Change+transitions+Asperger's=HELL

     We've been out for, let's just say..,. a while.  We've had a lot going on the last year that made it nearly impossible for me to have any spare time.  And one of the things that I had to let go of for the sake of time management was blogging and social media.  I finished up my degree and graduated college at the age of 32, while working AND interning, AND being a mom.... AND a wife.... AND... AND.  You get the idea.  I spent the majority of my time away from the house and the last 6 months I only say the boys from about 6:00-7:30 pm during the week.  Most of that time was spent cooking dinner and regular nightly routines.  My weekends were filled with homework, most Sundays were spent locked in the bedroom for anywhere between 6-11 hours doing school projects and that's just for myself.

     In November, the place I had been interning at for 2 years offered me a paying position.  This meant in addition to my internship.  But hell, I was going to get paid and that also meant when I graduated college, I would ACTUALLY be able to use my degree.  I averaged about 500 miles a week driving back and forth to work, then school, then back to work and back home.  
  
     Hubbs also changed jobs in December, he went from a cushy desk job, that he wasn't in love with, but paid well and had outstanding benefits, (which as most of you know is essential with neurotypical children, but even more so with special needs kiddos) to a job that had little to no benefits options and paid less, BUT, it's what he was training for and what he's wanted to do for at least the last 13.5 years that we have been together.   In the words of Rory Gilmore "You Jump, I Jump Jack!"  So the opportunity arouse and we made the jump.  It was terrifying making that jump, but it's like I said to people who were concerned about the choice, "he has supported me 100% for 4 years through college while I chased my dreams, I will not shoot down his".    We cashed out his retirement with the company he'd been at for 7 years to help supplement the income, applied for public health care (nightmare by the way but a separate post is needed for this story), and held on tight.  It's been 8 months and he is now bringing home MORE money each month, but the kicker, even on crappy days at work, he is still a much happier man.

     So all this leads to the real topic.  Change+transitions+Asperger's=HELL.  Yep, I said it.  HELL.  It was a big enough change when I started working, then less than a month later, Hubbs switched jobs and that meant no more early shift and being off to get he kids from school.  It meant day care before and after school.  It also meant seeing less of BOTH  parents.  You think when you make changes that the adults are the ones making the changes and finding out where to sacrifice time, fun, events, appointments, you know, life in general, and the kids, well they're just along for the ride, right?  NOPE.

     So here's where it gets reaaalllyyyyy interesting.  I knew and I mean just KNEW that C would be the one to lose his shit first.  Let's face it, being an Aspie and facing major life changes is, let's just say -shitty.  About mid January C (now 11) still held it together.  But my anxiety built every day, waiting and wondering when it would come.  We put so much effort and thought into making this as easy as possible for him, that some where in the process of all this Ry (now 7) got lost in the mix.  Not sure when it happened, or that we really even noticed him start to go wayward.  But eventually we noticed little things like him "borrowing" things from school that he really had no intention of returning, lying, emotional outbursts, and much, much more. 

     When it comes to your attention, suddenly you feel like the worst person alive.  I've been neglectful.  He'll hate me.  I've ruined him! < All the thoughts that run through your mind when you realize you just screwed up your typical kid.  Great.  I had ONE job, do NOT further screw these children up.  After we reprioritized it took us a few months to get him back on track  But here's the really great thing I learned from this.  You can try to control everything, you can plan until you are blue in the face, but the universe and all the people in it don't give a damn about your plan.  All we can do is trust the process.  Make a plan and roll with it, be fluid. Think about that for a second... isn't the idea beautiful?  By demanding and needing to control things I missed out on a lot this last year.  Especially with the kids.

      When I look back, you know where you watch what I call your "life movie trailer" I can see where C just let go, he rolled with the punches.  HE waited until the rest of us pulled out shit together and then lost his mind...,. but only a little.   This is when I saw that all the work he has been doing working on his social skills and behavior management is making real headway.  I'm so proud of him. And you know what?  I'm so proud of all of us.  These things don't happen over night and they are NEVER easy, but the whole family has banded together to help each other grow and learn and become the most successful versions of ourselves we can be. 

     C started summer school today, it will give him a jump start to the wonderful world of JR High.  He will spend the next 3 weeks getting an extra boost of reading and math in the middle school building.  So while we might think 3 extra weeks of school sounds awful, I'm excited for him to be able to acclimate himself to the building and staff before the upperclassmen and even the douchey kids (yeah, I just said that) from his class last year are all on campus.  I'm hoping that this will ease his transition and boost his confidence so hopefully his first "real" day doesn't come with a mega dose of uncontrollable sensory overload, because I remember JR high... and it was NOT my favorite time in life.  Did I mention C has been titrated off all his meds?  Yeah... We did that at the beginning of the summer.  I was getting more concerned with long lasting neurological effects because of how their brains are still forming, so I thought now or never.  And honestly, he's "busier" than before, but as for all the other stuff, I think he (and we) have enough coping strategies on board to make this work Au Naturel.

Thanks for coming back to visit us.  See you around the quad!

                   This is how we spend our summer, throwing rocks in creeks and catching crawdads.

 
    

Model kinder and New Friends

So Ry went to his very first day of Kindergarten.  He got up early, showered, ate only half of his breakfast, brushed his teeth until they were "sparkly squeaky clean".  Made sure the (now pay attention here) tag in the inside of the pants matched the color of the shirt, because otherwise people will know and they won't think he's cool.   Upon arrival he was so excited that he couldn't hardly wait to get started.  He hung out on the playground with C for a few minutes.  While we were standing there we snuck a peek as C's new friend he's been telling us about.    The boy was kind and even took a break from wall ball to help C teach Ry to play.  It was cute.  Finally, the bell rang.  The kinders lined up on the #5 painted on the playground.  It was time for class.  The excitement took a back seat to reality, crap, mom's really going to leave me here.  He hesitated for a minuted and gave me a giant hug...a really long one. I told him he'd have to let go soon.  He whispered, "not yet".  My little heart melted.  So one last squeeze of a hug and he got in line.  Up the ramp he went with all the other little ducklings in a line.  Dad stepped up and gave him a high 5 and that's all he needed to know it was going to be OK.  The anxious face faded and that little cheesy smile we love came back out.

We walked down (we live very close to the school and we is hubbs and I - he took the day off for Ry's first day of Kindergarten as he did for C when he was 5) to the school to get him and when we got there he was all smiles and ready to go.  We asked him what he did and his answer " I just hung out".  LOL. Really? We saw the principal (who I adore a great deal-she's a very kind hearted person) on our way off he property and apparently he set quite the example for the rest of the kids she said, "he was a model student". HAHAHAHAHA. Whaaaat?  Well. I've trained him well.  He talks about what he had for lunch and the fact that he got to eat in a cafeteria which is almost as cool as getting a new bike.  If I had known that I could have saved a shit ton of money on his birthday.  Kidding.  Kind of. ;)   So we ask what else he did at school.  " I played, I criss cross applesauced, I went pee..."  me-"where did you pee? You know you can't pee outside at school right?".  Ry-"oh yes, I peed inside".  Try to hold your laughter in on that conversation.  He also told us about his sticker he had to wear that told them where each kid went at the end of the day: pick up/bus and how she told him he HAD to leave it on all day.  We get in the house and he takes a nap with ease.  Did I mention he fell asleep with his spiderman mask on? Yep. He did. When he gets up he comes out, still with the mask on, and tells me "can you call Ms. *** (censored for her privacy) and ask her if I can take my sticker off?  I'm bored of it now".    Seriously hilarious.

So C comes home and does his homework.  Without fuss. Can I say amazing?  So he tells me that he gave his N.F. (new friend also for their privacy) our phone number.  N.F. asked his dad if C could come to his birthday party and his dad said sure.  So C, the awesome kid that he is, asks "wait, does your family do drugs? Because I can't come over if your family does drugs" LMAO.  NF said "no, 100% they do not".  Pure Asperger  bluntness. I love it.

Cheers to a successful Monday.  Hope you all enjoy the rest of your week.

Accountability and Understanding

     I find when I get busier that its harder to be understanding to what C is all about.  I find myself losing my patience more, saying things that aren't relevant, and not taking the time to try to decode him.  I laid in bed and regretted most of my attitude towards him that day.  Guilt is a horrible thing to feel.  He didn't do anything that I would consider wrong, I just felt like I no longer had the patience to really hear what he's saying and understand why he did what he did.  I woke up this morning and am still beating myself up a bit for it.  I know he says things that don't make sense to me, but he doesn't know how else to explain them.  I shouldn't fault him for that.  His thought process is just totally different than mine.  I see him mimicking things more and more.  Things that, as I reflect on it, I realize he has seen or heard somewhere else, or even worse, me.  I've known he mimics, but I suppose I've never been fully aware of how often and to what magnitude.  The very things I'm getting on his case about are things that I let him watch on tv, or allow him to hear in conversations.  They say children are like sponges, but most children don't have extraordinary memories and precise facts.  We made the decision yesterday to remove most of the television. We found we were getting too lax about the shows they were watching and it became an issue for him to even pause a show because he "HAD TOOOO" watch it.  No more Beyblade, no more Ninjago.   In the process we've corrupted him, he really likes ALF. hahaha... He's a child after my own heart.
   



 I wish there was a manual for parenting an Aspie.  And I suppose more than parenting,  a guide to understanding in the moment, not just in hindsight.   I've talked about it before, but managing yourself really is harder than trying to manage their behavior.  Being accountable for yourself, for lack of a better term, sucks.  I find I spend so much time trying to "train" my kids to be respectful and responsible, that it's possible I forgot to practice it myself.   



     On a brighter note, we had some friends from out of town stay with us last night.  Ry went to my mom's house so it was just C and 2 other kids (they have known each other their entire lives).  There was no fighting, no whining.  They played together the entire time up until about 10:30 this morning when they left.  I think it was good for him, he seems much more relaxed today.   All week I've watched his body get more and more tense.  By Friday his eyes were sunken in and darty, his shoulders were rolled up and he couldn't sit still.  A little break from his brother and a few friends who know how to follow the rules of and share similar interests in games.
     I'm off to buy stock in Adidas, (haha, not really but it seems like it) because they are the only shoes he will wear.  He won't wear sandals or flip flops, hates wearing socks, and cries when he can't wear his favorite shoes.  The peanut gallery can hold their comments about not letting your child be "picky".  Ask either one of my kids and they will tell you our motto is "you get what you get, and you don't throw a fit".  Until you have been in my "shoes" (pun totally intended) you can't judge.  There are certain things that have to be consistent where Asperger's is involved.  And if shoes is one of them, then so be it.