Turn about is fair play

My mother doesn't know about my blog and if she did she doesn't have internet connection at her house. Just not a techno savvy person. However I was thinking over this weekend and what good is it to laugh at someone else if you can't laugh at yourself. So in this spirit, I give you the following story.
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When hubby and I were first married we were very monetarily challenged. We had bought our first house, a tiny little one bedroom house that looked like it could have been made of gingerbread.

I had taken a job babysitting for a friend's son during the day so I could be at home with our daughter who was only a few months old. The boy was about 4 at the time and we would play all kinds of games and entertain each other throughout the day. He even on occasion helped out with the house work.

One day when he was helping with the vacuuming, I remembered what my Mother in law had told me about cleaning the coils under the fridge. She had told me if I vacuumed the coils it would reduce the energy bill. I figured it didn't hurt to try as we could use every penny pinched. I pulled the hose off the upright, bent over and started cleaning. The little boy, being the good little helper that he was, pushed the upright a little closer so I would have enough hose to reach.

The phone rings, I reach around and switch off the vacuum and as I go to stand up the vacuum falls over, the roller brush stuck in the back of my hair. Turns out that when he moved it closer to me the brush of the vacuum was still rolling, and my hair that was quite long got sucked right in. I am quite upset as I am now a Siamese twin to a vacuum cleaner with no means of separation. I finally answer the phone in tears.

My husband was on the line demanding to know what was wrong with me and in between my sobbing and trying to tell him what happened, he decides he had better come home. The little guy had grown quite concerned and I laugh for him when he asks "Are you stucked?"

A short while later, still not able to get the evil thing out of my hair, I hear a knock at the door. It's the little old lady that lived two doors down. She knows I am home but I am not keen to open the door in my state. I go to the door, the vacuum hanging from my head and open the door a tiny tinny sliver to see what she wants.
"Honey, are you OK?" she asks.
"Yes I fine. Did you need something?"
"Well...uh..your husband. A lady came over and hit his truck head on."
"Is he OK?" I forget about my little problem for second and start looking up and down the road my stomach in knots.
"Oh yes, he is fine. The EMS are checking him out. The wreck was right before our house. He keeps telling the police that he has to get to his wife that somethings wrong. I told him I would come check on you."

I fully open the door in a new state of tears and show her the vacuum hanging from my hair. She in turn goes to get her husband to see if he has any tools to get me loose. They were a great old couple and I'm sure they had one hell of a laugh when they got home, but for the time it took to get me loose they never cracked a smile. They were even so kind to watch over the two children while I ran down the road to see for myself that my hubby was OK. He was fine, though I was feeling incredibly guilty.

Round brushes and dicie boxers

Sleep was not easy to come by with the constant rumbles of thunder and flashes of lightning. When I allowed myself to fully awaken the teens were ready, so I threw on some jeans and a t-shirt, socks and shoes, did a quick brush through my hair, then grabbed coffee and keys and we were out the door. The lightning and thunder had not relented and the rain was coming hard and constant making the air cold. I didn't much care for driving on this ominous morning, but responsibilities are not put off for inclement weather.

There is a five car pile up on the road going the other direction across from Connor's favorite elephant that is safe in the confines of the putt-putt. As we near the high school I grew even more nervous as I know there are teens with very little experience in driving on the very wet streets. I drop the oldest teen off at the front doors of the school safely and relatively dry.

The youngest teen and I find an alternative route to the middle school as the traffic has thickened considerably from the 5 car pile up. We do eventually run into a bit of traffic but thanks to the detour she arrives at school with time to spare.

I get back to the quiet and dry house, hubby and Connor still asleep in their cozy beds. I try to take a bit of time to sit quietly with a cup of coffee and read email. I barely get signed in and my in box opened when I hear knocking at the side door. I am startled at first but the urgent rapping on the door tells me it's my mother.

Swearing under my breath at the inconvenience I go to the door. As I get closer I see her outline silhouetted on the drapes, but something seems strange about it. On the left of her head there appears to be a horn. I dare a peek out of the window and realize the problem straight away. The poor thing is standing at my door step with a round brush sticking straight up in the air, relentless stuck in the hair by her left temple.


As I open the door she pleads for help. I try to restrain myself from laughing and instead ask her if she drove all the way over like that. When she looks at me I realize what a stupid question I had asked. She sits at the table and drinks some coffee as I go gather supplies that may help in freeing her head without leaving a bald spot. About this time the two layabouts have gotten up from bed to see what the noise is about. Hubby asks me to turn her head so he can run through in dice and flame decorated boxers to get to the basement laundry room. I am glad her head is turned when he comes by, she is too emotionally fragile for the look on his face when seeing her plight.

As I start to work on the problem Connor wanders over to see what is going on. He doesn't understand why she has a brush fixed so close to her head. Being one who does not like a brush to be anywhere near his head, he is terrified. Aversion to people with brushes stuck in their hair, who would have guessed.

After Connor is calmed and attention directed elsewhere I continue to work. Hubby comes back upstairs to asks the same stupid question I did. "You drove all the way over like that?"
"Well it's no different than those kids wearing picks in their afros!" she defends, arms flapping.
"Yeah it is. They can get those out when they need them. How did that happen anyway?"
"I sneezed. I was curling my hair and I sneezed." she explains.

Thankfully he doesn't go on about it any longer so I don't have her here in a blubbering mess while trying to get this brush out. She is so tender headed that every touch is meet with "eeks" and "ohhs" and hands flying in the air as if I was ripping the hair out of her skull by the handful.
"Can you just cut it out?" She is reaching her limit.
"No I can't have you going around looking weird. You just went through all the trouble of having your hair done and we are going to keep it in tack!" I wouldn't like to see her back in frizzy ponytails.

That gave me an idea and I run to the bathroom and grab a pair of nail clippers. I clip off the bristles of the brush and have her free in a matter of moments with a majority of the hair still attached to her head.

Later that night as I am recounting the story to my sister over the phone she starts to laugh. Not just a giggle but a tears in your eyes and face hurting kind of laugh. I thought it was a funny situation but hadn't thought it that hilarious. "What's got you in stitches over there?" I ask
"Well it was on her left side so she couldn't hide it from other drivers could she?"
"No I guess not." Still not clued in.
"Well imagine you are going down the road and you happen to look over and see a rusty old white 72' Chevy pickup with pink and purple pin striping, and then you see an old woman driving it with a brush sticking up out of her head! Just goes to show you can't go on a first impression can you?"

Breakfast with Friends

Very rough evening so I guess I am kind of cheating and taking a Wordless Wenesday late. Oops guess not totally wordless.

Just say it, please!

For awhile I thought he had problems with the muscles in his mouth (Apraxia), because sometimes when he opened his mouth to say something his tongue would just dart around everywhere and words would fail to come. Now I believe he can say anything. Sure some of the consonants could use refinement and his grammar isn't the best. He always pronounces cookie as tookie, lion as wion, water as wader, but I look at these as 3 yr old kid pronunciations.

He has short sentences, most scripted but we all have to start somewhere. His conversations have few exchanges but we are seeing more and more back and forth.

He shows his teasing sense of humor at the dinner table while we eat. Putting his knees in his chair he puts the weight of his upper body on his elbows, leans sideways, looks at his Dad and says "I gonna fall!" in the cutest sing-song southern drawl.
"You're not gonna fall if you straighten up in your seat." Dad responds.
"I gonna fall!"
"No you're not, sit down right and eat."
"I gonna fall Daddy!" He screams and laughs. Daddy just can't help but smile because it is too darn cute and he said "Daddy."

I had swore that if he ever said "Mommy" I would probably faint from shock. I used to spend so much time teaching him that word, just to have him stare blankly back at me or say something totally different. He started talking never saying it and then when he did, he was only making noises. He wasn't talking about or to me at all. I was sick of all the evaluators and his OT calling me "Poor thing." when they found out.

One night at dinner we were playing a game of "who is that?". We would point to another person at the table and ask "Connor, who is that?" Finally one night I was blessed and he said "Mommy" and was talking about me! I didn't faint or fall out of my chair but sat there and cried a little, hoping that it wouldn't discourage him from saying it again.

It hadn't discouraged him and we are hearing it more and more. One night last week when it was Daddy's night to tuck him in, he sat up real fast looked around his room and asked "Where Mommy?" I was in the bathroom and heard him. Between you and me, that felt really really good.

Bobby and life lessons

He was a year younger than me and we lived next door to each other since he was 4. In many ways he was just like any other boy. He would catch turtles, frogs, crawdads, fish, and any other creature of the creepy crawly variety from the nearby creek. He taught me where to hold a turtle so as not to be bitten. Taught me the different types of turtles and showed me soft shelled water turtles I had never seen or heard of before. He taught me that crawdads swim backwards and in order to catch one you had to have your net behind them.

He could walk, jump, and ride bikes with the best of us. He couldn't run very well, although his fist were balled up in front of him and pumping, his lower half didn't fully cooperate so he barely got up to a jog.

We played together often but as we got older I found less and less time for him. Truth was, as time went on I didn't like him much. I was getting more mature and engrossed in who liked who, and who said what about who while Bobby was still catching creepy crawlies. He was gross too, eating jelly and ketchup on eggs, rarely having his mouth closed. He would get off of the short yellow bus in the afternoons and if I was outside, he would declare to everyone that I was his girlfriend. At his house he would often come out of the bathroom without his pants. Though not something I cared to witness his was the first I ever saw of the male anatomy.

My Mom told me that Bobby was mentally retarded. When I asked what caused that to happen to him, she said these things happened sometimes when the Mother was malnourished during pregnancy. So I imagined my poor neighbor not being able to feed herself while pregnant and now having to pay the consequence.

This is what Connor has taught me;

1. That goofy run Bobby would do was the cutest, though I didn't think so at the time, I do now.

2. Bobby's Mother was not starved during pregnancy. She was/is a hardworking, brave, and caring woman that loves her son very much.

3. Either my Mom didn't like to admit she didn't know something or she was misinformed.

4. Autism and Mental Retardation are different animals when it comes to eye contact, communication, socialization. Bobby had no problems in these areas.

5. They are the same in that they both have special needs.

6. Don't judge a parent by the actions of a child.

7. I had been a very judgemental person.

8. Don't Judge!

9. I could have been a better friend to Bobby.

10. Sometimes it is the youngest and smallest that teach the best life lessons.

Occupational Monday

A trip to the Goodwill to drop of a trunk full of old unwanted stuff didn't take as long as planned, so we showed up 10 minutes early for our 11 o'clock appointment. She was 15 late when another OT came out to tell us she was dealing with a meltdown and would be out as soon as she possibly could. "OK, no problem." I say with a smile.

With the same techniques as last week, using the stroller and superman vest, I added a few picture books and wax candy. We were good to wait for awhile yet with no tantrums. She arrived a few minutes later and when Connor sees her he starts to unbuckle himself and I take off his vest. He follows her through the halls bouncing and humming.

I have no idea what she was planning to do with us today, but I told her I would like for her to model joint compressions for me again. Connor had been adversive to it the last week when I get to his hands. I also let her know we were interested in trying the listening program. She had told me that they didn't move forward to the listening program until a good sensory diet is in place.

So when she runs off to get the CD player and headphones, it occurs to my that she must be under the mistaken idea that I have a clue of what I am doing. For those who wonder what listening therapy is, well I have a hard time explaining it but the link is here.

He was hesitant to wear the earphones at first but soon he was zooming around wearing them with no problems. She told me to watch him to see if there were any positive or negative effects. Apparently sometimes good things happen immediately and sometimes it takes a few tries.

When we get home he ate a peanut butter sandwich. He didn't tear it apart and play in it as usual, he ate it. When we went to my niece's volleyball game tonight he stayed in his stroller watching contently for the most part. The loud noises and lights did eventually get to him, but it was much better than usual.

No he didn't walk up to me and say "I need to go potty." or get himself dressed, or sit with me on the bleachers at the game like other children his age. Nor am I sure that it was the listening therapy that caused the good eating and temporary calmness. He could have been starving. He could have been just tired or very interested in the game.

At the end of the day however, progress is progress, and I will take whatever progress that comes our way as a huge blessing.

Proud Mommy

We are all proud of our children. Many different reasons for being proud of them, just for being ours is a big one. Just recently I have been bursting at the seams with pride because of a daughter making honor roll for her first time, finally getting past the constant forgetfulness stage. Proud of a daughter for being talented beyond all reason in playing viola and making All County. Proud of a son that has slowly started to show empathy and follow directions.

For example, tonight while I was tucking him in and we had read our bedtime story, I hung around to snuggle and rub noses. We were getting giggly and I was pretending I had to sneeze.
"AH, AH, AH, CHOO!" and I blew a raspberry on his belly. He thinks this is hilarious and after the first time he starts to imitate me.

"AH, AH, AH, CHOO!" Clunk! We bang heads. He puts his little hand on my forehand and asks "OK?"
"I'm OK. Are you OK?" I rub his forehead and when he smiles at me I tell him "OK I think we need to try that again."

He puts a hand on either side of my head and before I realize what he is doing his head comes toward mine. Clunk!