Writing is Way Cooler than Tracing

One thing I learned during my conference with Olivia’s teacher is that Olivia loathes tracing. She hates it with the passion of a four year old who hates something really unpleasant. She hates it that much.

Her teacher said that when it’s time to trace, Olivia will get up from her chair, head to the wall, lay down on the floor facing the wall and just relax there, prone, to avoid tracing.

This typically doesn’t work these days, though in the beginning days of preschool the teachers were more likely to give her the alone time. Now? They’re on to her antics and so they retrieve her from the floor, sit her in her chair, put her pencil in her hand and make her trace.

And she’s not amused.

She refuses to do it at home at all. She’s been known to throw pencils across the room to avoid tracing at home.

But as much as she hates tracing, she loves free writing. Give her a pad of paper and a pen, and she’s a happy camper, ‘writing’ to her heart’s content. Mostly, it’s just scribbles. Sometime she manages a legible O or a T.

Last night, though, she surprised me. I asked her to write her name, expecting an O an then a few scribbles.

Instead I got this:

It's OLI and then some scribbles. I know!! Isn’t that seriously awesome? I was so excited I had to show Tom and Alyssa how well Livie had written her name. Alyssa was less than impressed but I pointed out that it’s a START and that’s all we can ask. You have to start somewhere and I’m so glad we’re getting there. No matter how slowly, any improvement is worth applauding.

Then, after writing the OLI, Olivia went on to make several perfect tic tac toe grids. Her ability to write straight lines is getting better and better. And that’s where we have to start. Of course, next stop is to get her to at least attempt to draw people, with appropriate heads, bodies and limbs. But like I said, we’re taking this one step at a time.

Here's the Thing

Okay, see, my husband is definitely more likely to race off to the doctor when one of the girls develops a cough or has a fever over 98.9 for more than an hour. He’s also more likely to be clutching his pearls and his smelling salts, should the trauma of a child with a cold get to be too much for him.

Me? I’m all, enhh, she’ll get over it.

And then? A week later, I give in, call the doctor, make an appointment, he takes her, pearl-clutching the whole way and off they go with a prescription in hand for an antibiotic to beat that nasty ear infection I said would go away on its own.

Don’t I feel bad? Yes, yes I do. I knew Alyssa wasn’t feeling well but I honestly thought it was a cold. Heck, I have the same cough, congestion and irritability but I’m not trucking myself off to the doctor at this point.

But I have to admit, Tom was right. She needed the doctor and the medicine and she’ll feel better in no time.

And for that, I’m glad.

It’s just that I’m so bad at figuring out when a doctor’s opinion is needed. Heck, when I broke my arm way back in 1993, I wasn’t sure I needed to see a doctor. Okay, so given I couldn’t actually see the swan-neck break that my arm was doing because I was wearing a coat that camouflaged my arm. And yes, dear sweet heaven it hurt so much I thought I was going to throw up, but I kind of thought that might pass.

Of course it didn’t and yes, I did have to see an orthopedic surgeon to set that break. But that’s just an example of how unsure I am of when I need to see a doctor.

One would think I’d choose to err on the side of wasting my and the doctor’s time but alas, I can’t bring myself to do that. So instead, my children suffer for a few extra days because I put it off, thinking they’ll surely beat this bug this time.

Yet I’m not actually beating myself up right now over this. We could have taken her to the doctor yesterday, sure we could have. But we didn’t and now, she’s at home with antibiotics coursing through her system, fighting off that nasty infection for her and she’ll get better. And maybe, just maybe, next time, I’ll heed Tom’s obviously superior instincts and head off to the doctor as soon as he says it’s necessary. I’m not one who can’t learn from her mistakes.

That’s not to say I don’t have to make them more than once to actually learn the lesson though. Just saying.

Birthday Week

I love birthdays. My own especially. I know, that shows how very self centered I am, doesn’t it?

Well…

Anyway, since Tom and I have been together, I’ve extended my birthday to a week. He good-naturedly hassles me about it, but he always just shrugs when I declare that it’s my birthday week.

This morning, he and the girls greeted me with presents. Yay!! The girls were as excited as I was to see what was in those pretty gift bags.

And what do you know? It was blue carnival glass. A butter dish, salt and pepper shakers and candle holders. Did I say, “Yay!” yet?

Even though I was resolved to go back on my strict healthy eating plan as of today, my salad was delicious for lunch, by the way, Tom suggested via email this afternoon that I pick up a pizza for dinner.

I do so adore that man.

I told my mom this weekend that 40 doesn’t feel old to me. Well, 41 doesn’t feel old either.

I think 41 is going to be a pretty good year.

Whew!

I don't know how Julie and her family do this weekend after weekend. That family is perhaps the busiest group of people I know.

The girls and I got home at 2:30 on Sunday afternoon. We left home at 2:30 on Friday aftenoon, heading for Bloomington, Indiana. We'd been invited to the IU Dance Marathon (IUDM.)

This was our second dance marathon at IU. We've been to two at Purdue too. We're heading to West Lafayette in two weeks for our third Purdue Dance Marathon (PUDM.)

See, we're a Riley family. It took the doctor at Riley Hospital for Children listening to me, really looking at Olivia and running a test that she honestly thought was pointless for us to get O's dianosis.

The cool thing is that once upon a time, I was a dancer at the IUDM. I was awake and on my feet for 36 hours. Way back in 1993, as I faced exhaustion and muscle aches that lasted for days, I never imagined that I'd be back to another IUDM at a Riley mom. I never imagined that college students would surround my children with love, wanting to give them an amazing weekend of fun, of near constant attention, of knowing just how amazing they are.

I never, ever imagined that I'd stand on a stage, holding a microphone telling our story, which, really, when compared to the stories of others on that stage, isn't all that miraculous. I often say that while Riley didn't save Olivia's life, they did save my sanity.

But wow, the physical and emotional toll weekends like this take is pretty big. We're home and tired and Alyssa managed to catch a cold. I don't have as much laundry as I could have had, but there's enough down in the basement waiting to be done.

None of uf ate well this weekend. I don't think a single vegetable was consumed all weekend long.

But it was so good. So fun.

My mom went with us this weekend. This was her first IUDM. She was amazed by the students, by the families (she wiped more than one tear away as she listened to these amazing stories) by the atmosphere that makes the kids know how special, how incredible they are.

As good as it was, we're glad to be home. At least until it's time to head to PUDM for another fun-filled, kid-centric weekend where we'll once again tell Livie's story, ending with Alyssa's sentiment that while O might have a little less genetic material than the rest of us, she's still able to do almost everything we all do, up to and including being a very annoying little sister.

Conference - Part 1

A few weeks ago at my mom’s house, the kids were being silly, as they are every afternoon after a day of school.

Olivia did something (I don’t remember what) and I said something about kindergarten and my mom said gently, “If she’s ready next year.”

And it hit me. She might not be ready for kindergarten next year.

I’m glad my mom said that to me when she did.

At O’s parent/teacher conference today, her preschool teacher said pretty much the same thing. She didn’t say O won’t be ready for kindergarten next year but she did allude that another year of preschool wouldn’t hurt Olivia at all.

She (Mrs. F) fears that kindergarten is very, very academic and that Olivia is still working on the social aspects of school.

She’s right, of course.

Olivia still has trouble tracing. She hates it and doesn’t even want to try. She is willing to cut paper into confetti these days, which is a big step in the right direction but tracing letters and shapes? No thank you, says Olivia.

She’s also still more into observing the class rather than taking part in it. Mrs. F said that during circle time, O will sit back and watch the kids, sometimes mouthing the words to the songs but never doing the motions. We think this is a processing issue. O needs a little more time to get into sinc with everyone else and I know she’s one of those kids who doesn’t even want to try something if she isn’t going to do it perfectly the first time.

We’re working on that, obviously.

Potty training is also still an issue. A child who won’t tell the adults in charge of her that she has to use the bathroom is going to have trouble during those hours she’s with those adults.

At the Halloween party last week O told me she had to pee. Her teacher was amazed by this. Olivia has never, not in the three months she’s been in school, told either of the teachers when she has to go to the bathroom.

I know this is more about her comfort with the adults than it is with her ability to speak or be able to know when she has to go but it’s an issue.

I suggested today that started next week the teachers take O to the bathroom every 45 minutes or so, just to have her try to potty. This might clue Olivia in on the fact that it’s okay to tell the teachers when she has to go.

We have another meeting in January to discuss her IEP and at that point we’ll decide if she’s going to do preschool for another year. Mrs. F warned me that the principal will talk about high school sports and will warn me that if we wait another year before sending Olivia to kindergarten, she won’t be eligible to play sports in eighth grade once she turns 15. Obviously eighth grade sports are at the bottom of our concerns right now.

Obviously there are some things we can work on. But there are also some great things happening for Olivia these days.

She’s talking like crazy at home, telling stories about princesses in castles and planning imaginary parties. She’s constantly giving me invisible gifts that I have to open and she ‘swims’ through the room, sometimes forward, sometimes backward. She ‘flies’ too.

I think preschool has been good for her this year. It’s pushed her out of her comfort zone and made her try new things. It’s given her peers and let her see that there’s more to the world than home and Gram’s house.

We’re going to work on tracing and cutting at home as well as talking up the fact that she can tell her teachers when she has to potty.

And honestly? If she attends another year of preschool instead of heading off to kindergarten next year, what’s the big deal? What we want more than anything for Olivia is for her to be happy and reach her fullest potential, whatever that might be.

Her teacher was kind enough to point out that as O is on the small side, no one will even know that she’s a year older than her kindergarten peers if she waits another year to attend. Not that that would be the deciding point for us. But it’s nice to have that in our pockets we worried about it. There are benefits to being tiny.

You know, as I read back on this and think about how it took my mom’s comment and then Olivia’s teacher’s confirmation of the validity of my mom’s comment to really get it to sink in…maybe I am in more denial than I realize. Of course, isn’t that the way denial works? We never really realize we’re in denial until we look back at our past behavior?

But see, I think Olivia is just amazing. I think she’s the bees’ knees, if you will. I think that about both my girls. And I think that whatever they’re doing, they’re awesome at it.

What I see at home is so different from what those girls show people at school or even in public. And so it’s easy for me to be in denial of Olivia’s limitations. At home, she appears to have none.

But when confronted with those denials, I don’t get defensive or irritated. I try to listen because I realize that others see things I don’t see. Or, rather, they don’t see the things I do see. And I want to help Olivia show the world the side of her that, at this time, she reserves for home viewing only. I want her to be the best she can possibly be. If that’s denial, I’m not sure I want to wake up from it.

Patience

I sit here and look at the new pictures my girls brought home from school. Alyssa’s in blue and Olivia’s in red. I can’t help but think of those as their colors these days.

I look at those pictures and I imagine the mother those sweet, loving girls deserve. And I always fall short of that ideal.

I know we’ll never be quite ideal but I want to try harder to get there.

I want to be more patient. More loving even when I have to discipline.

Take meals for an example. It drives me nuts that Alyssa takes forever to eat dinner each night. How hard is it to eat four green beans? It doesn’t even matter that they’re drowning in ranch dressing, she can take fifteen minutes to eat those stupid beans. And I get irritable and grouchy with her.

She’s just a kid. She doesn’t like green beans and so she puts them off to the end of the meal. And then she draws it out even further, trying to avoid eating them at all.

In the end, she eats them and we can all leave the table. But while we’re waiting and she’s telling stories and being silly, I get more and more frustrated by the fact that I have a lot to do and instead of getting all that stuff done, I’m sitting there waiting for her to eat those damned beans.

But…reframe: I get to sit there with my daughter and listen to her imagination as it spills out of her mouth. Yes, the beans are still uneaten but I should be treasuring this time that she wants me nearby. This is a precious moment in her life when she wants to talk to me. And I need to step back and take it all in rather than thinking of all those other things that need to be done. She’s only going to be eight for ten more weeks. She’s still so little in so many ways.

Instead of nagging her to eat her beans, I need to listen to her, bask in her beauty and her intelligence. Those beans almost always get eaten anyway. I think a little nudging instead of nagging will get the job done. And that will allow the mood to stay jovial instead of it deteriorating into frustration all around.

Both girls deserve a little more patience from their tired old mother. I’m trying. I hope, someday, when they look back, they’ll know how much I love them and how much better I wanted to do. I hope they know that they were the most important things in my entire life. I hope I manage to show them how special, how amazing they both are between my snapping at them to eat their beans and to just go to sleep already.

There’s a lot of hope flying around my life these days.

Fighting Genetics

As a child, I had horrible teeth. My baby teeth were discolored and just nasty. I think genetics and taking getting Pepsi in my bottle were the cause.

I had horrific experiences with the dentist in my youth. I hated the dentist. I hated the hygenist. I hated the office and the way it smelled. I hated the nitrous oxide they used to put me out while they worked on my teeth. I hated it all.

I got lucky, though. My adult teeth are stronger than my baby teeth were. Of course, by the time my permanent teeth came in, I no longer used a baby bottle and I rarely drank (drink?) Pepsi.

My girls have had their problems with dentistry. Both managed to injure a top front tooth when they were three. They've each had to have fillings.

They don't have a good opinion of dentists in general either.

But we're working to change that.

Our visit yesterday was the girls' first meeting with a new dentist. They'd gone to a pediatric dentist in the past.

The old dentist had a strict rule about parents in the room when cleanings/procedures took place.

I took them to my dentist yesterday. I was welcomed back where the cleanings were taking place.

Both of my girls were superheroes. They were awesome as they cooperated with both the hygenist and the dentist.

And...they both joined the "No Cavity Club." We're attempting to fight genetics with regular visits to the dentist and strict tooth brushing habits.

It can be an uphill battle, but we're trying.

And finding a dentist who is kind and patient to his patients is a definite step in the right direction as we head up that hill.