachers that she’s doing the work and learning and involved in her own education.

The special ed teacher was thrilled to hear that Olivia is taking gymnastics, she agrees with me that it’s a good extracurricular activity for Olivia, both physically and socially.

She said that O is working with a new aide in the special ed class and was happy to report that Olivia talks to this aide even after only a few weeks. This is progress too.

We like progress.

This Just In

So if it hurts to poop, it’s a bad thing.

This, I actually already knew, hence the appointment with the doctor yesterday.

But, and this is a Good Mom Moment, the doctor was glad I’d come to discuss O’s bowel movements with him because it should never, ever hurt to poop. Pain during pooping is a bad, bad thing and we need to do what we can to make sure it is never present during a poo session again.

How do we do that?

Fiber. Water. Apple juice. And if that fails? Benefiber, Miralax and good old milk of magnesia. Yikes.

But that last one? The MoM? It’s a last resort to be given if O ever goes three days without needing to sit on her cushy tushy with this week’s volume of Star Magazine.

Alyssa was lucky enough to be in the room while the doctor and I discussed O’s poop habits and she learned way more than she ever wanted to know about the colon, wet poop versus dry poop and tearing of the anal walls.

Olivia was just relieved the doctor didn’t to an actual physical exam. She was really worried he was going to want to look at her butt. This from the girl who asks, “Can I just be naked?” at least five times a week. Though to be fair, we’re always at home and we rarely have company so she’s only ever naked around immediate family.

All this is to say that I’m really glad I made the appointment. He gave us some great tips on how to get more fiber into her diet and he also told us how much of each medicine to give her it we end up needing to go that route. So we’re on the right path and if the path forks, I feel confident that we’ll choose the direction right for Olivia.

With that, I do so hope this is the last time I have reason to discuss poop.

Consult

Last weekend, Olivia was perched on her cushy tushy which was perched on the toilet. She was trying to poop.

I know. TMI. But it’s relevant so deal, okay?

She was trying to poop and it was taking a long time. I checked in on her to see if she was done. She looked up from the latest copy of US Weekly and said sadly, “It hurts.”

I told her how sorry I was that it sometimes hurts her to poop. I wished there was some way I could make it less painful.

And that’s when it hit me.

Maybe there is a way. I mean, we all know there are medicines out there that soften poop and make it easier to have a bowel movement, a movement that doesn’t cause the pooper actual pain when passing feces into the toilet.

But I’ve been so against medication for so long.

I’ve always been absurdly proud of the fact that Olivia is not on any medicine at all.

Why? Where is the pride coming from? What am I accomplishing by keeping her off meds? What the hell? Why was I making her issues about me? Because you know I was.

I don’t think anything at all about other parents who medicate their children. Whether the medication is for ADHD, for constipation, for mood disorders, or hell, just to help their kid sleep better.

I don’t judge them. I figure we all do what we have to do to make like work for us. We all make the best decisions we can for our family.

So why was I so against giving Olivia something to make it easier for her to poop? Why was I making her poop about me? Because at the end of the day, it’s not about me. It’s about her and making her life better, easier. It’s about letting her sit on the damned toilet and not be in pain.

This afternoon we’re meeting with the doctor to discuss the lowest possible dose of Miralax. I’m over the whole ‘no medication’ thing but I also don’t want to give her too much and end up with runny poop that she can’t control. I want to make it easier on her but I don’t want to go to the other end of the spectrum.

If the doctor can suggest other remedies, I’m open to those too but I’m taking a moment and getting over myself when it comes to medication. I want to help Olivia, I want her life to be just a little easier. I want her to stop hurting when she has to poop.

I guess we’ll see.

Sit with Me?

The laundry sat unfolded in two baskets in the corner of the family room. Olivia slept in one corner of the couch, her legs across my lap.

Alyssa leaned against me, her right hand clasping my left. She smiled up at me and in that moment I was so glad I’d made the decision to sit next to her moments before when she asked, “Sit with me?”

I’d finally gotten Olivia to sleep and was standing all of three feet away from the couch, starting to fold the laundry that had mocked me all day long. But that one question made me stop, put the underwear I’d started to fold down and settle back in between my girls.

Alyssa won’t always want me to sit next to her as she falls sleep. She might not even want this next week but for now she does want that and I want to give it to her. It’s during these quiet moments when Olivia is already asleep and Alyssa’s in that sleepy stage right before falling herself that she needs me, wants me near. It’s in those moments that she’s still little. Gone is the snarky, eye-rolling tweenager and my sweet, loving girl is back and I want to cherish those moments, relish them, hold them tightly to my chest and make them last forever.

I did get the laundry folded and put away, but it happened after Alyssa had fallen sleep, after we’d spent some quiet Mom/Lyss time, just the two of us, warm under her blanket, whispering and giggling and just being happy to be together.

I will always sit with her. Anytime she asks I’ll put down the laundry and sit.

Boing

That’s the sound of me bouncing up and down with the whim that is life with Olivia.

Last night at gymnastics, after a supremely craptastic day, I found myself fighting tears as I gazed proudly at my girl. She was up there, on the beam, with five other little girls, standing tall but wobbling just a little. Her arms were out and her knees were bent, just a little, she looked terrified and yet determined.

The coach and her teenage daughter who works at her assistant, were on either end of the beam, there to offer a hand or shoulder for the wobblier ones, caught O’s eye and made her way to the center of the beam where Olivia stood. Miss K held out her hand and Olivia smiled at her, putting her own hand just above Miss K’s, not quite touching but within grabbing distance should O suddenly become even wobblier than she was at that moment.

I was so touched by this woman’s intuitive nature. She could see that O wasn’t quite as comfortable as the other girls in the class but rather than say something, she just moved to a place that gave O the comfort she needed. It was awesome and touching and yes, tear-inducing for this mom who’d felt pretty frazzled when the class started.

Another moment that made me sigh with relief was when I saw Olivia respond to Miss K’s daughter, little Miss K, when she was asked a question. Olivia talked to her! She answered her question. Yes, she answered with a whisper but she answered and that, my friends, is communication. We’ll take whatever she’ll give these days.

Last night was a reminder of how hard Olivia really does work. She tries so hard and wants so badly to be just like her peers. Her confidence is growing and it will continue to grow as I continue to give her opportunities to show just how amazing she is. School will get better and easier and then, suddenly, we’ll be dealing with first grade and learning it all over again. And that will be okay too.

I need to remind Olivia, every single day, that I’m there for her, even on the tough days. I am her biggest cheerleader even when I’m her sternest disciplinarian. I’m her biggest fan, the one who wants her to succeed just as much as she wants that for herself.

Together, we’ll get through the tough days and celebrate the good ones.