New England Mamas

Hello, Summer!

Holy frijole!  Is it hot in here or WHAT? While I'm not quite old enough for menopause, I managed a pretty good imitation as I ran errands today.  Popping between the car and the stores, I sported a shiny and flushed face, sweat dripping between my boobs, and severe irritability toward, oh...  everyone else on the planet.

The fact is, I am not a Summer Person, and that is because I am a Sweaty Person.  If you are also a Sweaty Person, you have my sympathy, and I know you share my pain as well.  I am an example of the unfortunate sub-type of Sweaty People that sweat mostly on their heads.  I sweat normally on the rest of my body, but my scalp is out of control.  More than once I have been captured in summer party photos looking like someone dumped a bucket of water on my head while my armpits are miraculously dry.  It's lovely, trust me.

This is actually one of the few things I'm truly self-conscious about, so a while back I did some research to see if anything could help me.  I'd been to one too many elegant functions held outside on a hot day and spent far too much time running to the bathroom to pat down my forehead with paper towels.  On these summer evenings, I was acutely conscious of the flush on my face and the sweat trickling down in front of my ears as I nibbled hors d'oeuvres.   As if high heels on gently sloping lawns aren't torture enough, I always end up using a finger to discretely squeegee off my cheekbones.

A few years back, a friend of mine (who is a nurse) took one look at my sodden state and said, "Whoa!  Hyperhidrosis!"   Because I am a well-educated, rational woman, I immediately went home and Googled it.  Yes, it is a real condition.  No, I don't think I'll be having microsurgery done on my SPINE to cut a tiny nerve ending to stop it.

I'm not someone who has embraced the concept of aging well at any cost.  I wince when the gossip rags show pictures of actresses sporting brand new pouts, and like many people, worry about what popular culture in this country is promoting as "beautiful."  I'm not anti-plastic surgery, per se, because I know several women who have had procedures and I was thrilled for them when the results were so positive. But guess what is used for sufferers of hyperhidrosis?  Botox injections in the scalp, which paralyze the nerves that send "We need more sweat up here!" messages to the sweat glands.  Yeah, I'm kind of ambivalent about that one, too. 

Another option is high-potency aluminum chloride antiperspirant gel you can apply to the affected area, but again - not a fan of the neurotoxins!  Or of the "burning and irritation that may occur." Ouch. Oh, wait!  There is also a handy pill, made up of various herbal ingredients in "strict proportion," which would only run me $160 for a two month supply.  After tracking down the common names for some of those ingredients, I discovered most are common herbs and spices, but one of them is this stuff:

Latin Names : Cateria lacca... English Name : Lac insect  

The most common and widely occurring species of lac insect in India is Laccifer lacca... which produces the bulk of commercial lac. Lac is the resinous protective secretion of the tiny lac insect. The major constituent of sticklac is the resin (70-80%); other constituents present are: sugar, proteins, and soluble salts, coloring matter, wax, sand, woody matter, insect bodies and other extraneous matter...

Huh. 

Looks like it's up to me to start a brand new, back-to-the-future fashion craze.  Handkerchiefs or bandanas, anyone?

I Don't Know Why It Still Surprises Me.

Ever since Peanut was a toddler, we've used the phrase "developmental issues" to explain to strangers and acquaintances his odd and/or problematic behavior. To family and friends, he's just Peanut being Peanut, but every now and again some of the clothing-chewing, mouth-stuffing, spinning, rocking, bouncing, flapping behavior would come back and we might find ourselves at a party explaining, for the ease of understanding, that he was "mildly autistic."

As he has changed and developed, we started to understand much more clearly what his strengths and weaknesses were, and that meant we were pretty much expecting the PDD-NOS diagnosis we received this spring. Last week, we had an IEP meeting to discuss his transition from one school to another, from preschool to kindergarden. It went very, very well, and included some amazing news about a grant that will provide extra staffing.

It looks like he and a couple other children on IEPs will be grouped together in a regular kindergarden classroom. There will probably be 18 or so children in the class total, and some of the non-IEP children will be half-day students, so it will be an even smaller class in the afternoons. There will be the regular teacher and a part-time teacher's aide for the class, and thanks to the funding that came through, there will also be a specially trained full time co-teacher responsible for the 4 children on IEPs and a special education aide as well. 

This is what we wanted for Peanut's kindergarden year: a high teacher ratio, as much inclusion in the regular classroom as he can handle, a teacher or an aide with specialized behavioral training. They relied heavily on the independent evaluation we had done, and we spent a long time discussing ways to prepare him for the big changes next fall.

As we were wrapping up and going over everything, we came to the part that startled me. They brought up the fact that his current educational diagnosis, which was assigned to him as he entered preschool 2 years ago, fell into the "developmental delay" category. Given all the changes we have seen in him, as well as the clinical diagnosis of PDD-NOS, we all agreed that he should be re-classified as "autistic spectrum disorder."

No surprise, right? I mean, duh - we've been saying he's mildly autistic for years, we've received an official clinical diagnosis, and hello? He's autistic. Not profoundly autistic, not by a long shot, but definitely On The Spectrum.

Except it still startles me to hear that. Hard as it may be to believe, it catches me unaware. Who, me? I have an autistic child? Really? Are you sure? Because I don't think of him as autistic, obviously. I think of him as emotionally fragile, easily excited, smart as a whip.

It's weird, because unlike some parents I've talked to, I've never shied away from "labeling" him. It always seemed to me to be the best way to get the services that have helped him, and it's honestly one of those things I didn't think too much about. I just never felt like "The Mother Of An Autistic Child" before this IEP meeting.

I guess I was too busy being, you know, "Peanut's mom."
__________________________________________

(Originally posted at A Smeddling Kiss)

Old Friends Are The Best Friends

My best friend and her family just headed home after a overnight visit.  It may sound strange that we haven't seen each other for a good part of the year, nor talked or even e-mailed much, and yet I call her my best friend.  She and her family live in Boston, and we are only an hour away, but our lives are such that we don't get a chance to see each other often.  Family, work, finances, stress - they all get in the way of getting together.  Yes, I realize what a damn shame that is.

She and I met 20+ years ago, as volunteers in a program to teach school in Africa.  I loved her dry humor and no-bullshit attitude, and of all the things I experienced during my time in Africa, her friendship is one of the things I have treasured ever since.  Well, her friendship and her snarkiness.  I appreciate that in a person.

Our early 20's were spent in Boston, working, dating, hanging out.  When Dr. V. and I married, she was a bridesmaid.  When she told me, long-distance, about how she looked forward to her computer crashing because that meant the cute IT guy would have to come fix it, I hoped  he was as nice as he was cute.  And I was so happy when that turned out to be the case.

Then we moved back to Boston 10 years ago, and we got to hang out some more, and she got pregnant.  She didn't have the easiest pregnancy, and I was so honored when she and her husband asked me to be at the birth of their daughter.  And it was the most amazing thing I'd ever experienced, and I still get shivers when I remember that moment when their daughter was born.

In the last decade, I had my daughter, and then we moved back to New England, and I had my son.  Her mom died, and my dad got sick, and my sister got divorced and her brother got married.  She's been through a lot, up and down and all around, and so have I - and I have no doubt we will go through more crazy times in the future.

What I love about our friendship is that even though we don't see each other enough these days, I know from our history that there will be more adventures for us.  When our kids are older, I fully expect there will be time to hang out, to travel, to talk.  To drag her across the country in a rented R.V. or make her drive up to Montreal with me and practice badly accented-French.  To disgust her with my trashy reading tastes and get more excellent book recommendations from she and her husband.  To be a bad influence and talk her into a hangover and laugh so hard our old-lady pelvic floors give out.

Her friendship is one of the things I'm counting on still having when I'm older. 

Waistline? Gone.
Youthful innocence?  Long gone.
My best friend?  Still around, thank God.

Rain, Rain, Go Away... NOT!

Yes, I know.  You think I am insane.  All the dampness here in New England must have affected my brain!  The rot and mildew is setting in!

I have one word for you to explain my love for the rainy days we've been having: allergies.  Last year at this time, my poor little Peanut was hit with a tidal wave of pollen.  You may remember that it stayed cold for a long time last spring, and then BOOM - warmed up and stayed really warm and dry for a while? 

The allergist told us it was going to be a terrible year because everything that would normally bloom over a span of weeks or months bloomed at the same time instead.  It hit so hard and so fast, we ended up in the E.R.  a few days after the warm weather started, with Peanut wheezing and needing a nebulizer treatment to set him right.

The rest of the summer was the same.  My boy is allergic to a lot of thing, just a few of which are trees, weeds, and grass, and the weather pattern last year made it impossible to even play outside for parts of the summer.  It really sucked, loading him up with prescriptions and nasal sprays and eye drops, only to watch him rub his eyes and ask to go back inside on a beautiful summer day.

This spring has been really different so far.  The rain has come, and gone, and come again, and each time it has washed away a ton of pollen.  This morning dawned sunny and bright, and despite trying to keep the house as allergy proof as possible, I couldn't resist opening the windows in a burst of optimism. 

It was lovely, and I enjoyed the breeze even as I began thinking I should probably close up the house and run the air conditioning, but then the skies darkened.  The rain has been threatening to come down again this afternoon, and I'm loving it.  Our family is singing a new song these days: 

"Rain, rain, don't stay away! 
Come back and wash the pollen away!"

___________________________

Cross posted at A Smeddling Kiss

I Know How Lucky I Am.

I had planned to pull together a post about all the stuff that happens to a woman when she starts a family in honor of Mother's Day.  I had a few cute stories to relate and a couple poignant thoughts to share about the different ways women make their journeys to motherhood.  I even planned to include an ode to my own mom, a stellar example of motherhood.

But guess what?

I never got the chance to write that particular post, because motherhood got in the way.

Earlier in the day, Dr. V. took the kids for a walk around the bog that backs up to our neighborhood, and when they got back, I did a quick tick check on the kids.    Anyone who has read my blog this spring may remember the Great Infestation of 2008, in which this author bravely battled the lice brigade that had taken up residence on her child's head.  I'll give you one guess what I found in her hair!

How does this happen?  Friday, I braided her hair and saw nothing, and yet today - aaargh!  Creepy crawlies on mah preshus baybee! 

I took it a little personally, that my "special" day of lazing around and reading blogs and playing with the kids was now going to be superseded by hours of combing and crying and loads of laundry.  I sent my husband off to the store to pick up more lice shampoo, and when he came back I started working on my daughter's hair. 

It only took a few words from him to make me feel like the luckiest mom on the planet.  A little background is necessary to understand what caused it.  My husband is very careful not to share any personal information about his patients, even with me.  I understand, and I respect their privacy as well, so I try not to ask about specific patients even when I can tell something is bugging him. 

Last fall, he had a particularly bad week and he confided in me that he had a patient that was really getting to him.  She was a woman my age, with two kids, a wonderful husband, and terminal cancer.  He said it was very hard for him to see her sometimes, because she looked and talked a bit like me, and their kids were the same age as ours, and as it happens, they live on the other side of the pond that backs up to our neighborhood. 

So, fast forward to this afternoon, as I was settling down to my glamorous afternoon and evening of lice removal.  As the sun began to set over the pond and the light turned pink, I said to him, "Look at the sunset.  Pretty, huh?"  He looked over at the pond, and then said, "Remember that patient of mine who lived across the pond?  She died a couple weeks ago.  I just ran into her husband and kids at Stop & Shop."

I'm not sure what else to say in this post, except that I'm incredibly blessed. 

We are all blessed, all of us mothers, and our children are lucky to have us, and we them. 

Happy Mother's Day, everyone.

On My Own.

The stars and planets aligned just right this weekend, leaving me alone in the house from Saturday morning until Sunday afternoon.  Let me repeat myself:  glorious solitude is miiiiiiiiinnnneee! 

I don't know about other people, but I love being alone.  I've always needed time away from others, as far back as I can remember from childhood.  I'm the oldest, and my sisters and I are each about 20 months apart, so by the time I turned 4, there were 3 of us already. Some of my earliest memories involve time spent in secret hiding spaces, like sitting a closet or laying under a bed.  It sounds odd, but the memories feel safe and comforting. 

As I've gotten older and become the mother of a child with sensory issues, I've come to recognize some of those same feelings in myself.  Too much noise makes me jittery, strong smells make me gag, and I rely heavily on visual cues - bulletin boards, chalkboards, post-it notes on every surface - to keep me on track.  I also have an inordinate fondness for cashmere sweaters, flat shoes, and elastic waistbands.  These clothing preferences could be "sensory," but c'mon, I'm a chunky middle aged woman!  Let's call them "common sensory" choices, shall we?

As a parent of young children, you have to be in "Alert" mode all the time.  It is incredibly relaxing to be able to turn off that switch every now and then.  I don't think enough parents, moms especially, take the time to recharge by being alone.

I usually feel compelled to work on a project of some sort when I get a chunk of time alone like this.  This weekend, I am painting one of the small walls in my kitchen with black chalkboard paint.  I'm blasting the "inappropriate for children" music, I'm eating non-meals of cheese and crackers and fruit, and I'm watching gory investigative crime dramas full of fake autopsies on television.  It's wonderful, and I highly recommend it. 

If you are feeling frazzled and discombobulated, I have some advice.  This week, when your family asks what you'd like for Mother's Day?  Don't answer and say the usual flowers and brunch will be great.  Instead, just tell them to leave you alone.

I'm So Done With Disney... For Now.

We went to Florida last week, to spend some time with my parents during school vacation.  The time my kids spend with their grandparents is precious for everyone, since we only see them a few times each year.  The days were filled with... well, nothing, actually.  It was great, relaxing and fun and what a vacation should be.

Then Sunday came along, and it was time to go to Orlando.  The last few times we've vacationed in Florida, we have spent most of the time with my parents and no more than a day or two in Orlando before heading home.  The Wonderful World of Disney is overwhelming, and I'm not one of those people who adore everything Mickey.  This year, my husband decided to combine our vacation with the opportunity to complete some of his CME (continuing medical education) credits by signing up for a course held at one of the Disney area hotels.

The course only ran during the mornings, so we figured that I'd hang out with the kids at the pool in the mornings and we'd do the parks in the afternoons.  We spent Monday afternoon at the Animal Kingdom, which the kids had seen a special about and were very excited to experience.  They got to pet a snake, identify birds, and learn about conservation.  The highlight for them, however, was when Mommy got completely and utterly drenched on the Kali River Rapids.  No one else on the raft!  Only Mommy!  Yay!  After squelching our way back to the hotel, we discovered that the lobby barman was happy to give us margaritas in plastic cups to take back to the room.  That was Mommy's favorite part of the day.

The next afternoon, we decided to try the Disney Quest "experience," which we knew very little about.  It turned out to be an indoor arcade extravaganza, including games and virtual rides which were actually pretty fun.  We all agreed that our favorite was the "Pirates of the Carribean" ride, where they usher you into a little room and your group stands on the deck of a ship and fires virtual canons at virtual pirate ships.  My husband has decided he would like to install that game in his basement man cave... which doesn't exist yet.  I tell him it's his "virtual man cave" and offer to bring him a "virtual beer," but he doesn't find me as amusing as I find myself.

Our last day was spent at the Magic Kingdom.  The original plan was to go to SeaWorld, but the kids were kind of animaled out and really just wanted to go on rides.  I took them over in the morning, and we got the Small World ride out of the way first thing.  (I find it's helpful to go there first, so that you can enjoy the earworm all day long.)  We had a pretty good day, but my son started having problems mid-afternoon.  He gets sensory overloaded at times - while it's new and interesting, he can deal with noise and crowds, but after a full day he began to lose his mind.  First he started walking into walls, and by the time the parade came around he was beyond ready to go.

As a result, our exit from Disney was hurried and frantic.  I ended up hauling him down Main Street U.S.A. through the crowds with his little hands pressed against his ears as he cried, "Make them stop singing!"  We even ducked into a couple of stores to escape the singing and dancing throngs, but we could still hear the music.  "Turn off the happy music!" my son begged, and if I'd been able to pull the plug, I would have.  Finally, we made a break for it, scurrying out of the park full tilt. 

As we headed back to the hotel, I sat on the monorail with my son curled up on my lap.  I stroked his back and found myself mentally drafting a post about taking your autistic child to a theme park.  Then I looked around me on the monorail and realized that most of the people had similar dazed expressions and crying children.  One couple actually had two crying children, and they were discussing returning later on in the day!  Not for us, though.  We're officially done with Disney. 

At least for this year. 

I've Found My People

I've discovered something important about myself this week.

We've been on vacation since Thursday, when we flew out of Boston and headed down to Florida.  My parents have become snowbirds, and we decided to come down and visit them for a few days before heading off to Orlando for the obligatory wallet-emptying.  Today we are leaving the Gulf coast and driving to the land of Disney, and I don't want to go.

That's right, I don't want to leave the slow-paced, shutting-down-for-the-season island where my parents live 4 months out of the year.  I don't want to stand in lines, or ride shuttle buses, or eat in noisy restaurants.  The only thing I am looking forward to about our time in Orlando is the opportunity to see other kids behaving worse than mine, which is always nice for the parental ego.

So, the big epiphany I've reached this week? 

I am apparently a leathery-skinned 80 year old widow who likes to do water aerobics in the condo pool every morning living in the body of a 42 year old suburban housewife.  I'd happily stay here with a pool noodle and a tennis visor and send the rest of the family off to Crazyville as they battle the crowds, but I don't think my husband would go for that.  The good thing about all this is that at least I know what I want to be doing in 40 years.  Woo hoo!  Florida, here I come!  Only 4 decades to go!
______________

Happy school vacation week, everyone!

I Have No Shame.

Ah, spring! This past week has finally started looking a little less like winter here in New England, and people from Maine to Connecticut are walking around with smiles on their face. The garden stores are opening up, eager buds are popping out on the plants and trees, and one afternoon - go ahead and laugh, you non-New England readers - I even drove around with my windows open!

All sorts of living creatures are making their spring appearances and while some are welcome, others are decidedly NOT. I've spent the week dealing with a visit from one of the unwelcome varieties of small critter. Not the woodpeckers, although they are back. Nope, not any 4-legged animals, like mice or raccoons. Unfortunately, our little visitors are of the 6- legged variety, and as I've been wading through all the treatments and advice and home remedies, I've learned a lot about how to deal with Our Friend: The Louse.

One thing I have noticed now that I am a member of this special club is how many people still feel a sense of shame and panic when their kids get lice.  When the first case appeared among our acquaintances a few weeks ago, I spent hours on the phone with a friend listening to her freak out after her child was sent home from school with an itchy head.  I felt a ton of sympathy for her, and I hope I was helpful in talking her down from the ledge a little bit, but while I could identify with the panic part of what she was feeling, I didn't understand the shame she obviously felt.   

Now that we have it in our house, I still don't get it.  Panic?  Sure - you want to be done with this never-ending combing and laundry NOW, and when it still isn't eradicated you feel frustrated that you have to start all over.   I wasn't sure why it didn't bother me at all if people knew, though, until I called my mom and told her about my awful week.  She replied, "Remember when your sister got it? "

Suddenly, it was clear to me.  I didn't remember it that much, because it was no big deal to my family.  Maybe it was a reverse class thing, because my dad was a doctor and we caught it from my cousin via a ritzy high-class gymnastics camp, but I just never thought it was anything to be ashamed of.  Getting lice was like getting poison ivy - a bummer, a bit painful, and even though it took you out of circulation for a while, it was just bad luck.

A quick spin around the internet will show you that lice are universal.  It is a myth that only "dirty" people get them.  People from all walks of life have the little buggers hitch a ride onto their heads and into their homes.  Heck, even the Countess from "Real Housewives of NYC" had to deal with them.  Of course, her kid had international jet-set lice, but I digress.

This post is really for those of you parents who have yet to experience the thrill ride that is a lice infestation.  Chances are good that you will experience it at some point in your child's school years.  If (when) it happens to you, just remember that "louse" is not a dirty word.  You have nothing to be ashamed of.  Really.

Instead, do what I've done:  shampoo, treat, comb, pick, bag, wash, repeat.  Do your best to eradicate it, be patient and diligent, and try not to dwell on where your child picked it up.  Repeat after me: "Catching lice is not a moral failure."  Then go play the lottery, because you are totally due for a change of luck!

A Visit to Oz

Today is the last day of our local high school musical.  The Barnstable High School Drama Club is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year, and over the last 3 months has been working on a large scale production of "The Wizard of Oz." When I say large scale, I mean it - over 300 cast members, rigging brought in by a "flying" company to fly various cast members around, and a live horse onstage. It's a Very Big Deal down here on the Cape.

The local buzz about the show began when it was announced that Warner Bros. would be taping the production for a new on-line content venture, Warner Bros. Studio 2.0. They plan to broadcast short webisodes of the entire undertaking, from casting to performance, for which they paid the school $25,000. Not everyone was thrilled with the involvement of Warner Brothers, but it seems to have worked out, and everyone is eagerly anticipating the eventual broadcasts.

When the auditions were announced, there was a flurry of activity. There are parts for all ages, including little kids, and all the kids we know wanted to be involved. There are over a hundred Poppies, including half-a-dozen kids in my daughter's class. It's been really fun watching the show come together, and now that performance dates have arrived, it's become the talk of the town down here. The huge auditorium holds 1400 people, and each of the 6 scheduled shows have sold out. The director even added a second show for today, and announced last week that they have extended the production rights into the summer to allow them to perform 6 more shows in July.

Here is a clip of the show I found on YouTube, taped by someone in the audience:

I believe this was taped opening night, which was the night my husband and son and I attended. The performance that night had its share of glitches, including a horse with stage fright that bucked backstage and damaged some scenery. What I was most struck by, however, was the excitement of the crowd - everybody was thrilled to be there. The sense of community I felt was amazing - within 5 rows of our seats, I spotted my son's teacher, my neighbors, a fellow Girl Scout and her mom, and our UPS delivery man.

The feeling of being a part of something really special has been hard to miss - everywhere I've gone over the last two weeks, "The Wizard of Oz" is what people are talking about. It is actually a little magical, the way people are so excited about it, and the sold out tickets have become a very hot commodity. I reserved 11 tickets for today's matinée performance just in case every member of my husband's family could come down from Boston to see my daughter in the show. We are only using 5 of the tickets, and the rest have been snapped up by various people who found out I had spares and were thrilled to get them.

It has been a lot of fun, but it has also been our first experience as a family of deliberate over scheduling. I knew way back when Pepper tried out for the play that we would have a conflict with another activity, but we decided to go for it. The other activity is now over and done with, and today is the last day of performances. As much fun as it has been, I would be lying if I didn't admit I'm happy that we are almost done. After today, there will be no more late nights and ride arranging, no more Poppy wrangling for whichever one of us is the mom-on-duty that night. But while I'm looking forward to getting back into a normal routine, I think I'm really going to miss visiting the wonderful world of Oz. It's been a remarkable experience, and one I know my daughter will remember all her life.