This Insane Life

It’s been almost a month and a half since uprooting my life and moving two hours away from our home. I pulled my seven year old out of school, quit a stable job running the shipping and receiving department at a print shop, left a great (aside from a few noise issues) apartment complex, in a beautiful city on Lake Michigan that felt like home. We now live in a college town in the middle of the state, two hours away from support and friends. The city is filled with terrible drivers blasting loud music, random strange noises at two in the morning, and all the places I remember from living here during my undergrad are either closed or no longer a place one takes a child. Some days are tough; after I walk my son to school, I can’t seem to make it off the couch again, and I sleep until I have to get my son from school.

Despite this, Smalls has never been happier. He is excelling at this school, getting all his work done despite constantly being held in last year due to incomplete work. His new 2nd grade teacher has told me he isn’t having any real issues! She has communicated that occasionally he may be the last to finish something, but that his answers are correct. And every morning and afternoon, there’s this program where they get some of the antsy kids out into the hallway to do work. Smalls loves it! See, after last year, this is the craziest, most awesome thing to be told ever! He is reading chapter books, is constantly exclaiming how he LOVES his math workbook, and has begun to make friends inside the classroom and out.

Last year was the opposite. He was kept in from recess more than he wasn’t. He achieved excellent marks on his report card, yet his teacher made it sound as if he was disruptive and not getting anything when she filled out the form a psychologist sent with me, as it was recommended by multiple people within the school he be tested for ADHD and anxiety or depression. Every morning Smalls awoke with a stomach ache, every day he told me nothing about school. One day he told me there was a student who was allowed to leave the classroom to deliver something, and that student got to pick another student to go with them. Smalls told me he was never picked, and when it was his turn he was going to choose anyone to go with him because no one chose him. That kind of thing isn’t healthy, and it broke my heart. It was difficult for me not being able to help him more, not know how to help him.

I did not get a job upon moving here, but am living on my savings for the moment. I won’t be able to continue this for much longer, but it’s going to be a tough thing to give up, this stay at home mom time. Though it’s lonely and I’ve been struggling with depression and self worth, when I walk the couple of blocks to pick up my kiddo and he’s all smiles, it’s so worth it. Every day, he says, “Hey Mom, guess what?” about twenty times on the six minute walk home. It makes every day so much better! We have time to go to the orchard and pick out pumpkins, to play games every day, to cook dinner together and walk to school. Today, there was a two hour fog delay, so we were able to play a Dr. Seuss memory game and Joyride Kinect together.

It is so easy for some of us to get lost in those in between times, so hard to see the end when it feels so far away. Grad school really is just around the corner, and I need to try my best to not let my brain derail this opportunity to be the mom I’ve never been able to be due to single parenthood full time job status. Shut up brain! Get planning the future, not dwelling on the imperfect areas of life!

So, here we are. At the beginning of this amazing new chapter, in this insane, unpredictable life! How can I not love it?

My Child, Aspiring Spy

I played host to a group of six, seven and eight year old boys this weekend. It was only for a few hours, and I definitely wasn’t alone, but it’s one more of those firsts as my child grows into this separate little human being. It’s been a very difficult summer for my head, all the thoughts and emotions and processing and what not going on in the jumble of brain matter, and it was pretty awesome to see him having fun with other kids, as he does not regale me with his daily daycare adventures. Our conversations upon pickup go something like this:

Me: “Hey kiddo, how was your day?”

Caolan: “Good. I’m hungry. What can I do when we get home?”

Me: “I don’t know. I’ll make dinner. Did you do anything fun today?”

Caolan: “I don’t remember. Can I play my Kindle when we get home?”

Me: “Maybe after dinner. Who did you play with?”

Caolan: “Really? After dinner?!”

He could be a spy. He gives me nothing.

The end of this year was especially difficult, because he was officially diagnosed with ADHD Inattentive type. This was not surprising considering genetic lineage, but still not something a mother has an easy time hearing. That, however, wasn’t the hardest part. I had to fill out a whole bunch of paperwork, as well as sending a whole bunch of similar paperwork to school with Caolan for one or two of his teacher’s to fill out. It was reading their responses, and seeing the discrepancies on his report card, that really hit me.

He received an excellent report card. The paperwork made him sound like he was disruptive, miserable, lonely and unable to learn or finish anything.

I still find the discrepancies bothersome. This is my child. This is his future.

Was he faking his general happiness throughout the year? I don’t think so. Perhaps I’m being presumptive to think keeping him separated caused a separation between him and his classmates, as he was kept in so much to finish his work. So, if something like punishment isn’t working, should it continue? Continue doing something with the hope of different results? And if it continues, how will he not see himself as different? As someone who is not as smart as his classmates? There is a reason I hate labels; labels define and categorize and they are damn difficult to get away from. At seven, I’ve put a label on my child that could follow him his whole life; how does he not use this when defining himself? How does he not see how others define him based on labels?

Well, what I do know is that I need to take a much more active role in his school day. Helping with homework and reading and such aren’t enough; I need to be more involved in making sure that just because my kid can’t sit at a desk and work on something he knows how to do, doesn’t mean he keeps being separated out from his classmates and kept in during recess. Keeping a kid separated who’s having a tough time time getting work done a few times might not be such a bad idea, but when it becomes more often than not, well, maybe it’s doing more harm than good. Punishing a child who already feels like he’s different than his classmates doesn’t seem logical, especially when it doesn’t work.

Aaahh!!!!!!!!

Sometimes one exclamation point just isn’t enough.

We live in a beautiful city by Lake Michigan, I have this kickass deck I can write on, and a child who is hilarious, loving and intelligent. We are surrounded by awesome people in our lives. There are so many positives. It’s tough for me not to get dragged down by the negative, but, here, today, sitting on this deck with my Wonder Woman coffee mug, my zombie gnome and my blue sky view, it’s tough to not be optimistic. We will get it figured out. Life is hard. It doesn’t get different, or easier, or less crazy after one hard time passes, because there will always be difficulties.