No, seriously it is Tuesday and we ar eon our third day of rain. ugh. so gross.  all I want to do is curl up in bed and read with my puppy.  I know I should say all i want to do is curl up with Meters Man and listen to the rain, but that is like too obvious and sounds like a horrific Nora Roberts book.  blech.  Besides I’m slightly ticked at Meters Man.  it has been almost tow months and we don’t talk that often and he never calls the day after.  It annoys me and I’m going to tell him.  No matter how satisfying and good the oompaloompa he needs to up his game.  I’m so in love with the new Neko Case album, esp. track #9.  So everytime I get in the car that si what I listen to.  So Meters Man is coming with us to the show on Fri. night.  As tempted as I am to take him home, I think I’ll have to send him home so he can learn the lesson.

what else?  This stupid fed. A bill. shit.  A therapist called me on the phone today asking me to rally parents.  I almost fell for it.  And then i called my best A friend and she straightened me out.  ia m not getting involved again.  i am walking away.  i can’t believe it, but I am.  i am not getting involved.  I am taking care of me.  Spending time investing in things that feel good and productive.  Like trying to make a potential relationship ignite with Meters Man and going to grad school.  Can you believe it? me neither.

I dream and think about this new life I am making all day long.  I mean I finally got a dog.  Something I have ached to do for years.  Curing my own isolation.  Now I am a dog person who lets her dog get in her bed at 5:30 am.  Who would think?  but I love it.

I loved having Meters Man arm around my shoulders as we waved a dinner guest adieu on Fri night.  And sitting around the fire eating dinner and him stoking the fire and putting it out and putting the hose away for me.  it scared me it was sucha nice feeling.  And then Sat. morning-”tell Boo i said HI”

I almost fell over.  I wanted to say don’t say that.  I’ll get attached to you.  stop.  don’t ruin things.  what are you doing to me? what are your plans.  Just a simple sentence.  him meaning well has sent my mind reeling for days.

Then that phone call telling me he took a little driving trip with his ex girlfriend.  I pretended I didn’t care and to be honesgt I’m not sure of I did.

I need to go to the grocery store, but first I have to unload allt he addorable Orla Keily stuff I splurged on at Target!!!! yeah

so cute so spring so spring clean reorganize!!!!!

ok i gotta go

not sure how random this all was, but hey.  it is Tuesday and I started writing again so cheers to me.  I could open a hard cider and down it right now.  that would be yummy.  When will it Margarita season again?  maybe Fri?  margaritas and Neko . . .hmmm . . .too good to be true.  Kinda like meters man deciding to stay around a while.

I realize the picture is upside down, but that is how it was taken by Boo.

daffodil

Yesterday my therapist finally had her own breakthrough moment with me.  She suddenly understood my life a bit more and my reasons for many of my actions, feelings, motivation, etc.  

I come from a long line of survivors.  The reason for lack of posts as of late is because I had to go see my 91 year old grandmother in Ca.  She not only survived the Holocaust, but her fifth heart attack.

But is this survivor surviving?  Is survival enough for me?  What does survivor and survival really mean?  I write this as millions are being foreclosed and I am figuring out my own future.  Yes, I survived a trauma with my child unlike any other.  

I am tired of feeling like I have just survived.  I want to feel like I am beyond just getting by or through-still in survival mode.  I am in many ways.  I am calmer.  My stress level should be way up right now, but it is down.  i feel a calmness unlike anything I have before.

My heart aches for her.  How much I yearn to sit with her and say we can weather this storm, too.  But the truth is i don’t know what will happen.  So I find my non religious self praying morning, noon and night.  

G-d and my religion, who I felt abandoned and chucked to the side by  . . . return to me.  Open your eyes and help this family.  Shove that cloud to the side.  Do it for that mom.  How much are we Amamas expected to take?  I beg of all fo the spiritual powers that be to just get him back home withhis A brother and siblings where he belongs.  This child I yelled at on Sat to stop skateboarding at dusk so he doesn’t break open his skull . . . is now fighting for his life.  

And today at therapy she told me that i was emotionally detached . . .grandmother going into hospice, lice, friend’s child in ICU.  maybe I am or maybe I am just tired.

Looking forward to board that plane tomorrow morning to Calalala land

Every few months or so the phone rings.  Late. very late.  And on the other end is usually a sobbing friend or sometime a stranger that will become a friend.  Tonight it was a stranger that was my friend a minute into the phone call.  She got my number from another mom.  This how it always goes.  A few mothers that I now consider my closest friends did the same for me many years ago.  They became my mentors and idols in Aland.  

Numbers are passed to each other in hushed hallways at schools, in therapists waiting rooms or through the magic of email.  

Call her for this and this mom for this.  She knows how to do _____.  She can you get you in ______.  Her child can do _____ now.  They sued____school and won.  

And the worst is we always say, Don’t tell anyone I told you to call ____________.  Or to tell them ___________, so you can get services.

Then always ends with,  ”I know how you feel. Keep me posted.  Let me know what happens.  Jut don’t tell anyone I told you to call__________ and to ask for _________.”  

It’s like a secret society we create.  Working a system that is as broken as we are at times.  Hush, hush . . .shhhh!  what are we so afraid of?  Is there a prohibition on sharing  A info so your child can get services, education and therapy?  shit.  IL is 50th in the country for disability.  So, yes it is like the prohibition.

Limited quantity and quality. Lots of demand.  No one official willing to help.  G-d forbid you want some biomed intervention.

Autism Prohibition.  

That is what we have folks in 2009! 

I just googled Autism Prohibtion and things came up.  Try it yourselves people.  Watch what comes up.  Will blow your mind.

ok back to the phone call:

She is crying in her closet.  I am standing in my pantry trying to figure out what to put in Boo’s lunch because she “is like so bored with peanut butter.”  Within minutes I am crying in my pantry as she lays out her story to me.  The emotions all come flooding back to me.  Now we are two women crying in closets.  And I wish we were just crying over the jar of salsa I dropped or crying tears of joy.

We are not.  We are crying over crushed hopes.  She just got the diagnosis and bs talk about he will never______. 

She wants to know where to start.  

What would I have done differently?

This is always the hardest question to answer.  Would I change anything.  Yes. Some things I would, but not most of it.  This journey is not just about her development.  This journey will forever be the most transformative experience of my life.  How can you want to change that?  I’ll never know.

So I start.  For those of you new to Aland.  These are my wise words of experience.  

1. A lot of the “experts’ will tell you to get a psychologist for your child.  Get one for yourself first.  You are going to need counseling.  Get it sooner rather than later.  Get it with someone that has worked with families affected by autism before.  Do Not let it be the same person you take your child to.  You need your own space and place to vent your emotions-the good, bad and just ugly.  It is worth the money.  I realize you need the $ for your kids therapy, but either get a therapist or find a friend that is like a friggin’ rock.

2.  Gather your girlfriends.  Only the closest ones.  You will need them.  Hold them tight and they will hold you tight. The ones that don’t may disappear, but now you know who counts.

3.  Just start whatever therapy you can.  Just start.  Something at first is better than nothing.  Then keep the therapists that speak and listen to you.  Get rid of the rest.  Doesn’t mean they are bad just means they are not the right for you.

I love me some DIR/Floortime.  But now there is this cool model called SCERTS tthat didn’t exist when we got going.  Or maybe RDI is for you.  Just go the building relationships route, even if you go ABA I beg you to throw some relationship therapy model in there.  It is good stuff learning how to build relationships.  It transfers to all aspects of your life.  If you are a single mama you will never have another date where you don’t look at the man sitting across from you wondering if he has enough social emotional availability to be with you.  

4.  Talk to the mothers in the waiting room.  Trust me.  They want you to.  Just make the first move. do it. I wish i had done this sooner.

5.  Listen to your mama gut and never stop asking questions.  You know what is best even when you think you don’t.  You do. and BTW if that gut of yours is telling you something is wrong with your kiddo’s gut then go check out biomed interventions.

7. Find a brand of $5 wine you like and buy a case or a good margarita blender.  Not to drown your sorrows in.  To celebrate every damn small victory.  Every damn one.  It could be pointing, it can be sayng “hi,” it can be acknowledging you exist or a successful trip to Target.  

I won’t lie.  You will have some very dark moments besides the ones sitting in a closet crying to a friend, but there will also be amazing incredible moments of joy.  sheer joy.

This development path you are about to start together is not always fun, but it will change who are for the better.  And that is worth celebrating every damn part of the way at every twist and turn thrown at you.

That is what happens late at night sometimes at my hacienda.  Other nights are spent dreaming of a better tomorrow of a new life in a new country when I finally make it across the border.  I feel close to it because most of my nights are now spent making those plans and thinking about things besides A.  I am letting go of fear.  slowly. baby steps.  I felt myself brimming with newfound optimism in this shit economy the other day.  Lately, I feel less doom and gloom because I am moving forward. slowly, but surely.

I would buy some new boots and cute outfit to go rock in.  I would eat bbq and find my around Austin.

I would feel free.  How I long to feel free.  Free of A, free of responsibility, free of worry and angst.  It still looms for me, this angst.  Another school issue rose this week.  Have to deal with it.  Can’t ignore it.  have to advocate.  ughhhh.

what a pain.  thorn in my side- this advocacy business.

yeah I know.  me too.

grandmother getting sent home for hospice. more ugh. more bad day

me getting over stomach flu passed on generously by meters man. ugh

me not knowing when to call him next.  Do I tell him I am leaving for Ca on Friday or do I see if he calls to check on my stomach again? hmmmm . . . .

oh this stuff is hard. dating sucks.  parenting sucks right now.

I feel like I’m stalking mailbox waiting for that damn letter of acceptance.

Wondering how I can afford anything right now including grad school.

ughhhhhh…..arghhhhh . . . .blechhhh . . .oh stomach stop aching along with that heart of yours

shit I need to freeze my amazing short ribs meal. more damnnnnn. grrrrrrrrrr . . . I want to stand on top of a mountain that my shrink tells me to visit and scream into the wind today.  Just scream all my frustrations.  get them out.  that or have really good satisfying oompaloompa. hmmmm. no. 

I wonder when my flowers will start blooming in my yard.

come on spring. bring it on and stay already.

I want to camp and see the stars.  I want to feel the sun on my legs until the sun goes down and then sit around the fire

hmmm . . . where do I want to live while in grad school?  Can I live in a small apartment in the house now that I have lived large on 2 floors?  Do I want the owner responsibility?   Long term could afford another house ever in this neighborhood on this city?  no.  Is there anywhere else in this city that I really want to live? no.  I suspect I am staying.

School starts in mid May.  Mid May!!!! I’m excited and scared to death for this new chapter.  What if the other kids don’t like me?  Who will is it with at lunch?  etc

In Meters Man news there is little except to say . . . I really like him and I fear falling hard is immenent.   I made the most amazing meal for him on Sat.  I worked my magic in the kitchen.  Too bad he was recovering stomach flu and could barely eat any.

Feel like things are coming together in other aspects besides parenting for once!