Autism

Autism is so many things, to me. It is a big pain in my ass, and I sometimes get so, so mad at it. But then I think my baby boy has autism, and I love him and I even love his weirdness and quirkiness and ... well, downright ANNOYING behaviors and a lot of them are because he has autism. So I love it? Maybe?

I'll tell you what I don't think about autism. I don't think it makes my son into some kind of unicorn or something, I don't think I should leave him just as he is. Because as he is is kind of ... well, socially unacceptable. Selfishly, I want him to talk more because I want to hear what he has to say. I want him to say "NO!" to his sister when she is being a pain or taking something from him. I want him to say "I love you" to me or to his father. I would love to just have a conversation with him, ask him how his day went, something.

We are so, so lucky that we live in a state that has an autism mandate. If we didn't, I don't know what we'd do. There is a therapist at the school that J goes to and her brother has autism. He's like 27 or something and there was no mandate when he was growing up, and her father had to quit his job to stay at home with him and do ABA therapy. He quit his job! I can't imagine. I mean, I am home anyway but there is no way I could do ABA with J, I am busy with those needy sisters of his.

Autism makes for strange bedfellows, or playgroup fellows anyway. I know that sometimes people don't invite us to things because of J and I think it's bullshit. BUT I understand it. J isn't rough or anything, he never pushes or starts fights, and he really likes to be around people. He also likes to wave his hands in front of his face and make goat boy noises and I guess some people aren't comfortable with their kids being around someone like that. Whatevs.

I always start to follow Autism Moms on Twitter and then sometimes I have to stop. I cannot worry about vaccines having caused my son's autism. I don't think they did, and even if they did, (which they didn't, I am sure of it, he's been who he is from Day One), what good does it do me to worry about it now? I have too much to do trying to advocate for my son, I don't have time to advocate for Jenny freaking McCarthy or her idiot boyfriend.

Autism hasn't ruined my life, or my marriage, or my son's life, as some ads from Autism Speaks would want you to believe. While it's true that we have challenges, more challenges than parents of typical kids, I swear to God, Kathleen is twice as challenging as Joseph right now. And Todd and I are so, so dumb about it. Joseph was so non-verbal at Kathleen's age that we are always like 'what is UP with all this talking?' It's exciting and annoying and a little bit sad, to us. Just like Parenthood! Ha!

Random, some more

• My mother and I are fighting. Ugh, it's the dumbest thing - I asked her if she would like to come and stay with me while Todd goes on a long weekend trip. She is in her winter, snow bird home, and I said we'd fly her up here if she wanted to come. I only did it because before she left after Christmas, she went on and On and ON about how much she'd miss me and the kids, and how she wished she could be in two places at once, etc., etc. So she said sure, and then immediately started to say why she couldn't come. She said she was going to drive - for two days to stay here for three days - which seemed screwy. She told me everyone she's ever known has gotten sick after flying. Finally, I emailed her and said FORGET IT, my sister would come and stay and help me out (there are really only a few times a day when it would help to have someone here, as Joseph is kind of stringent about his schedule). She wrote back and told me that the UNDERWEAR bomber was the problem, had I not heard about him? Sheesh. ANYWAY, I asked her WHY did you say you'd do it if you didn't want to and she told me that she likes to be helpful. Um. NOT helpful. Anyways. It's disappointing but I honestly feel like I'd rather know. Mother OFF babysitting list. :)
  
• Kathleen turned two. It feels like she should be 20 or 30 by now. She is so unbelievably relentless. I am hoping as she gets older it will get better, OR maybe I will lose my hearing and it will stop bothering me.
  
• Lucy is getting so big and sitting up and starting to do some pat a cake, which is fun. I wish she babbled more. She seems quiet and of course I am nervous because of Joseph, I'm worried she'll have autism too and if she does I want to get started helping her. This is crazy thinking, I'm aware. She is only eight months old and she's pretty engaged and I'm sure she's fine but man. I am up in the night a lot and I have lots of time to worry.
  
• Joseph is ... oh, he is mostly noisy! The noises that come out of that child! Again, deafness seems not so bad to me right now. I am taking one day at a time with Joseph. He is so sweet and gorgeous and I feel my heart breaking every day when I look at him. I know he'll be all right but ... again with the late night worry.
  
• I am up in the night because that 8 month old baby is far, far, from sleeping all night. She is up usually twice and ... it's wearing. I'm worn out.
  
• As soon as she is weaned, I am going to go away for the weekend, with an old friend of mine who also has three kids. I can't wait and I am also worried. I'm worried the kids will be mad, mostly Lucy, but I have never spent a night away from Kathleen either. Todd and I are planning on going away together in the summer, just for a weekend, so I hope they get used to us being gone separately first.
  
• I talked to a friend of mine about Kathleen starting at a co-op preschool ... I guess next year? When she is three? I don't know when typical kids go to preschool. I love the idea of it. I just don't know if I can wait a year.
  
• Todd and I are fine. He is so good in so many ways, mostly I try to ignore/subtly correct the ways that bug me. Today, it's good so I'll take it.
  
• I have been working out a lot, I'm almost done with the couch to five K. I am still as fat as butter though. I just can't eat as little as I should. I'm hungry. And also? I like ice cream when I'm nursing. But I'm working on it. I wish it were easier but it's NOT.
  

What Have I Done?

Sometimes (largely when I am thinking of other people or looking at their damned blogs) I think OMG I did this all wrong! I was too damned old to get married and start having kids. I see these women who had babies after I did and they are as thin as reeds and I think what the hell? I have been pretty good, diet wise, since August and pretty good, exercise wise since then but also have been running and I am not. As thin. As a reed. Even a trunk-type reed. Well, I think I'm over 40! What do I expect? I think that I am never supposed to eat sweets or anything bad and that just ... that sounds so hard! I'm so tired, I gave up caffeine for the sleepless breastfeeder, I can never go out without getting a call that the baby is crying, etc., etc., all that and no cookies? Ever? It seems wrong. It seems like if I was 15 years younger, it would all be much easier. That and I wouldn't feel so close to death.

Motherhood 101

I have a six month old, and I look at a lot of blogs of people who have babies my age. I like the feeling of it, that we are all in it together or whatever. Sometimes I don't know the person, it's like a friend of a friend or something. This one blog that I go to? It's so strange. The mom had a picture of her older girl, who is like three, and her baby, who is a month younger than Lucy, and the baby appeared to be standing! They were at a pumpkin patch or something outside and it looked like the two girls were standing there by a pumpkin. Then I looked more closely and I could see the Dad was propping up the baby, holding her up in a standing position.

Did I miss a meeting or a class or something? Are we supposed to buy this bullshit? It's like these wretches that are always talking about how their kids slept 'through the night' at whatever age. Two weeks, six weeks, whatever. My friend Cathryn always says her boys slept "through the night, from 7 til 7, and only got up twice to nurse". What the what? That is not sleeping all night! That is sleeping and waking up to nurse!

Lucy has been sick, she had a high fever all last week and I got up with her for like four nights in a row at midnight - for the day. She's better now and I know that's all that matters, but man. Todd was rubbing my shoulders last night and I started to cry, it felt so good. I told him, through very dramatic tears, that I feel like I'll never be well rested again. I'll never just wake up in the morning and ... feel normal. You can set your watch by it, I have a six month old and I think the world is going to end. I know she'll start sleeping soon, better, but man. I am tired and grumpy in the meantime and I just can't take these bitches standing their babies up in pictures!

Litany

Oh do I have complaints! Where better to take them? I hope?

• My head hurts, and has for days. I gave up caffeine, hoping it would help Lucy sleep better. It might be and it might not but for right now my head hurts. Also, she pulls the hell out of my hair and that makes it hurt, too.
  
• I am tired. I haven't slept for eight hours in ... well, it's been years. But I haven't slept for six hours in a year or two and that's harder. Last night I slept for five hours in a row for the first time in months.
  
• I am in a crappy mood, and unable to appreciate my life.
  
• Our furnace needed to be cleaned and when the guy came to do it, he found out that the exhaust pipe was broken (by some bad kid, no doubt) and spewing carbon monoxide everywhere. I assume it had just happened, since we have a CO2 detector and it hadn't gone off yet.
  
• Joseph continues to flourish in school, but I had a run in with the director of his school, who established a policy, through flu season (which she says is through February or March), where your child has to stay home for SEVEN days when they have a fever above 99.9. It's really, really hard for J. to be off his schedule for that long, especially since he was sick for exactly one day.
  
• Kathleen wakes up so early that she is never going to just take one nap a day. She's already up from her first nap and it's 10:30. Lucy is down for her second nap, but crying, because she's so tired. How does this happen? How do I think so much about sleep and never get any?
  
• I am not going to my MIL's for T-giving. She's disappointed, even though I have said we're not going to travel an hour each way when one of us hates the car seat so much that she screams the entire time she's in it. Also? Don't have dinner at 12:30 if you want us to come. That's at least two people's naptime.
  
• I am always worried about money. We're fine but we haven't even started to pay on J's school yet, the insurance company is delaying it so much that we haven't had to pay our $1K deductible yet. We have no idea what we are going to have to pay, with copays, etc. It's so weird to not be able to contribute at all. I can't get Lucy to eat any food, she won't take a bottle, so I have to be here during her waking hours.
  

Let's see, is that all? That's probably pretty good, for a Monday. I am actively trying to make my (our) life better, I am trying to get L to eat and sleep better, trying to push K to stay awake a little longer in the mornings so she can just take one nap a day, and trying to give it over where J and his school is concerned. I'm trying not to worry so much about the future. "I'm trying", I always tell the kids, but you are too". Ha!

SAHMing and Failure

I was just on the phone with my husband, telling him how I have been putting Lucy down for a morning nap for like six weeks now, and practically every single morning, she cries. Sometimes only for two minutes but sometimes, longer. I am willing to leave her up there for an hour (I suppose), because that's what my book says, but man. My flesh is weak when it comes to that - I hate to hear her cry. And also - what the hell, Lucy? Go to sleep! Take a nap! You're tired, it's been two hours since you've woken up, you're yawning and rubbing your eyes - go to sleep! Sleep! I'm sick of failing every day of my life in this job. My husband said, well it's not your failure, but really? It is. If he went into work today and tomorrow and for the next six weeks and effed up the first thing he did every day, it would be considered a failure.

I sometimes wish I wasn't so old when I started all this - marriage and family. I worked for a long time, got a Masters degree, worked some more, etc., etc. I have almost always had two jobs, because I like to work. I like to make things work. I like to polish silverware and iron, because I like the gratification of it. I have all these expectations of how my day will go, and just ... it doesn't go like I think it's going to and it's depressing.

For the last few weeks, I have been really trying not to focus on me and how sorry I feel for myself. It's been working, too. But just when it's going okay and I am NOT losing my mind for once, I have a night where I am up three times with the baby and never really sleep. I guess sleeplessness is my kryptonite? That is beyond unfortunate for me, what with the three bad sleeping kids that I have. Todd is always telling me that I can go take a nap, on the weekends. "Do you want to go take a nap?" he says, like it's a possibility. Like I won't hear the other three, or even just the baby.

At least my parents have gone to their winter home, so I don't have to hear them tell me every day how this is the best time of my life. There's that.

The other day, I was reading a linked post about liars on the internet. I was so excited to read it because I HATE liars on the internet. But I was a teensy bit disappointed, because it was about real liars. I was thinking more about the liars like D00ce is a liar. Like how she says how AWESOME it is to get up at 6:00 in the morning, because her baby is so awesome! It doesn't even feel like the morning! Or something. I didn't read it, but I bet it was in a draft somewhere, that D00ce's baby's shit doesn't stink, either. I am so tired of reading blogs that talk about how awesome and amazing it is to ... not to have kids, or watch them grow, or even take care of them. Because of course those things can be amazing. But to not sleep, or to listen to them scream, or to get peed on, or whatever. Those things are BY DEFINITION, NOT AMAZING. Those things are a) exhasting, b) painful to the ears, and c) dirty. Lord. Those are the kind of liars I hate on the internet.

Lastly, because it wouldn't be a post if I didn't say something about my MIL, this weekend she was here and she was all, "do you guys get to go out at ALL with your parents gone?" Todd said yes, we had a babysitter last weekend and we also go out separately, too. She went on and on about how BAD she would feel if we didn't get to GO OUT. I said to Todd, after she left, what the hell is she getting at? Is she rubbing it in that she won't babysit? She's not a mean person, so it doesn't seem likely, but what the hell else? Why would she ask and ask about if we are going out, say how important it is for us to get out, and then never offer to babysit? I try to just ignore it, because otherwise, ugh, I don't know what I'd say. Nothing nice.

How We are Doing

My husband ... drives me crazy. And then I am driven crazier because I should not complain, he could not be nicer or more kind to me, to us. But my God. Because you are so nice and kind, does that mean you can leave the dirty diapers where you changed them? Walk by things that are on the floor and need to be picked up? STOMP around this house when everyone is sleeping? Snore? Does it? Maybe.

My son ... is doing very well in his new school. He is thriving, I daresay. Sometimes I remember that he has autism and I get super, SUPER panicked and sad but it's rare. Mostly he's just my boy, and we're doing what we need to do to get him where he needs to be. I told my husband the other day, I don't care if he lives with us forever, but if he could be a little quieter, that would be great. LORD he is noisy! It's like bad yodeling, and it's constant. Yesterday as I was driving him home from school, he bleated the whole time and I wanted to jump out of the moving car to get away from it. I think it's bad and then I talk to my husband on the phone when he is with him and I think HOLY CRAP how can anyone I talk to on the phone hear me through that braying? It sucks because I like to talk on the phone in the car, it's my only chance sometimes.

My first daughter is driving me mad. When Joseph was her age, he was nutty but he has autism and some of the things that he did can be explained by that. But she is nutty too! She is like a walking, climbing, RUNNING baby! She has no sense at all and she is MAD all of the time, practically. She wakes up way too early and is completely lunatic by 8:00 a.m. It's so depressing, I don't want to put her down for a nap, she's closer to 2 than 1 and I would like her to just take one nap a day but I have to put her down, if only to not be with her.

My baby girl is ... getting older and better. She is never fussy anymore unless she's tired. She still likes to be held, mostly, but I am trying to just put her down in different places. Our house is insane with the seats, exersaucer, baby gym, blankets, etc. I can't ever put her in anything on the floor because then Kathleen can get to her so it's crazy looking around here. She's sleeping okay, napping crappily, and being super cute to make up for all of it. She is my favorite right now.

My parents are ... headed to their retirement village for the winter this week. It is great to have them here because my mom babysits a lot but man. They're crazy. I always, always feel so set up by my mom. Todd took the two older ones to his mom's this Saturday and my mom asked me specifically how Joseph had done in the car and I said 'man is he noisy! I could hardly ever hear Todd, he was so noisy". I could hear her IMMEDIATELY pooh pooh it. She wants it to be that it's not so bad, that it's just like everyone else, but it's not. He has autism and one of his stims is that he brays like an animal, really loudly. It's NOT the same as a 'typical' four year old talking or asking questions, or even singing. I'm ... well, not fine with it, but I'm accepting of it and I wish she would be. I cannot stand it when people downplay what others are going through so that it makes THEM feel better. Last week, my mom and dad were here and she asked me how I liked my haircut. I said, oh it's fine, but it's too short, I have to dry it and straighten it or else I look like Ronald McDonald. IMMEDIATELY the two of them were on me, "Oh, it looks FINE! It's not CURLY! It looks GREAT!" I stuttered along - well, the thing is, it only looks like this because I had to spend so much time on it, when it was long, I could just put it up and ... you know what? Never mind. They are insane and probably just like everyone else's parents.

I am.... afraid I'm not going to make it some days. I've been not eating sweets during the week for several weeks now. I have broken my ice cream addiction, I think. I was working out well but I've stalled, since I had a cold last week and I don't sleep enough. I'm too tired for mean old Jillian Michaels half the time. Lucy is sleeping well but she is still up once in the night and that means I rarely get four hours in a row. I'm tense enough and well rested enough that it takes me a while to fall back to sleep after I'm done feeding her and God forbid Todd is snoring, then I'm really screwed. But it's better, it's better with Joseph in school, it's better that Lucy is getting older. Nothing aboutg Kathleen is better, really, but she's only getting older and that in itself will be good. I hope!