an afternoon off the grid

Today Johnny and I went on a mommy/son date. It wasn't planned, and what made it even better was the fact that I didn't have my phone on me. The phone was accidentally left behind in the rush to get out the door for church, and when we ran to drop off my wedding rings to be re-sized with a jeweler in the mall afterward, I didn't bother to stop at home to pick it up. After all, we were only going there then home.

On the way into the mall, we passed a restaurant where we had recently gone out to eat with "My Grandpa". I've made the mistake of calling my father "daddy" one too many times in front of Johnny, forcing me to explain repeatedly that he is "my daddy". As a result, Johnny has begun to call him "My Grandpa" every time he sees or references him. Johnny got very excited and asked if we could go eat pasta and draw with crayons? I hadn't planned on spending any money on eating out, but then again it would be about half the price of a normal excursion since his meals aren't too expensive yet and Steve wasn't with us, so I figured why not? I agreed on the condition that he behaved while we were in the jewelry store. We went into the store and I explained to the lady at the counter what the problem was (I was there so they could fix a mistake they had made in their resizing a week prior) and Johnny began to wander around. Suddenly he started to sing.

I can't even recollect the words to the song. He could only remember one line of it himself, having just learned it in Sunday School. There were hand motions involving throwing his arms open wide and giving himself a big hug... something along the lines of "His love, for us". It totally took me by surprise. I hadn't honestly been watching him because the lady who was behind the counter facing me was keeping an eye on him and she knows us pretty well. I was filling out paper work at that point. Everyone in the store stopped and stared as he repeated it several times, projecting his voice (but not yelling as he is want to do). When he stopped, everyone clapped. -- Then he started again. Naturally, we all burst out laughing. He got a big goofy grin on his face and just continued. At that point I had finished up what I was needed for, so I was able to lead him out of the store, singing all the way.

By the time we walked back over to the restaurant, he seemed to have realized that he had lost his audience. The song quieted to more of a chant while I gave our "just two" and asked to be seated. When we got to the booth, he took a good 3 or 4 minutes to decide which side he wanted to sit on. He finally pointed at his choice, (the right side; I have no idea what made it the superior choice in the long run, but it was better in some way) and I went to sit on the opposite. "NO! You sit with me mommy! We can draw with crayons together!"

I scooted in first and he snuggled right on up next to me. The waitress came and placed some utensils on the table as well as a kiddie mat in front of him. "We will have crayons, a soda, and a chocolate milk please." The little guy had ordered for us! And in a very matter-of-fact way, without blinking. I couldn't help but laugh and nodded my head at the waitress in affirmation, specifying which soda I wanted. Having been there plenty of times, I knew what I wanted so I didn't bother with the menu when Johnny wanted to get right to work with the puzzles on the place mat. We spent the next 30 minutes or so (the place was absolutely packed) figuring out what letters different pictured words start with, drawing circles around similar shapes, and hunting down hidden objects. We ran out of activities on the mat, so we made up our own. We counted to 150, writing down the numbers as we went. He wrote numbers 27 - 63 all by himself. He is a bit of a speed demon, to be honest. We sounded out words that we found written on posters on the walls, and we began to sing "Pop Goes the Weasel" with the wrong words. His favorites included the monkey chasing a volcano around the cobbler's bench and the Johnny chasing the mommy. I wasn't too sure about the logistics about the volcano situation, but the mommy popping after being chased by the Johnny seemed reasonable to me.

When our food came, everything was as usual. He wanted his pasta, but not enough to actually eat all of it. We bargained just like at home, despite the fact that he had come up with the idea of eating there and picking that food in particular. I'm not a mom who is ashamed to admit that at the end of the day, if my kid eats a few all-fruit gummy snacks so that I had less of a need to pull my hair out and I have avoided yelling, I've had a successful day. I do what I have to do to get by. I've covered deals before... this is all a part of that. Anyway, the deal today was that if he ate all of his food, he could have a cookie when we got home. Even better, he could have one from my supposedly secret stash of Grasshoppers that he actually knows all about (a special treat for our unexpected date). Lunch was a success! We finished up and while waiting for my card back from the waitress, he turned to me and asked for some money. He wanted to go to the crane machine bus outside of Macy's to try and win an Angry Bird.

I'm a sucker. It turned out that his lunch was free, (apparently it is a Sunday deal there) so how could I say no? He had behaved so well! So I looked in my wallet and there was exactly one dollar bill. I leaned over and explained to him that I was going to give him a dollar because he had been on such good behavior and I thought that since it was a special mommy and Johnny day he and I could walk down and do that, but part of the deal was that he needed to continue to be very good. He agreed, took the dollar, and lead the way out of the restaurant.

Barely had we made it into the mall before he stopped completely. I squatted down to see what was up. He cocked his head sideways at me... "Daddy gives me two." I may be a sucker, but apparently I'm not as bad as daddy. I told him it wasn't going to happen, but nice try. He insisted that he was telling the truth, which I know really is the case and I told him I believed him, but as the mean mama is always saying, I'm not daddy. Thankfully today he didn't seem to mind. Thus began our trek from the middle of the mall to the end of the mall.

We didn't step on a single crack the whole way. Not one. For a three year old, that is quite a feat, seeing as how you have to walk on every single square. There isn't any skipping tiles and there is no keeping pace with pedestrian traffic. We took our time and (naturally) spent all of it looking at our feet. People quickly figured out what we were doing and gave us a wide berth. When we got to the bus that houses the crane, I saw that it still wasn't calibrated right, and was unable to drop any prizes off in the bin, but figured it was more of a problem to walk him through that disastrous conclusion than it would be to just spend the dollar and not win.

We lost.

We walked at a normal pace after that, being harassed by Girl Scouts several times and stopping in a few stores to see if we could find a birthday present for daddy. No such luck, but he did find a few presents he though would be great for him. No such luck on that front either, though his efforts were quite spectacular. Some of the explanations as to why he should get them were even close to valid. After lapping the mall again, we started to get tired and headed back toward the entrance we came in at. We had stopped in one store where they were playing their music too loud for Johnny to handle and he had covered his ears and yelled for me to take him out, so we began singing our own songs at an inappropriately loud volume. This is something he often does to compensate when he has had a sensory overload experience. Quite frankly, it is also something that he does at random for no reason other than because he is three years old, and three year olds sing very loudly at times. Today this was not the case, but so what if it was? We were back to Pop Goes the Weasel most of the time, inserting outrageous combinations to create what would in truth be hilarious scenarios. It was just as we rounded the corner and came in sight of the doors that exhaustion entirely overcame him. Johnny sat down, dramatically tumbling down to his spot on the floor.

So I sat down. He started to giggle. Actually, so did an elderly couple sitting on a bench nearby. I was quite thankful that I was wearing a skirt that reached to my ankles, but other than that I didn't mind in the least. I asked him what was up, and he told me that he was just too tired to go any further. We had talked about the fact that we were going home to take a nap, and he told me that if he sat there long enough he would be rested and not need to go to sleep when we got home. I told him that would only work if we took a long nap right there on the floor. He looked at me like I was nuts, but I wasn't going to give up on a nap at home, so I made my point by laying down. He giggled and laid the whole way down too. That is when he noticed the skylight.

I think we laid there for a good 10 minutes. Johnny was convinced that the "window builders" had messed up and put it in the wrong place. He is currently of the opinion that no adults know how to do their jobs, because he also saw some guys cutting down a tree while we were parked at the gas station earlier, and he told me he was going to have to go back on Tuesday (?) and get all the pieces and put it back together. "They are supposed to help fix the trees, not hurt them. They are the bad guys!" And now the builders were putting windows in the ceiling? Crazy adults!

When we finally sat back up, he insisted he was still too tired to walk to the door. Instead he decided to scoot. To me, this takes more energy. To a three year old, this is avoiding walking while simultaneously remaining dramatic. He scooted on his butt for an entire corridor through the mall, stopping only once to shout out, "I NEED A TISSUE!" as his nose started to run. I didn't actually have any, so I thrust out my coat sleeve and dragged it under his nose. He laughed at me and I told him I would throw the jacket in the wash as soon as we got home and that he isn't allowed to do that with his own clothes unless it is an emergency and there are no tissues anywhere. His sensory processing issues would have kept us from doing anything until the snot problem was fixed, and it would have caused a complete meltdown. I'd rather just gross up my jacket.

He made me hold open the first set of double doors so that he could scoot the whole way through to the outer doors. When he finally got there, he stood up and gave me a high-five. We held hands in the parking lot so that he didn't fall, and got buckled in. He didn't say a single word on the ride home.

I had 7 missed calls. I'm so glad I forgot my phone at home.

      

curious minds

By no means is the issue of endless questions a matter that is entirely unique to my child. Having worked as a nanny for 10 years, I can tell you that the constant stream of "why?" is only beginning when they are toddlers/preschoolers. While the questions may over time grow to come packaged in more sophisticated wording, they will never cease to come. Thankfully, the rate tends to slow down a little as they get more independent (and find other resources for information). The trick then is to make sure their sources are good ones. -- But that is jumping way too far down the road for my preschooler for just now. At the moment, the main focus is the fact that these constant questions come whether we want them to or not. And they come from all kids, because the growing mind is curious.

The other night we had a 45 minute dinner discussion about ants. I have no idea where the topic came from. There haven't been any ant sightings in my house for a few months, so I'm not quite sure why he has them on his mind. I know that bees are always on his mind when we pass the bush that is in front of our house because there was a nest out there last summer that we couldn't get rid of. We had to tell him to stay away from it because even the exterminator that our landlords called couldn't pinpoint the exact location of the hive. Now every time we pass it (even in the winter) he asks us, "Too cold for bees?" just to double check whether or not he can walk on the sidewalk near it. But ants? No clue.

At this stage in life, a question isn't just one question. A question is really ten. Or twenty. Or the entire evening spent in conversation.

What do ants eat?
Do they eat grape juice?
My pasta?
And the sauce?
They like tomatoes?
Why do they take it back to their house?
Can't they eat it here where they get it?
Isn't it heavy?
They don't have to be strong if they eat it here. Why be strong?
Where is their house?
What is their house made of?
Can I pick it up?
Can I move it?
Do we squash them?
Can I feed them?
They have their house in our house?
Lots of little houses?
Tiny houses?
Tiny tiny houses?
Why can't we keep them in our house?
They'll eat all of my food?
I don't want my carrots today. Can I give them my carrots just today?
Can we squash their houses outside?
Can we throw them in the garbage can?
Does the garbage truck eat the ants?
Where do they go in the winter?
Do they get cold?
Can I find them?

What is really important to keep in mind is that sometimes indulging these inquiries, (maybe not for the full 45 minutes every time, but for a few questions while getting dressed or during a drive somewhere) can not only mean the world to a kid but also make a huge difference in the long term. They are learning. How do we learn in life if we don't ask questions? Often if you have a question or are curious about something, you can just look it up online quickly. Young children don't have that ability. When kids don't usually have access to a computer's search engine at their leisure until at least middle school age, where else are they going to go if not mom or dad to answer their questions?

My smart phone was one of the best things to ever happen to my own curious mind. I don't have to wait until I get home to look something up on my computer anymore. My husband just about peed his pants the other night laughing at me. We were watching a television show where one of the characters was standing in his psychologist's office in front of a book shelf full of encyclopedias, and in order to avoid answering an invasive question, he remarked that he'd always wanted an actual physical copy of one instead of just access to the information online. I looked at my husband, honestly shocked, and asked if I was the only kid who had ever asked for one for my birthday? CURIOUS MINDS! I guess I may be quite the oddity, but I bet my parents were glad they didn't have to answer nearly as many "why?" questions from their 8-year-old anymore. Some kids have more of a drive to learn than others, but all kids are curious.

dreamcatchers & boxes

So with Steve's trip have come the return of the nightmares. I anticipated this, and on the first night that he was gone and Johnny began to have trouble sleeping, I took down the dreamcatcher from above my bed and brought it into his room. It was bought on the Cherokee reservation during a trip we took to North Carolina. I hung it on a hook on the wall (I didn't have string to hang it from the ceiling) and explained that it was supposed to catch any bad dreams that he might have.

Mr. Literal didn't buy it. He told me that it couldn't work because it didn't sit sideways like a "closed basketball hoop" to catch them if he threw the bad dreams up to it, and it wasn't sticky to catch them if he threw them at it while it was sideways. Dreamcatcher = fail.

I grasped around inside my sleep-deprived brain at 3am to come up with an alternative solution. A dream BOX! Ah-hah! Okay, so we were going to make a dream box, where he could put his bad dreams when he had them, and then they could stay in there and become good dreams.

-- He needed a fail-safe option. In case it didn't work.

Okay, well if some of them (or all) didn't become good dreams, we could flush the remaining bad dreams down the toilet.

In the morning.

Don't EVER forget to add in clauses with Johnny, or else you'll be doing things at 4am right after he has the bad dream and says the box "didn't work". I think the flush-them-down-the-toilet thing is reminiscent of was to get rid of dead fish, but nevertheless...

In all of this, it is important to keep in mind two things:

1. Dreams in their non-embodied state look very much like blown kisses and can be handled as such. You can throw them and catch them, lock them away in boxes or dump them in toilets.

2. However literal and rational one may be about how to handle said dreams, they are still invisible and, let's face it, imaginary once in a state outside of the sleeping mind. So... at least he's creative when it comes to his literal handling of imaginary (yet real?) things!

snow days

So Friday was a "Snow Day" for Johnny. The school district at large had an early dismissal, but since he doesn't start until noon, he didn't have class at all. The problem with how things went down is that this is the third time this year that he has had school canceled, and it is the third time that there has been no snow in the air or on the ground when I have had to explain to him that there is no school. To him, the term "Snow Day" can't apply because there is no snow. But even if I avoid using the phrase, he still wants to know why school is canceled. With a kid like this, you really have be sure you are fully answering a question and you are 100% up front about things right off the bat. You have to be completely honest while still careful about how you word things in order to minimize the impact and create the least damage possible.

Anything you say can and will be used against you in... life with Johnny.

Obviously it isn't intentionally a cruel thing on his part. You just have to keep in mind that pretty much anything that comes out of your mouth can come back to bite you in the butt. As parents, sometimes Steve and I eat our words. "But you said I could have a gummy snack if I listened to your words today!" -- At 3am. We forgot to let him have some when he got home from an outing at the grocery store, like we had promised. There is no "I know, but it's the middle of the night, you can have it in the morning" with this kid. He is completely accurate and entirely literal. He doesn't forget anything, and although sometimes it takes a while for him to remember it, he will eventually have it come to mind. With most kids, I would stick to my guns and just tell them to go back to bed even if they whine. But his mind doesn't work like that. It isn't a matter of me being a mean and horrible mommy and then the kid having forgotten it by morning. This is something that will bother him until we rectify the situation, be it in five minutes or five days. It isn't a power play issue like it is with most children, it is quite literally a matter of what he considers a "deal". -- And he holds to his end, too. When you remind him (even in the middle of a tantrum) that he has to stick to his end of a bargain, he pulls it together.

To Johnny, deals are concrete. You don't break a deal unless another alternative agreed upon by both parties is struck. Deals are rules. I know this because this is how my mind works, too. It has taken most of my lifetime to learn how to cope with the fact that pretty much no one else goes by this standard. Sure, people will go by it some of the time if they physically say "deal" or shake on it before going on their way, but it still is kind of a loose concept. But to view the world the way I do, only in the mindset of a three-year-old who has yet to learn any coping skills... We've got a big challenge on our hands. As much as Steve and I can try to be patient and understanding, and as wonderful as his preschool teachers have been about working with him on this matter his level of comprehension, he still needs to be prepped for people who aren't going to understand him. I spend more of my time repeating the words, "But it isn't your job to tell so-and-so what to do, and you aren't in charge of them. You are in charge of Johnny". I sound like a broken record. Isn't it funny that those are words we don't say enough to our own adult selves? "You aren't in charge of anyone else (you can't control those around you). You are in charge of you." I have a hard time because it is an abstract concept for a three-year-old, and yet most adults still struggle with it daily. I know I do.

This morning when I told Johnny it was time to get ready for church, he was very confused. Friday school was canceled because of non-existent snow. Wasn't church canceled now because of non-existent snow? It was quite the fight to get him out the door. I just pray that there aren't any more cancellations this year. Didn't Phil say his shadow eluded him this year? Bring on the warm weather!

one more week

I still have a few days left before the weekend, but I have this dark gray cloud looming over me that is Steve's last week of training 3 hours away from home. It might as well be halfway around the world; the point is that he won't be living here in the house with us for another full week. We made it through the first two weeks of his training like this, (just barely, and only with the help of family, without whom I would have fallen apart completely!) but it is still daunting. I feel like a whiny little kid considering a lot of the single moms I know who deal with the responsibility of raising a child on their own every day, but at the same time, dealing with a kid who has Johnny's specific needs and triggers when they so often line up with my own can be extremely challenging.

In Steve's words, "I don't know how someone who deals with kids his age regularly can spend any length of time with him and not see that he is different. He is awesome, but he isn't the same as other kids his age." I'm not saying that when he gets older Johnny will be diagnosed with the same thing I am, (well, technically he can't be, since Asperger's Syndrome is being dissolved into the spectrum entirely before the end of this year) or that he will have a pinpointed issue at all. Goodness knows, they didn't finally diagnose me until I was 21. That's the problem with the narrow-mindedness of mental healthcare in this country. "You must exhibit 9 out of 10 traits in the top-10 section of the 100 trait long list..." Never mind the fact that you fit a good 70 of the rest of them. Who can plot personality on a piece of paper? Who can truly know someone in one or two 30 minute sessions? How can a short snapshot of time outweigh the feedback and pleas of a parent for help with ways to meet their child on equal footing to help create a better understanding and more consistent positive interactions?

At times I feel lucky that I of all people ended up being his mama. I often am able to understand him and follow his thought process when others are completely lost because he is having a hard time or isn't communicating at all. I think it is part of why sometimes I'm able to be more patient with him when other people get annoyed or upset. Johnny seems to be making a big deal out of nothing or just whining for no reason, but in reality he has a very justifiable excuse for his reaction-- he just isn't able to calm down long enough to explain it because he is too emotional. That is when the parenting part of things kicks in. It is going to be a long road, trying to work with him on leveling out his emotions. When the wiring is different and people aren't understanding his initial attempts at communicating a problem or thought, it is really rough trying to overcome the instinct to lash out. I still struggle with this all of the time. Everyone does, but for people on the spectrum, it is much more intense.

The problems come between the two of us when his reactions to things that are upsetting him are triggers for me and he continues to repeat them. (Or when he is simply doing something that is a calming technique for him that crosses over into my trigger areas.)

In general, I've found that I have a higher tolerance for my son overstepping boundaries that trigger me than I do anyone else. For example: I really don't like it when people touch my face. If I'm ready for it or I see it coming, I can handle it with a little more grace than straight up freaking out, but I still HATE it. The only time it is okay for someone to touch my face is if I am the one to initiate it, like with a baby, picking it up and letting it touch my face. Johnny has a tendency to crawl all over me. He wants to "be with me" at all times, something that I remember doing to my mom constantly. (Mama-- I apologize!) When he is doing this, he is constantly touching my face, turning my head so that I look at him, stroking my cheek, and so on. I ask him to stop, I tell him to stop, I push his hands away and threaten to make him sit by himself. I threaten to get up and walk away, and then I start to lose it and have to leave. But like I said, props to me for the higher tolerance with my kiddo, because with most people, I wouldn't have made it past the first time without practically snapping their finger off. You don't touch my face.

It is in instances like I've just described that I've gone wrong during the other two weeks Steve has been gone. I've felt the need to spend extra time with Johnny to fill the role of both mom and dad because I know that Steve isn't coming home at the end of the day. Even at that, I feel like I'm sticking him in front of the TV all too much and handing his iPad to him constantly and telling him to "go downstairs and give mommy some alone time" so that I can try and stay sane. And this isn't a matter of not wanting to handle single parenting for the short amount of time that I have to do things on my own, it is truly a matter of finding a way around ending up in situations that spiral out of control. We trigger each other. I never realized how much having Steve come home at the end of the day (even though for the past few months his schedule only allowed him to see Johnny for 10 minutes after Johnny was already supposed to be in bed) helped keep us from endlessly bouncing back and forth. Without that guaranteed mental stability walking in the door every night, I began for the first time to question who was running the house. I've always been able to out-stubborn our kid when no one else could, but man!

With this next week alone, I'm trying to prepare myself for another week of nightmares and absolutely no sleep for me. Both weeks without Steve involved an 8:30pm bedtime for Johnny that resulted in what averaged out to be around a 2:30am actual sleep time, followed by regular night terrors that woke him every 5-10 minutes. This resulted in no real quality sleep for him and absolutely none for myself. This also meant that any chance of having a well-behaved child went right out the window. My own lack of sleep lowered my tolerance for the times when he triggered me. The compounding problems just kept stacking up!

The problems at school didn't help either, though I have a feeling they were part of the self-perpetuating cycle that began with his lack of sleep. I'm afraid it is all going to start again when Steve leaves. Since he drives out on Sunday and Johnny doesn't go back to school until Tuesday, we will be well into the "daddy isn't at home" blues by that point. By the time the second week had rolled around before, Johnny was refusing to go to school at all. This was a problem for me because Steve had taken our only car. If Johnny didn't get on that bus when it came to a stop outside the front door, he wasn't going to school at all. I wasn't going to make it through the day if I didn't get a few hours to myself to catch up on some sleep. I finally figured out that if I sent him in a super hero costume, he felt safe. He wore an outfit every day. If I have to send him in an outfit every day next week, guess what he is going to school in? I'm getting that boy on the bus, no matter what it takes! Sadly, I wasn't able to get any sleep even on the days when he did have school. And then there was the day they canceled school because of snow...

This just has to be a better week. Maybe with the knowledge that it is the last one, and going into it having just had him home for a full week...? It will be worth it, though. Steve has a better job that he absolutely loves! It pays more, has good benefits, and the hours allow us to be a whole family together again instead of the ridiculous hours he was working before. -- As soon as training ends!