The good news is that the movie, ‘Beverly Hills Chihuahua’ is growing on me. It’s O’s Obsession O’the Day.  And Emil thinks it’s cute and says, ‘wah wah!’ The not so good news is that we’ll be camped out at home this week. O’s 2nd e.coli test came back positive!  So, we get to start over with testing until we get 2 negatives in a row.  And the other news is that Baby E broke his foot yesterday.  That is what it seems anyways.  Peter and I got home from the ER Sunday night at 11 with the little guy in a boot.  His eyes lit up when J and M greeted us at the door.  He’s not bearing any weight 0n it and is not happy to have it on.  We went to the orthopedic dr. at Children’s on Monday. They ended up casting it.  Its a lovely shade of blue.  A little baby cast. I am glad that they casted it even though E screamed for the entire time that they were trying to put it on.  30 minutes of the cast guy named Wayne wishing that we weren’t there.  Me wishing that we weren’t there. E screaming that he wished that he wasn’t there. It had to be put on though because O and E were trying to take the boot on and off when he had it on that first day. O ended up really hurting Emil, but he didn’t understand. He so didn’t mean to. O has such issues with not understanding how much pain he inflicts upon others.  He kicked me so hard in the stomach last week, I threw up. It’s hard not to get mad at him but he just doesn’t know.  But, then again, it’s important for him to see peoples reactions to his actions.  He only hits and kicks and bites me, Peter, J, M, and E.

I don’t know if it is because the autism walk is coming up this week or because I have received such amazing support and empathy from family and friends, but this past week it was difficult to cope.  I’m super gung ho about accepting autism into our life.  After all, it already lives with us.  I like my life right now. Alot. I kinda see it like, well, until this point we’ve gathered our thoughts, our minds, and our souls and everyone is holding hands, ready to go.  Now we actually have to take the leap that we’ve been talking about and preparing for. Okay, someone has to count 1,2,3, go!  I started to get weepy and super emotional this past week about being that person. What if we didn’t and just stayed the way we were/are?  That’s not real.  The fact is that I’m ready to jump but just acting anxious and kinda savoring the life before we are an autistic family. Is it the calm before the storm?  Is there going to be a storm? When I saw O today and how he was…I think, what storm?  He was so incredibly good today.  No breakdowns.  So sweet.  Really connected.  E was far more difficult with his new super feisty behavior.  My goodness.  My Mom and I were conversing about this tonight and her comment that, “none of your kids are easy” is soooooooo true! I love these little monkeys, but good grief, they are tough!  Difficult and hard.  Sweet and savory.  Kinda the perfect mix.  The ideal dish has the perfect amount of sweet and savory, hot and cold, crunchy and soft.  This period in our lives is temporary and I am confident that the feistiness in E, the all around difficultness in O, the talking back phase of J…it is making them who they are.  I am fiercely proud of that.  My goal as a parent is to make each one of them the very best that they can be.  No more, no less.  Why is this so hard?  Through all of this craziness of the past week, with O and E, it was really nuts, but I feel that we all pulled together to help each other out.  THAT is what family is about.

First of all, I have to say that I’m so sorry to those who were at Bellevue Botanical Gardens this morning.  My heavens, what a morning.  What a ruckus my children and I caused.  Mostly me.  I don’t know why, but I had little patience for dealing with my children this morning.  I apologize.  I don’t know why I had reached my limit much earlier in the day than I am used to. Good……ness!  I am still trying to comprehend what went wrong and when. How do I make it so that next time is better?  Because, yes indeed, I will encounter if not the same experience again, it will either be similar in intensity or more difficult.  E has been screaming and extremely clingy. O has been the same, but louder and more difficult to understand. Mostly, I think that it was my expectation of the morning to go well that was the problem.  I was so looking forward to let the kids run around on the big lawn there and get some gardening inspiration at the same time.  When we got there I realized that we only had the single stroller, not the double.  I was wrong in assuming that wasn’t going to be an issue.  I managed to make things smooth and got both of them into the single stroller and tried to make it a fun game.  It went okay until we decided that we wanted to get out and run around.  I couldn’t push the stroller on the grass.  The garden nazi in me wouldn’t permit it.  I think that I need to start getting over my rules and permissions.  The Catholic girl in me won’t allow it.  The Japanese girl in me is ashamed just thinking about it.  What a conundrum.  So, because I just couldn’t get over myself, I made the kids get out of the stroller to run around. When raising Julian when he was this age, he agreed to these kind of things. There were things that just were…that was just the way it was and he dealt with it.  Sometimes things were disappointing, but the Positive Discipline way of discipline and parenting style worked for him, and for me.  If I try that now it just completely backfires.  I could ask J, “would you like sausage or bacon for breakfast?”  He would always choose one of the two or three choices provided.  O always has said, “I don’t want sausage, bacon, or any breakfast meat for breakfast.  I only want homemade waffles with mini chocolate chips.”  There is no room for error or interpretation in that equation.  I have tried to play it up, joke around, switch things around, and I always end up making the homemade waffles with mini chocolate chips. Almost had a panic attack the other day when I thought that we only had regular chocolate chips, not mini chocolate chips!  Of course, this is just a metaphor for every single daily interaction that occurs in O’s world.  And, in case you didn’t know, Oliver lives in O’s world and we are all just mere pawns in that world.  So, back to the BBG.  I ended up leaving the place with two screaming, flailing children and myself in tears. Bugger.  That is so not what I wanted!  In the future, do I just go into an adventure assuming the worst?  That goes against my personality for always expecting and hoping for the best.  AND, doing whatever possible to make that situation the best that it can be.  Do I just need to be more flexible?  Yes, there is some truth in that.  I do need to be more flexible.

I signed up for the Autism Speaks walk today.  If you want join, please walk with me.  It is Saturday, October 3rd.  Here is the link:

http://www.walknowforautism.org/faf/home/default.asp?ievent=304949

I registered under Team Ollie.  More than anything I would just most appreciate your well wishes, but if you are wanted to join in presence, please join us, if you would like to join by sponsorship, that would be so much appreciated as well.

I don’t know about you, but I was the best parent EVER, before I became a parent.  As a single mom, it was a bit more difficult probably than most, but Julian was easier to raise thru the earlier years.  (who knows what will come next:)) Now I can only imagine that when people look at me as I am trying to corral my little ones that they must be appalled.  But, that is okay.  They don’t know.  They will never know. I was naive to think that way before.  I guess that life is just like that.  It all seems so easy until you get there.  It sure is far more exciting and rewarding than I had ever anticipated though. If there is one thing that I always resort to when I am struggling with who I am as a parent, I always wonder WHY this dear soul chose ME as their MOM.  There is something about me that they need.  There is something about them that I need.  I held each of my kids so tight today after today’s fiasco.  We may never be allowed back to Bellevue Botanical Gardens, but we for sure learned something about each other that we didn’t know before.  That is how it works, right…I definitely think so.