Your Funnies for the Day

These were posted on a forum for RAD many months ago.


You know you're a RAD Mom when...

you suspect that the cat is limping because your child hurt his paw.

you panic when someone says your daughter is in the other room with a
baby.

you're cleaning up poop that you've found under the bed (and it's not
a pet's poop!)

you hear a child cry in the same room as your child, and you wonder
what your child did to that child.

your child goes up to strangers to ask them to buy her something
because Mom won't buy it for her. (Mom knows that she really doesn't
even want it and will destroy it anyway.)

you get upset when people give her things that you know she will just
destroy in a few minutes.

your child says she's hungry five minutes after she's eaten and makes
others believe that you're refusing to feed her.

you suspect your child of stealing whenever you can't find something
(and you're almost always right).

you don't believe the first answer your child gives you. You'll get
quite a few answers and may never get the truth from your child.

you cringe when someone (who does not know your child well) says that
you have a such a sweet child.

And you tuck your child into bed, turn on the alarm to their room and turn in yourself, locking your bedroom door behind you..............

You know you're a RAD mom when you take one child to be tested for STD after
molestation by another one and find yourself thinking, there one more task
off my to do list.....

you know you're a RAD mom when the threat of a snow day sets you into
panic..........

you know you're a RAD mom when you know all the locks, alarms and security
devices and where to find them in your area

You know you're a RAD mom when you have 4 different phone numbers to get in
touch with the therapist and have the police on speed dial!

you know you're a RAD mom when you automatically check under your child's window in search or urine or feces

you know you're a RAD mom when you've contacted the fire dept to find out what locks you can LEGALLY put on your child's windows

you know you're a RAD mom when you purposely cut down a tree because it's too close to your child's windows

you know you're a RAD mom you your child's timeline is 4x as long as yours - and you're 3x older!

You know you're a RAD mom when you know all the psychiatrists in your city
and a 30 mile radius and which ones take medicaid........

You know the names of most psychotropic drugs

You know you're a RAD mom when your money is being spent on replacing things
your child has broken, medications, shelters, attorneys, RTC's

You know you're a RAD mom when you dread holidays and birthdays........

You know you're a RAD mom when your:
*Every adult at your child's school knows him by his name and hug.

When you look at your bookcase and it's filled with books on attachment,
trauma, adoption along with other books on various learning disabilities and
a copy of Wright's Law and you have yet another book on trauma waiting in
the wings to be read!

When your friends ask you what you've been reading and you rattle off the
name of some research article and you're actually excited talking about it!

Mine:
You know you're a RAD mom when...

you find a pile of caramels vomited under her bed and don't even gag.

You're kid can projectile vomit on you from 6 feet away.

You're 5 y/o can take an entire door frame off in 10 minutes or less with her bare hands. 100+ nails

You're 7 y/o will stand looking at you and pee right on the carpet instead of walking 5 ft to use the bathroom.

You're kid looks like their head is going to spin around on their shoulders at any moment.

Now here are Torina's additions.

Still a little shaky

Things are still a little shaky but much improved over Tuesday and Wednesday. Reiki Tuesday night and AT yesterday. J's a little out of sorts and I'm trying my best to help her and most of the time she is receptive to the assistance.

Still not caring about school and she's still not going to school. Basically just rolling around on the floor from 8-12 with mini-tramp jumps every 1/2 hour or so. My kid is stubborn ya know. That's all I know and that's all I want to know. AT went just like last week where Jessi and J went in to deal with their stuff and then I went in with J for regular AT. Only 1 hour this week due to a scheduled root canal for the AT. Bless Kristy's heart. I hate only 1 hour appointments though.

Salt/soda bath again last night and I thought it was going to be a repeat of the one she had a few weeks ago. Texas Mary and Gerri....you know what I'm talking about. I was reading Little Women to her while I was sitting on the toilet (with the lid down folks). You could see it coming. The cloud came over her face and then things started getting scary. Out loud I kept calling on Jesus and Archangel Michael to remove the yuckies and help her feel better. I called for Christ to shine His light on her and into her soul. She had a bunch of crystals in the bath with her (she loves to take crystal baths), amethyst, quartz, pink quartz, etc and she started frantically grabbing all of them and putting them on her stomach. She said the crystals would protect her. She had turned beet red again in the blink of an eye. A few minutes of calling for all the angels to help her she returned to normal. Whew!

Afterwards she asked me if I would smudge the house and I did. She was asleep 15 minutes after her head hit the pillow. This morning the dark circles under her eyes were almost gone so she slept a little better at least.

Going through some stuff

I knew it was coming and trying not to blame it on the progress report but things are shaky all over here. Will blog about it later when I get my thoughts together.


On a lighter note, 12.4 inces of rain in 2 days! Yahoo!


Y'all I have an announcement to make. Drum roll please.....

My dear friend Texas Mary, (a/k/a Squeak and Mary the Mom) has FINALLY started blogging. Please give her a warm welcome and a big hug. She is an awesome woman and has lots to share so please go show her some blogger love at Muddling through Mayhem. Mary is the mom to 4 and 2 of them are little radishes.

Nice Quiet Weekend

No lake this weekend just a nice, quiet, peaceful weekend at home. No drama. I was really afraid that after my post on Friday night that she might prove me wrong. Sometimes that happens you know.... She's working on a little project in her spare time. She's writing down all the things she has to remember. It's alot! All the nitty gritty little details. Thought it would be an interesting project for those times when she wants to "involve" herself in other people's business. Cause if you think about it...when you mind your own business it's a full time job. I'll use the bathroom as an example.

1. Go to bathroom
2. Turn on light
3. Lift toilet lid
4. Sit on toilet and do your business
5. Make sure all your business is deposited into toilet
6. Check to make sure you've done all your business
7. Remember to wipe appropriate areas
8. Make sure areas are clean
9. Remember to throw tissue in toilet
10. Put toilet lid down
11. Flush
12. Apply soap to hands
13. Wash hands while singing ABC song.
14. Rinse hands
15. Dry hands
16. Turn off light

Life sure does have a lot of details when you think about it. She has been impressed with everything she has to remember too.

Reiki last night and J said 3 yuckies left. Whoo hoo!

Folks, a miracle happened here last night. It's raining! Not just a sprinkle that doesn't even leave water under the trees. A real rain. 3 inches according to my parents who live about 4 miles away! Even my poke weeds had wilted so I am sure that they're doing a little dance. Funny how weather changes the mood of people. Complete strangers in the post office this morning had little grins on their faces and were making happy comments regarding our rain.

Paring down my hyperlinks to just one today. Thought it was really cool so I had to share. I'm still so new to the blogging world so I love getting help on how to manage, etiquette, etc.

Gratitude & Comment Replies

Gerri, I do believe our girls are conspiring against us. Haven't you noticed Alyssa's on the phone with J late at night while we're peacefully sleeping? We need to be checking our phone bills. ;-0 It does seem to go in cycles. Maybe it's the moon cycle or something.

Yep, Thorn, I can wear something out. While emailing CJ a little stuff yesterday, I just discovered that you can do it in Outlook Express. Don't you feel sorry for all my email buddies now? ;-) Actually, Lauri taught me to do it several months ago. Aren't you glad you weren't reading my blog then!? I was really over the top! But then again, I am a Freak (see comments from Gerri in the last couple of days - she knows me really well). No, I'm really a Super Freak. If you're going to do something do it really big. CJ will verify that for you too!

Gratitude is the foundation for everything that I do. If hadn't been well schooled (thanks Priscilla) in gratitude before J, I don't think we'd have ever made it. I have to be really conscious of the progress that she has made and for all the little things that she's accomplished or I would've drowned in depression a long time ago. It's so easy to forget from where we come. I get lost in the drama, rages and well...just life in general if I don't make a concerted effort daily. You do NOT want to be around me if I'm not doing the gratitude list. Heck! I don't even want to be around me. It's not a pretty picture. Yuck! I keep all my lists in a journal and look back on them sometimes. Then it's really astounding! I've been remiss in posting some of our gratitude lists on here. I'm going to rectify that at the end of this post.

Torina, I am so tickled that you liked the Therapy Shoppe! It might really be a big disappointment but this therapy tool looks like it might prove to be very helpful. They had a lot of cool stuff I wish I had known about a long time ago.

Just in case you're new to my blog here's something you need to check out. This was Friday, April 4, 2008

This progress from that post to this one is this:
1. She hasn't had a true rage meltdown at all on me in months. (Notice I said "me")
2. She hasn't hit the doors or walls in months.
3. I haven't been bit, kicked, spit-on or hit in over 4 months.
4. She hasn't tried to hurt Puddin since March 2008.
5. She now LOVES to sit in my lap and give hugs on my terms.
6. She has earned the privilege of petting Puddin almost daily. (Always supervised)
7. She has earned the privilege of feeding and giving treats to Puddin.
8. She is an absolute joy to be around 90% of the time.
9. No longer does she sleep with the covers pulled so tightly around her face that I wonder how she breathes.
10. She is willing to work hard on her life. (most days)

That folks, is a lot to be grateful for!

Here's J's Gratitude:
1. Awesome Mom
2. Ms. Chris doing Reiki on me.
3. Play date with Roman & Siena
4. Mom reading Little Women to me.
5. 204 jumps with the jump rope. (non-stop)
6. Lots of people helping me heal my heart.

My daughter has beautiful spirit that is fighting to come out. I am so proud of her!

Since my discovery of The Therapy Shoppe, I found a couple things I got for J. Hoping they prove helpful. One of them was this which is a struggle for a lot of kids. This was the other thing which will hopefully just help accentuate all the tools that she is already using. I'll let you know if they are helpful at all.

As is always with a radalicious kid it is 2 steps forward and one back. Tuesday & Wednesday she made about 5 steps forward and has now taken about 2 back. But that's still 3 steps up so that is wonderful!

There's a good bit of whining going on for some reason and just general out of sorts but nothing major. When I went in her room this morning she was giving Reiki to herself so that was encouraging. Anything she can do to be a part of her recovery is a good thing. Plus being willing to do something different.

I love Pioneer Woman and I stalk her site regularly! One of this morning's post was about chores and she bragged about this book, Choreganizers. We don't typically have a problem with this but I thought it was a very clever idea so I thought I'd share. Especially how it tells the child "how" to do the chore. Boy! I sure could've saved some work for myself if I'd had one of these a couple of years ago! Pretty cool!

So Much Progress

AT was very impressed with the progress that J has made in the past couple of days. I am still so grateful that she's open-minded about J's treatment. She has known since the beginning that J would require many interventions to help her heal due to J's severity on the spectrum of RAD. It was the first time EVER that she checked her energy and it wasn't flipped. She checks it first thing before each therapy session by muscle testing.

There's so much to this energy business and I am still confused by most of it but I can give you a little tip (if I can explain it right). Have your spouse hold their arm straight out by their side. (If they put up both arms like this they would be shaped like a letter t.) Put your hand on their wrist. Ask them to say, "My name is ________ (insert their correct name here)." Once they have said it tell them to hold their arm up as you press down on their wrist towards the floor. It won't budge. Then ask them to say (with their arm still out and your hand on their wrist), "My name is Suzy Q." Tell them to resist (hold their arm up) and press down on their wrist. Their wrist will push down easily. Hint: You can always check to see if someone is lying with this. Once you've tried this on your spouse or someone other than your Radalicious kid (sorry Christine-had to steal that one) then try it on a kid. You might get some interesting results.

J worked really hard in AT today. During dinner she said that she really wanted to get all of the yuckies out and she wanted to work hard on her life. We talked about how many people she had in her life that was working so diligently to help her get all the negative energy and yuckies out of her. We talked about the AT, Ms. Chris (reiki master) and me. Then I told her that sometime soon that Ms. Donna (who did the pastel of angel Sarial), Ms. Donna's husband, Dudley, Ms. Chris, Ms. Kristy (AT) and I were going to have a Reiki session to help all the negative energy and anger to leave her body. That we were all going to work with her at once to help lots of yuckies leave. J's response, "Really????? Mom, I am such a lucky girl to have so many people helping me." Yep she is but I was shocked that she saw herself as lucky. That was really neat.

While she was jumping rope her side started hurting. She sat down and I asked her if she remembered that she could give herself Reiki to make the pain go away. Oh yeah mom! So she started givingWhile she was jumping rope I asked her if she thought she should take a shower or salt/soda bath. Immediately she said salt bath. While I was running her salt/soda bath she asked if she could put some crystals in the bath with her. Ms. Chris (she is a Reiki Master and an ordained minister) had told her yesterday that she could put crystals in the tub with her and they would give her positive energy and help the yuckies get out. I was so over the moon that she is using the tools she has been given to help the yuckies move out. She is choosing to be a part of her healing and making a conscious choice to work on her life. As most of us know, that half the battle is to admit that something is wrong and to want to change it. Once you become willing to change lots of little miracles start happening.

And just in case you're wondering, Day Three is a success too! Not a word or a peep out of me.

Still me...letting go....turning loose...giving it up.

Pseudo-crunchy woman, Christine, has been added to the blogroll. Go check her out.

Oh and my confession of the day is that:

I. Hate. Shopping!


You see... now you're asking yourself if I am really a woman. A woman that hates shopping & ice cream. There has to be something wrong with her. Yep. But y'all already knew that.

C.J. Merrell, you are a hero!

Thanks Joy for letting me know it's actually a chain link on top of the world instead of a little hat. :-)

Another Quick Tip

This is another quick tip to new bloggers, to go with the other tip, I blogged about earlier this morning. It changed my life. ;-) I kept missing new comments because people would comment on a post that happened several days before and I didn't know about it until I would "just happen" to be looking back on past posts on my blog. Then I discovered the new tip.

Go to Settings then click on the Comments tab. All the way at the bottom it will give you a place to put your email address. Add your email address of choice. No one sees it but you if your worried about spammers, psychos, etc. Every time you get a comment on your blog you'll get a nice little email with the nice little comment that some sweet person left you. Then you feel all loved and special and stuff. No kidding...you really do!

That's my tips for the day. Two posts in one day! See how much time I have when I'm not spazzing out about being the education enforcer?

Have a blessed day!
Given up

Day Two

Once again.... I made it. Ms. Cranky Pants did not reside at my house again! Not one peep from little ol me. Starting to get the hang of this "not giving a flip" thing. Who knew an old dog could learn new tricks?!? Two days down is monumental for this old pit bull. (Just a FYI: maybe I should have used chihuahua instead of pit bull. The only pit bull I ever had would run hide under the bed when company came. She was such a weinie.)

Chris was such a dear to come over and give a Reiki treatment to both J & I. J did really well but she did say that the yuckies left a pretty big hole when they vamoosed so I made sure to fill her up with lots of pink love so the hole wouldn't be so empty.

Guess what? AT is this afternoon. Mrs. Kacak is coming. Mrs. Kacak & AT are going to meet with J about school issues. I. AM. NOT. GOING. TO. BE. IN. THE. ROOM.! School is now their deal not mine. Nope. Don't even want to hear about it. Not my problem.

Letting go....see....it's not a big deal after all. Boy that pendulum really swung in the other direction fast didn't it? Didn't see it coming did you????

After Jessi and AT meet about school then I'll come in for our normal AT session. Sweet loving mom. No longer the education enforcer. No more Ms. Cranky Pants. She has left the building.

Now that all of that is out of the way I would like to introduce some really cool, new people around the block. Kelly is in the process of finding her daughter. Joy has two little radishes. CJ is a really awesome mom to Sean and has a great post about Eye Lights today which I am going to check into. Thorn & Lee are also in the process of finding their children. Brenda is mom to two radishes too. Enough two/to for you? Maia is the sister to many and works tirelessly in a residential treatment facility with lots of little radishes. Please keep her on your prayer list as her family is going through a tough time right now. Newly found, Queen Mommy is the mother of two as well.

By the end of today I'll have all of you linked up on my blog so if you don't want to be associated with a former chihuahua mom let me know and I'll de-link you. ;-0 Gotta share the love ya know!

This morning while I was plundering for CJ I found a really cool OT site. So I thought I would share. While I am over using my linking capabilities I'll share The Listening Program with you too. Lauri is somewhere in the mid-west shaking her head saying, "good Lord! I wish I had never taught that trick to the chihuahua mom." For all you new bloggers I will give you the tip. Highlight the words that you want to hide a link in then click on the world button that looks like it has hat. (It's a couple of buttons over from the Bold and Italics button). Paste your link in the long box. Works like a charm!

Still giving up. Powerless. Yep that's me alright!

The Earth Didn't Stop

Thanks to all of you for rallying around to support me. I don't know where I would be without all of you! Maybe a straight jacket??? ;-0

I am so proud of me. I didn't mention a peep about school. Almost had a little slip out of habit. When I get home J runs up to me, hugs me and asks me how was my day. Of course she did so tonight too. Chrissi was sitting right next to her. As soon as J asked I said, "fabulous!" then I almost slipped. But quickly recovered and looked at Chrissi and asked her about her day. Whew! That was close!

We had a great evening together. The world didn't stop turning on it's axis. Who knew??????!!!!! It was so much fun to just be a mom instead of education enforcer. I'm reading Little Women to her at bed time. She is very enamored with the story.

A beautiful, brown-paper package was waiting at the door. Oh! How exciting it is to get brown-paper packages! Then I opened it. The complete set of Little House books had finally arrived. Be still my heart! These were my most beloved books when I was a child. Laura Ingalls & I were the best of friends. Completed the whole set in 2nd grade. Actually many times over and over. Mrs. Swindall, the librarian, thought I had taken up permanent residence in her library. They took me to distant places, taught my imagination to soar and made my heart sing. I can't wait to read them again. 3rd grade the love was Little Women and Gone with the Wind.

J watched me open the beloved brown-paper package and her eyes got wide with excitement. Unfortunately according to the new plan they went downstairs to the "bookshelf". You know the one. Well...J took them down there and put them up. Mrs. Kacak got lucky again. Of course after bedtime I'll be sneaking and reading me some Little House on the Prairie. ;-) Laura & I will be best friends again. We have some catching up to do!

When J was in public school it was so easy to let go of the "school" thing. I explained to the teacher that it was J's problem. She almost never did her homework and the teacher did let her complete it during recess. If I'm really honest about this situation it's about the money (hanging head in shame & embarrassment) and not really her education. (Although I do think it's extremely important. I'm still letting go...see? ) I'm paying one person to be her teacher and one person to be her babysitter. Every day! Well, if I'm paying someone to teach her then, by golly, she should go to school. Dadgumit!

Well...Chrissi goes home 9/8/08 so I'll have to pay her teacher anyway so I just need to get over it. School or babysitting. Same thing. Doesn't matter to me....nope. I. Don't. Care.

This is still me....giving up. I am giving up. Yep, P, I am powerless over people, places & things. Powerless....That is me.

P.S. Lynn honey....I need you to call me or email me your new email address. Something to ask you on the down low.

Since I'm keeping it really honest. I don't like ice cream. Now you can run screaming into the streets.

Happy as a lark....Couldn't care less.....me

This is gonna be hard...

Okay....I have a warning for you...this is going to be long and painful for both of us. This is a lesson in "what NOT to do." Be prepared to call me a horrible mom.

I have something to let go of. I don't like to let go of anything. I am a pit bull. Tenacity is my middle name. It is one of my biggest attributes and also one of my greatest defects of character. I always grab something by the jugular and won't turn loose until "it" works out the way I want it to or else. It's not working for me on this one and I am waving the white flag over my head. I GIVE UP! There... I said it. *heavy sigh* I am sure the world is about to stop turning.

As most of you know, J has had a chronic problem of being extremely irritating, ODD (emphasis on defiant), hateful, disrespectful, biting, scratching, spitting on, hitting and in general hard to get along with in the relationship with her homeschool teacher. You also know she does EMDR, tapping, energy work, consequences, therapy, teacher re-direction, LOTS of mini-tramp jumping, rewards, respite, lordy...the list just goes on and on. IT. DOESN'T. WORK.

She tends to have one good day at school and the others suck. Around 1 PM I get phone calls from Jessi to see how the day went. So four days out of five it's a long diatribe of J being disagreeable. Please know right now I am NOT faulting Jessi here. She is doing EVERYTHING the AT & I recommend over and over and over. Most people, by that I mean 99.9 %, would have quit by now. I certainly would have and I am by no means a quitter.

This is from the AT:
I just want to say that it seems to me like Jessi is doing everything right and I'm very proud of how much she has learned about teaching RAD kids! I hope J is better today after last night's session with Chris and post-Chris. If not, I think Jessi needs to continue just like she is....J is stubborn, but Jessi will win if she doesn't give up and takes pride in her approach and doesn't get frustrated or burned out.

So after the phone calls I get crabby because I am at work and I can do nothing to make this situation better. I have tried going home to get things re-directed. IT. DOESN'T. WORK. So anyway, Miss Cranky Pants (me) goes home and proceeds to bring more cranky to the table.

Friday night I had an epiphany. I have put way too much emphasis on education with J because I want her to have a great education. It is stressing me out and her as well. She has got to want to have a good education and I am D.O.N.E. caring about it because no matter what I want, it is her life. I can give her all the tools to get a good education but she is the one that has to do the work.

Sidebar: A few weeks ago, my dear friend, Texas Mary sent us a ton of books. You know...chapter books for 2nd - 3rd graders. I put them all in her room (big mistake). She loves books! So it was several sleepness nights for her as she was trying to read all of them and was totally overwhelmed. I let her pick 25 of her favorite, I want to keep forever, books and keep them in her room. We've always affectionately called them her "baby books" because they were her "starting to read" books.

Saturday morning, after coffee and meditation, I ventured into her room to let her in on the epiphany. First of all, I explained to her that I had made a mistake and I wanted to apologize. I told her that I had put too much emphasis on education and too much pressure on her and that it was unfair of me to do that. I let her know that from now on that I wasn't going to ask her how her day went with Jessi or Chrissi and I was just going to focus on being the best mom that I could be and on our mother/daughter relationship. However, since I wasn't worried about her education anymore I was going to "give" her new books to Mrs. Kacak and her teacher could do with them whatever she wanted but that J could keep all of her "baby" books in her room. She is free to buy more books with the money she has earned from chores. I also told her we weren't even going to talk about school at all anymore that all the units of concern were now hers. She helped me move the books to a bookshelf downstairs outside her classroom. She wailed some....crocodile tears. You know....no tears, just the 2 year old wailing. But she helped me move them and proceeded to have a great day.

Sunday AM, in the car, she said, "Daddy G did you know I can write in cursive?" I tapped Daddy G's hand and he said, "J, we're not going to talk about school anymore." Go G! She said, "oh" and dropped the subject.

I called Jessi and explained the new plan to her and why I didn't want to hear anything about J's day for a while. She totally gets it. She's going to bring a good book and read Monday & Tuesday telling J she is taking some time off that she doesn't want to teach right now.

An email conversation with the AT bolstered my ego some:
I think that is a great way to handle it. She has been controlling your mood by being bad at school. Even healthy kids do better at school and in life when school is their deal to succeed or fail. (me: did you read that statement?) It is a hard one for parents to let go of. Let's see how she does.

If Jessie needs support when J has a bad day, she is welcome to call or email me. It won't bother me in the least and it will take you out of the loop and give Jessie someone to lean on. Also, I can make judgement calls about when or if to intervene.

I feel like a weight has been lifted off my shoulders.

This is me. Giving up.

We survived the picnic. I decided to get a great attitude about it. I was up at 6 AM cooking for 10 people. 9lb pork shoulder (carnitas), pico de gallo, guacamole, salsa, jalepeno poppers. It is required to bring your family to this event. The coordinator was 45 minutes late. The other family of 6 only brought 2 and didn't bring any food (they were going to bring a dish and so was the coordinator). Can you say lots of leftovers?!? How Cindy Bodie does it is beyond me. How do you feed 22 people, 3 meals a day, every day? Out of her 39 children at least some of them are out on their own now. The logistics of that are beyond my comprehension. Just a FYI, Chrissi, J & I had great attitudes at the picnic.

Remember....This is me... giving up. I Am Giving Up. See... if I keep repeating this maybe I can actually do it. It's not about me. Priscilla...maybe I need to write this 100 times too.

Does anybody feel the earth slowing down a bit??????? I swear I felt a little pause....

Sushi

You know when you've had a hard day nothing will pick you up quite like a road trip for sushi. Daddy G, J & I high-tailed it 3 cities south for all our favorite rolls. Of course J ate her weight in sushi and was a very happy camper. The moon must have something to do with my lack of sleep last night. Since I was up so early I took the opportunity to go snuggle J up. An hour of wiggly worm and I went back to my bed and then did NOT want to get up when the alarm went off at 5:45.

A 3 egg omelet with smoked provolone (veggie cheese of course silly!) and home grown maters and a piled high plateful of watermelon later my kid was FINALLY full. Who knew it could actually happen?!?!

Since we're in nice, peaceful space right now I wanted to take the opportunity to share with you some things that have really helped J. The Learning Breakthrough program helped J make significant strides in mental/sensory processing. Before this program she had trouble getting almost ANY subject. Couldn't choose the right pronoun to save her life. Sequential processing was extremely difficult. Most little radishes have lots of trouble with sensory and processing issues. Leaps and bounds were made with this program and it couldn't be easier. 15 minutes twice a day. Simple as pie. The AT noticed it first. I didn't mention that we were doing this program and she picked up on the difference only 2 weeks into the program. Very cool! I chose to do this program with an OT vest thanks to help from my friend, Tudu. Speaking of Tudu, she's been conspicuous by her absence. Gonna have to check on that girl! ;-)

The k12.com homeschooling program has been great for J and easy on her teacher. Simple as 123. Plus it's free as a state funded program in quite a few states.

I have a few more, but work calls so look for an update a bit later.

Much Improved

Things around our house are much improved. A huge thanks to Gerri & Texas Mary. I couldn't have gotten through it without you. Big things happened around our household that can't be blogged about but everyone came out in one piece and a huge step forward has happened. Possibly even 2 or 3 steps forward....

J worked unbelievably hard in AT yesterday. Undeniably the hardest she's ever worked. Zero yucky choices in school. This is a first! In AT she said (by her own volition) that she wanted to give up her anger and the thing that she wanted to work on the most was her anger. At the beginning of school she did the Secret Inside My Head workbook and she brought it to AT which she processed about half of it before we moved on to other things. We'll work on the other half next week. I really wanted her to work on the Volcano book but didn't find it in time. After she processes this book we'll move on to the Volcano book. I've just been putting this off for so long and it's time to pony up to the table and get with it.

Reiki on Tuesday night with Chris for whom I am eternally grateful. She helps me see the light at the end of the tunnel. A sea salt/baking soda bath and bedtime stories. J earned her American Girl magazine yesterday and boy was she excited.

To Daddy G's office after AT where she was able to play "The Boss" (for a limited time folks...). Sitting in his chair and answering the phone, "This is the Big Boss. What can I do to help you?" You KNOW being the radish that she is that she had the BEST time with this. Gave up play time at home for a while just to be "The Boss". G & I talked about her working a couple of hours a day in the mail room when she is 9/10 during the summer so that she can start working her way up the ladder. ;-) She LOVES sorting mail!

Tonight more Reiki and keep taking steps forward.....and hopefully not too many back.

Angel Sarial

More of the same

On J, yesterday was really beyond horrible. There aren't words to describe it. I went for a Reiki treatment yesterday and the Reiki master put a stone on my solar plexus and when she started doing Reiki there my stomach started thumping very hard. Really weird. When she got through I asked her if she felt it and she did and described it. Turns out she was sending Reiki to J through my solar plexus. I made the short drive (5 minutes) home and by the time I got there things had improved. I could start breathing again. I made her practice sticking her tongue out, growling and being disrespectful while jumping rope. Then when she stopped jumping I had her spanking herself. (She's been hitting herself alot and she's supposed to be working on being gentle with herself) I figured since she was practicing everything else she could just practice hurting herself by spanking herself (cause she can't hurt her fanny) while growling, sticking out her tongue and being disrespectful. This may not have been a good idea but I was running out of options. Plus I really wanted to spank her because she was being so horrid so it was a little plus for me too. She practiced all of this for an hour then she had a bath and Chris (Reiki master) told me to have her pick out some crystals then lay on the Reiki table putting the crystals wherever she felt the "yuckies" and keeping her hands over them. Then she's supposed to ask Sarial (her angel) to send a thousand angels to help her feel better. So she did this too last night. She really loved it. Tonight I will try to remember to take a picture of Sarial and post it here tomorrow. After J went to bed I smudged the house and cleaned the crystals.

This morning was better with the teacher but it went downhill fast after snack time. Very ODD, refused to do tapping, breathing exercises, jump, rubbing, she couldn't be re-directed to do anything.

Thanks Gerri for reminding me about the Volcano book. I'll find it tonight. It's at home somewhere. I just made a copy of The Secret Inside Your Brain (AT recommended having her do this every 6 months so I made copies) to have her work through tonight. This afternoon Chris is coming to help me (God bless her!) do a Reiki treatment on her @ 5 to get rid of some of the bad energy. Hanging on for therapy tomorrow.

Snarky mood

Some of my snarky mood might be coming from J having 2 really hard days in a row. Now granted I am very grateful that she hasn't had any bad days with me in quite some time. It's actually been so long that I would have to look it up on the blog to find out. That is quite a feat. However, when it happens it's like PTSD and I look like a possum in the headlights.

If I wasn't before I am positive that meds are necessary now. Yesterday I forgot to give J her meds. Damn. Not a very good day to say the least. Have seen worse though. Bossing, lying to G, hateful, bad attitude, etc. Last night I had her practice growling in front of the mirror for an hour. In actuality it was only probably 20 minutes but because of attitude it ended up being an hour. She started poking the back of her mouth to make it bleed (she hasn't self-mutilated in almost 2 years) and then screamed for me to come in there and that she had to stop.

This morning she "forgot" something to thank me for 3 minutes after I told her. ODD J refused to say it of course. To her room to throw a fit and then she came back and made it right. Since she didn't have her meds yesterday or last night I gave her the whole .50 mg this morning to see if it would help in the classroom (I was doing this awhile back per p-doc instructions but lately I've been giving her the .25 in AM & .25 in PM). NOT! Jessi says it's been a horrible day. One of the worst she's seen. ODD J refuses to do absolutely anything. None of the rubbing, tapping, breathing or the new things the AT has given her. I got on the phone with her and she was off the charts. I haven't had this in like forever. Extremely disrespectful, ODD, just absolutely blech! Screaming at me that she is hungry, etc. I finally told her to go to the respite room and be sure and throw a fit in there and to hit the walls and door then she could rest and that we'd talk when I get home. She went and is sound asleep now.

I am going for a Reiki treatment this afternoon at 3 before I get home at 4. God bless Chris! Maybe then I'll have something to give back. Smudging, Reiki, salt/soda bath, and lots of hugs & kisses coming up tonight.

Excuse me while I puke on the blog

Thanks Laura & Mary!
I apologize now for the puke you are about to read. Big Grrrrrrrr coming...

So one of the requirements for having an Au Pair is to have one annual family gathering with all other au pairs under a counselor/coordinator (a/k/a perpetually late, always have to do things on her time frame, lying, never showing up, never lets Chrissi know when to meet her until an hour before the meeting). I am so ready to get this woman out of my life and thankfully after Chrissi goes home on 9/8/08, I'll never have to put up with her shenanigans anymore. This meeting should be in a public place and last for approximately one hour.

Our coordinator only has one other family besides us. As I already said this family has 4 children and not one of them has an alphabet behind their names. I received an email last Tuesday that all of them would be at my house at 4 PM and to have food ready. Now I suppose I could just not show up but then Chrissi wouldn't get her $500 deposit back when she returns to Germany. Did I mention that this is Chrissi's birthday too? She positively loathes the coordinator and is livid that she has to spend her birthday with the woman that has held her hostage for a year.

My return email told them to bring chairs. The decision is to keep all of them outside my house. Did you see the southern hospitality as it went flying out the window???? It makes me really mad that the coordinator invited herself and others to my house. My backyard is a disaster and I don't have the time or energy to get it into "company" shape so we'll sit in front of the garage. Trying to decide if I will throw the dead plants away that flank each side of the front door and kill all the poke weeds lining the cul-de-sac. I'll throw a table out there and slap some chips & salsa on the table. Make a pitcher of sweet tea and call it a day.

The reason for staying out of my house is that walls make it really hard to see if my child tries to bein mean to another child. Now I would like to think that wouldn't happen but I have to protect my child and others. J will have to stay within line of sight of me or Chrissi at all times. Wonder what they will think every time I put her in a time-in for being a Miss. Bossy Pants?

At 6PM (our usual time) I'll excuse myself to start J on her bath, meds, bed time stories and nightly therapies and rituals. Then I can cuddle her up till she goes to sleep but probably not before the meltdown she'll have to have since we're out of a routine.

Southern hospitality is a distant memory....apologies again....

Linda suggested I wait on them in my car in the driveway and lead them to the city park. It won't hurt everyone to drive 5 more minutes right?????

Patiently waiting on sympathetic comments (or snarky ones).

Practice, Practice, Practice

J has taken to growling at her teacher. She's even decided she wanted to growl at me. No problem..... Tonight she got to practice growling for an hour at herself in the mirror. Growling doesn't seem to be an issue now. We'll see how tomorrow goes. Lordy it really feels weird to prescribe the problem. It just doesn't seem normal. But usually it works. I'll let you know how it comes out.

There's something happening next Sunday that I am so not happy about. Trying to get happy about it but it's just not working out. When I can type about the details with out popping a gasket I'll get back with you. The short version is that I am being forced to spend a couple of hours with a normal family of 4 "normal" (y'all know I hate that word) children, 2 parents and 1 unorganized, perpetually late, lying au pair coordinator. At. my. house. I was not asked. I was told. Therefore....I.Am.Not.Happy.

Trying to figure out how to slip some Exlax in one particular person's food...... Y'all think I'm kidding.....

Check out Kari's post on hanging with normal people. She put it much more eloquently than I ever could.

Conversations & AT

Saturday night there was a very meaningful and moving conversation around the dinner table. J & I were doing our gratitude lists and another person asked to do one as well. Sure no problem.... This person then had a hard time thinking of things for which to be grateful. J jumped in to help.

J: You have a room to sleep in that's safe. People used to come in my room at night and hurt me.
Added to list
J: You have food to eat. I didn't have food because my birth mom wouldn't feed me.
Added to list
J: Your mom sings to you and rocks you. My birth mom left me in a box all day and wouldn't change my diapers.
Added to list
J: Your mom gets you when you have bad dreams. My birth mom never picked me up. I just stayed in the box and bugs crawled all over me.
Added to list
J: You've had one mom who took care of you all of your life. I've had lots of moms and one of them was really mean and she made me sleep in the bathtub and locked me in the closet.
Added to list
J: Nobody helped me when I was sick. Your mom does.
Added to list
J: My life was really bad until my awesome mom found me. You've had an awesome mom all your life.

Needless to say there wasn't a dry eye at the table except for J. She was very matter of fact. She has never told her story to other people except for AT. I had to wait a few days before posting this because I sob every time and I am NOT a pretty crier. My beautiful child has come so far. How I wish she didn't have to go through so much....

AT yesterday. Turns out J was pretty mad at Kristy for going out of town on vacation. She thought yet another person had disappeared out of her life forever. They've made a deal now where Kristy will tell her that she is leaving and when she is coming back. This is a huge sign of progress for J. Before we didn't tell her because we knew it would send her into huge meltdowns. Now she is well enough to handle being advised of someone leaving and they will be back.

Also discovered that in J's head she thinks she's really stupid and that if we find out she's stupid that we won't love her anymore. She's living in fear of being outed that she's not really smart. Many people in her life tell her she's smart. (I am not one of them). She is VERY intelligent! So now I am going to TRY to get everyone to quit telling her that. AT gave her a new rubbing mantra where she says, "Even though I'm really stupid, my mom still loves me. Even though I'm so not smart, Mrs. Kacak still wants to teach me. Even though I think I'm really the most stupid person in the world, my mom thinks I'm really great kid." Now see...in my normal head that just doesn't make sense to have a kid tell themselves that and I think it sounds really cruel but the AT says it works and we've done it with other sentences for other behaviors and it works like a charm. So I go forth in faith trusting that this will help. So far yesterday and today it's working.

There's a poster in both AT's office and I've seen it elsewhere. It says: When you love someone more than they love themselves they will always attack you. This is very true and I understand that's where her fear of being outed comes from. How I wish I had Katharine Leslie's book Coming to Grips with Attachment, before I was blessed with J.
But then again I am not going to beat myself up today over shoulda, coulda, woulda's. Nobody wins then....

Thanks Brenda!

Thanks Brenda for your post on this. You put in words what I fail to do constantly. Knowing it and writing it is two totally different things and I struggle in that department. You rock!

AT today! Whoo hoo!!!!!! We are all so excited!!!!!!!

Returning to Washing Machine Normal Setting

Okay....I'm still here. Thanks Tudu, Gerri and Brenda for checking on me. I was so far down yesterday that I went to bed at 6 PM. Yup....6 PM really. I didn't get up until 5 minutes before my alarm went off this morning at 5:50 AM. I was one pooped puppy. There is a vague, twilight sorta memory of Puddin jumping on me when she came to bed but other than that I was in la la land. Not even one trip to the bathroom which is no small feat for me.

No details will be released regarding the events but just know that everything came out alright even though it is a miracle.

I will however, share the lovely events of our weekend. I surprised J Thursday afternoon (after school) that we were going to the lake. Yes....he was found and I am so profoundly grateful. We arrived at the lake in time for her to go swimming before bed and she was loving that! She had the day off from school on Friday so she was in the water by 9 AM and didn't get out except to eat and apply sunscreen until 5 PM.

After she went to bed my friend, June, came up to spend the night with her daughter Maddy. So J had a huge surprise when she got out of bed Saturday! Maddy is 10 and very mature for her age so I asked her if she would re-direct J when she got too bossy. Maddy did great at this! I would hear her saying "J that's too bossy, please try again." And J would. It was great lessons for J and they got along famously. Brian brought Kira up for a bit too so there were 2 girls to swim with her. Yahoo! It was a 9 - 5 day again in the lake. Maddy worked with J on diving and doing flips and J LOVED it! Dinner was at 5 so the girls came up to eat. Now y'all know how much my girl loves her food. She sat down and stared at her food and made a concerted effort to pick up her fork. I'm watching and waiting to see what is next because there are baked beans on her plate. My child never says "no" to baked beans! The unthinkable happens.... J says, "mommy, I am soooo tired....may I please go to bed." That child had absolutely worn herself out. So at 5:15 she was dead to the world and didn't wake up till 7 the next morning!

Daddy G and entourage are home safe from the motorcycle trip. One less thing to worry about. We were all very happy to see him even though he is a crispy critter from so much sun and wind. G had a great time playing with J on the float Sunday afternoon. Wishing I had my video camera down with me! Y'all will be happy to know that I am trying to make a concerted effort to do better in the picture department. I'll post some later.

Upon arriving home Sunday afternoon we found the dear, brown boxes left by the postman. Oh how I love it when I pull in the driveway and see beautiful, brown boxes sitting on the doorstep. My heart flitters and my feet do a little happy dance. The first set of the Little House books, Rebecca of Sunnybrook Farm and a huge box of books from Texas Mary (30 lbs!). Little Women and the rest of the Little House books should be here any day. J was in heaven! Texas Mary....You rock!!!!!! Early to bed Sunday night as J & I were both pooped from too much sun and fun.

Today I made the decision to unenroll J in the K12.com/gva program and keep her on the K12.com program. I know this will be more money but I think it will be better for J in the long run. They want her to test in a public facility 3 or 4 times a year in a room with 100 kids that she's never met before. This would be setting her up for a meltdown and I just can't do it. Plus the K12.com/gva program is much more remedial considering what she has already completed in 1st grade. It's set up for Georgia requirements and the consumer direct K12.com program is way ahead of GA. Praying I made the right decision. In my head it doesn't make sense to go backwards instead of forward.

Discovered Shakespeare Can Be Fun (who knew???.....only kidding...) series on thepioneerwoman.com and ordered a set for J. I think she'll love them and Mrs. Kacak is excited too!

Please pray for Murray. Tumor found and surgery coming. She needs some extra ones right now.

No....we have not forgotten to do gratitude lists but I don't have them here and my brain is officially mush so you'll just have to wait. So there!

Events

Y'all I am tired....beat up and exhausted. We've had some exciting events going on that I can't disclose but I need a mini-break. Hang in there with me...I'll be back....