Yearbook Yourself

Lazy leftover drafts filling in for NaBloPoMo


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Yearbook Yourself... genius time sink. I had so much fun!

It didn't quite work in the first photo because my modern day photo had bangs
me in 1958:



1960 worked a little better


and 1964


and 1966


and 1968


and 1970


and 1972




and 1976



and I'm pretty sure this was me in 1990


and 1992 no no no.. the soft focus touch





Here I am in 1994 love that perm:


And 1996:

Just not That Funny

So I can't remember where I was, perhaps it was the CBS 5 Blogger Mixer? (which was great by the way) and someone told me I was funny. And then they asked, "Is your blog funny?" and as I contemplated a witty answer, my dear friend Squid volunteered

"No. It's about her life." And then the conversation moved on.

Yeah. It's about my life, which lately is just not that funny. I mean I can make most things sort of sound funny...

like this one, ready?

Beware of Safeway meatloaf, it nearly killed me. It was so tough I almost took off my left index finger a few weeks ago and had to go to the local emergency room to get four stitches to staunch the bleeding. The wait wasn't very long. I asked them to triage me last so I could actually get a nap. As I see it that visit will end up being 40 bucks a stitch and $200 an hour for a bed to nap in.

What really happened?
Jake was so upset, as he has been for weeks and weeks and weeks now that I was hurrying and watching him thrash at the counter with his aide and I stopped looking at what I was cutting and sliced my finger. It bled through a kitchen towel and I still finished making his dinner so I could feel comfortable that I was leaving the aide with as little else to manage as possible. At the hospital I fell asleep on the gurney so hard that they were a little worried about me, as it seems they would leave the room for 20 seconds and I would fall sound asleep before they returned.

and then here's another good funny story:
My younger brother Gerard came up for the weekend. He arrived just in time on Thursday to go out for drinks with all of my mama friends from SEPTAR, scaring them with his amazing white teeth and strong beach body builder physique. On Friday night we decided to eat dinner at home because Jake was having such a hard time. He yelled for me after he went to check on Jake who had gone to bed early. I ran down the stairs only to find my brother with blood all over his hands and when Jake slid a bit to the side, trying to wriggle away from Gerard, blood all over the floor. Dude.. welcome to my home.

okay I can't even make that story funny.

After we put Jake to bed he continued to thrash about. I gave him the max on the benzodiazepine that was recently prescribed by the Psychiatrist. Apparently, this stronger and "smoother" drug takes more time to kick in and more time to wear off, than the other one we had used sporadically to control extremely out-of-control, dangerous, thrashing. We kept checking on him, but Gerard was the one who found him covered in blood, coming from an unidentified head wound.

Head wounds bleed a lot, and after carrying Jake upstairs and putting him in his 5 point car seat in the car, which the only place we can truly hold him down without hurting ourselves, we cleaned up the wound and decided not to go to the ER. Staples that would probably get pulled out by Jake would inevitably be harder to deal with than waiting until the swelling in the little know went down and the 1cm would closed up. It wasn't long before the bleeding stopped, but it was several more hours until we felt comfortable that Jake wasn't going to bash his head into another wall downstairs, so he sat in the living room with us, belted into his thank-God-we-have-this wheelchair. It was awesome. Jake's car seat still has Descartes' shirt over it covered in dried blood.(which Descartes stripped on and held against Jake's head as soon as he saw the blood.. God I love that man who knows how to react...)


okay so you can see...not that funny.

I also have an injured shoulder from Jake ripping my arm out of the socket (practically) which, while it is healing, and I am going to PT, makes me incapable of doing many household tasks well or at all... and my house was not looking good to begin with. And then I had an IEP for Jake, which led to the need to have another one (those went very well, just took a long time).

And I had a really emotional day after getting Jake into Camp. You would think that it would just make me happy, but it is a really bad process to sign kids up for 1:1 aides. I know I must be first my son's advocate, but it makes me cry (while driving friends on the highway in my Not-so-mini van at 75mph.. not good)

and did I tell you about the 2 inch nail Jake stepped on last week? I don't think I did. Went into and back out of his foot. His high pain tolerance meant that he did it while I was 12 feet away from him, and did not know expect for a strange drawing-in of breath that he took loudly. It was an odd enough sound that I watched him for a minute noticed a slight limo and asked Descartes to check out his foot as he passed by. He just scooped Jake up and said we are going to the hospital. I called Sage and she came for Lucy without waiting for me to tell her why I needed last-minute babysitting. The ER was great. They "got" Jake, and didn't insist on numbing his foot all up with a bunch of needles before we took out the nail. It came out as it had gone in quickly. Jake only cried when they washed his foot, and I am guessing it is only because we held him too still. We were able to spend the entire next day focused on Jake because Squid took Lucy home with her to play with Mali.

I haven't been laughing a lot lately.

I am okay. Good things have been happening too. I know they have. We decided on the list of contributors for the next Can I Sit With You? book due out in November. Jake continues to say more words at school-- "No! Applesauce!" when offered yogurt. Lucy is starting to sleep a little better. My closet is clean. I have amazing friends who jump at the chance to help us. We went to the new California Academy of Sciences which the kids loved.

Those things aren't funny either, but it is my life.

This is all just one part of my life, which will pass. Hopefully I am in a learning phase right now so that the next part is really really easy, and less physically painful, and funny. Maybe it will be funny.

Another Embarrasing Story to Help Children...

this one is all mine http://www.canisitwithyou.org

"Lena" and I were best friends in fourth and fifth grade. We even had boyfriends who were best friends. She came all the way from the other side of town to come to the GATE classes at our school. We went to different middle schools and pretty much lost contact some time during those junior high years.

She was a US champion surfer, which I suppose, is something that happens when you grow up in Southern California, you know movie stars and champion surfers. I also know she went to UCI (probably even took a class from my dad!)and I think she got a degree in Chemistry. I am fairly certain she is a pediatrician now.

now I sound like a stalker....

Vote for this Project!

If you have an American Express card, please consider voting for my dear friend's project. They made it to the top 25! Voting ends in just four hours.

Grass Root Soccer (http://www.grassrootsoccer.org/) provides African youth with the knowledge, life skills, and support to live HIV-free.

Yeah. I am.

During a dinner of fish sticks, tater tots, baby apples, sliced peaches, petit peas and 1 gallon of ketchup for each child, washed down with a glass of Ovaltine:

Jake: Whoop whoop!

[Jake signs for "more" then eats his last bite and races out to the backyard, still carrying ketchup on his lower lip and milk on his upper.]

Lucy: Mom. Mama you're so lucky.

Me: Really Lucy? Why do you say that?

Lucy: Because you are just so happy. We're all so happy. We're lucky. You're lucky mom.

Me: Well that sounds good to me!

Lucy: BRAVO! BRAVO!

[takes a giant bow]

A is for Apple

Jake ate an apple. Really. All by himself. Not chopped up, not pre-speared on a fork. He ate an apple.  He ate the apple pictured below on the right. 

  

Bite by bite he picked up the apple, took a nibble then set it down on the counter. Then he picked it up again, chose the next bite and took that one too. I started to cry. 

I told him I was really proud of him. Lucy, not really understanding the great accomplishment, but loathe to miss an opportunity to be a part of a good time, ran up and said "Good job. Jake loves apples!" 

Jake has never been able to do this before. Well, if we did let him have his own apple he would eat indiscriminately, core, stem, seeds, whichever. This time I watched him choose the next bite. 

Sorry to be obsessing over this seemingly small task but add it to this little list:

• new skill: Jake can pull the covers over himself as he lies in bed. 
  
• After grabbing the hair of a little girl on the play structure on Thursday (as she raced by him). I said "Jake! LET GO!" and he unclenched his fist, her shiny hair then slid past his palm and it looked more like the hello he was trying for and less like an attack.
• new skill: After being unbuckled, Jake walks off the bus without assistance and grabs my hand at the door.
• Jake tried to tickle his sister tonight after she tickled him. He touched her stomach, instead of a random grab for whatever part he could find. 
• Jake sat and listened to the entire story "The Giving Tree" when I just read it to him tonight.

It has been a pretty rough month...maybe even six weeks. Colds and migraines and general fussiness, and now, once again it feels like we have some small but significant gains in the aftermath. 

I will need to remind myself the next time I am in those dark hours, that this light feels so very good.

Real Women

support other women. Here's an idea I just had forwarded to me.

I made the gift to honor "All Women" but admit I did have the acknowledgment sent to Sarah Palin c/o McCain Headquarters:

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Here's an idea for $10, or even $5 (that's the minimum).

In addition to sending more emails about our Palin concerns, let's all
make a donation to Planned Parenthood.

In Sarah Palin's name.

And here's the good part: when you make a donation to Planned
Parenthood in her name, they'll send her a card telling her that
the donation has been made in her honor.

You'll need to fill in the address to let Planned Parenthood know
where to send the "in Sarah Palin's honor" card. I suggest
you use the address for the McCain campaign headquarters, which is:

McCain for President
1235 S. Clark Street
1st Floor
Arlington, VA 22202

P.S. Make sure you use the link below and choose "Honorary or
Memorial Donations" -- not the regular "Donate Online". Here is the
secure link to the Planned Parenthood website:

https://secure.ga0.org/02/pp10000_inhonor

Pretend

we've never really had a kid who played pretend in our house. Not initiated the game on their own, although we play tickle monster with Jake, and say all sorts of things while wrestling.

Now we have bears to hide from, and pretend beetles named Sophie (and Sophie's brother and Sophie's daddy too)

and just now, Lucy sat on the floor with a fairy and a Polly Pocket and the two little people had a whole discussion about having playtime together and they decided to be friends and play patty cake. Then they climbed a mountain and got to the top and said "Good job friend! We did it." Now they are at the fairy's house and they are singing a song about being friends and going to sleep. They are even saving a place to sleep for someone's brother.

She just asked me for a brother dolly.

One little person has "a nice haircut", which was met by "thank you nice thing a say [sic]."

In Lucy's make believe land all of the little people share and are kind to each other. They compliment haircuts and say excuse me.

It is also sweet because in this little world of hers, the brother talks too. And he always has nice things to say to his sister.

Every Action

has an equal and opposite reaction:

Jake off of his Adderall XR:

• more verbalization
• more silliness
• less able to sit in class
• more clearly visible by his reactions that he is "there" because he is making sounds and laughing appropriately at funny things
• I feel like I need to research every drug on the market to find him a new drug that will help him focus without losing what little verbal ability he has.

Travel to Tahoe, Southern California, East Bay and everywhere else we went this summer:

• Lots of great memories for kiddos and grownups
• Nice things to reference in the car when we there is a crybaby Lucy who misses her cousins
• Out of control laundry and suitcases that have not officially been unpacked completely in over a month.
• Nagging feeling that I am behind

I have finally done all of the laundry:

• can't find any time to fold it unless I am awake at 2am
• can't find anything because it is in a gajillion baskets all over my bedroom
• brief sense of accomplishment until I open the dryer and find more clothing that, while clean and dry... is still magically not going to be folded and put away.
• constant feeling that I am behind

Date night with Descartes on Thursdays:

• happy husband and wife who actually talked...to each other.. throughout an entire dinner about more than just who needs to go potty.
• less cash
• less time to do crappy laundry (see above)

Can I Sit With You? book number two being published this fall:

• whooo hoooo excitement and thrill of accomplishing something meaningful
• constant feeling that I am behind

Lucy is most precious bright star:

• no sleep for precocious toddlers in our family apparently because she has not been asleep before 11pm more than once in the last two weeks.
• I am worn out by 10 am each day
• have seriously contemplated nearly full time preschool/daycare so at least someone can stimulate her for 8 hours a day.
• breath-stealing guilt that I am sometimes annoyed by her smart, capable, little personage, after my oft-mentioned heartache of having a child with disabilities. 

Finally took care of myself and went to the doctor for shoulder pain:

• not only do I have a rotator cuff injury, but something is f'd up in my elbow as well.
• need to go to physical therapy 2-3 times a week for at least a month
• personal mini-crisis wondering how the hell I am supposed to be strong enough to care for my disabled child when I am only going to get older and weaker
• guilt for not going to the gym regularly so I could have avoided this injury, be in better shape and live a healthier life for me and my family.

I am now going to clean the guest room, one room, (I can do it) while Lucy is FINALLY taking a nap. 

I've Been Hiding

Not really. But I have somehow avoided real life for nearly two weeks with travel and family, so I suppose I've actually been living my "real" life instead of blogging about it.

I've actually had so much to say lately that I didn't really have the energy to write it down. A few things...

Jake has been doing okay in school. His new aide Lynna is young and strong. She appears confident, and gets along well with the other adults in the class, which I think is key to Jake's success.

Jake cried every day for two weeks in the morning before school. We would get two blocks from school (at a stop sign near a 7-11..and since he's never had a negative experience there, I had to assume it is his last marker in knowing that he is indeed going to school). He wold cry with real tears. Something that doesn't happen very often. Only when he's injured...or very very sad about something.

It would take him another 40 minutes at school with Janet comforting him and talking about change, and how Anna still loves him, but she is working somewhere else now before he would begin to be okay. Eventually he would calm down and has had pretty good days.

We shall see. Sadly there is no real way for me to observe Jake with his new aide without becoming a part of the environment. I expect that Janet will keep me informed, and Jake's home aide is also in the class, so while I don't like her to "spy" for me, I know she would say something if it was a bad match.

For now I am home with both kiddos. Jake has a cold. He slept until just a few minutes ago, and Lucy is happy to stay in her jammies and watch a kid show in the living room). She spent her days in SoCal with paper dolls and pink castles and the full attention of Grandma, Grandpa and mommy, her time further punctuated by adoration from her cousin Bubsy, aunts and uncles, and a whole other set of grandparents. She's an outgoing kid but I think even Lucy is enjoying being left alone this morning. We are skipping her swimming lessons this morning so as not to torment her brother by dragging him along.