May 29

Sarah finished her last week in kindergarten (extra thanks to Sonia for being Sarah’s 1:1 helper for the last couple of weeks to make it a better experience for all). Sarah’s class performed a play several times throughout the week. Amy and I saw it on Tuesday. Tuesday was not Sarah’s most focused performance time and while I was watching I was also feeling varying emotions of disappointment and comparison to what might have been. When the play was over Amy leaped up to give Sarah a huge hug. Of course. All that mattered was that Sarah had been in a play and we love Sarah. Nothing else matters. I am so thankful to Amy for that reminder.

After his session on Friday, G wrote, "We dove in to Brown Bear, Brown Bear, moved through the fish-stripes obsession, and ended up singing and laughing quite a bit.  Today, Sarah impressed me with her ability to match pitch and rhythm as we sang the book to the Twinkle Twinkle, Little Star melody.  She has a very sweet, quiet singing voice full of all of her personality.  As with most things in life, when Sarah decides to do a thing, she does that thing with all of her brain, heart, and soul.”

What I loved when overhearing parts of G’s session was hearing the love and fresh, new responsiveness he had in response to her statements that aren’t actually new. That is what it’s all about. 

In my Alexander Technique teacher class yesterday I learned again and for the first time how my shoulder joints are really supposed to work and how often I have them misworking. This connects beautifully with my session with J. from earlier in the week when I had a revelation about my coracoid process (part of the shoulder blade that you can feel from the front). I became aware that my right coracoid process, and the surrounding musculature, is where I try to Hold Things Together (HTT). Even things that can’t be held together. I think I’ve been doing it for years, at least since I was 11 and my parents told me they were getting a divorce. Even though it went as smoothly, easily, and wonderfully as a person could ever hope for, I think I still perhaps wanted to hold them together or was holding myself together. It is helpful to have another point to check on myself (along with tongue and eyes), especially when I am feeling stressed and quite possibly trying to HTT.

I’ve been thinking about how I respond to pressure based on my belief about whether the pressure is good for me or not. When the girls are pushing me for something or I feel tense because I don’t like what they are doing (creating my own pressure) then I resist the pressure. When I am getting a massage and J. presses on a group of muscles then I consciously tell myself to go with it, to let go with it, because I trust that the pressure will take me to where I want to be. What if I held that perspective about other pressures in my life? What if I moved with them instead of against them, trusting that they will take me to where I want to be? This doesn’t mean yielding all my power. It means yielding my resistance and finding a different way to go for what I want or what rules I need to enforce. It means yielding in my muscles when I feel pressure, so that I am soft and easy, being fully me but without taut frautness. 

On Wednesday the girls got helium balloons at a party. I said they could play with them at home inside. They really wanted to play with them outside and Amy swore she wouldn’t let go. I didn’t believe this to be probable and kept my rule. Perhaps this parallels my internal belief that if I can just undo the past years of muscle tension then I won’t redo any of it. I swear! I hope that on some level my insistence is just as adorable as Amy’s.

I’ve also been thinking about the still point when something is just what it is and nothing more or less. I often feel this about various parts of my body when I do constructive rest and sometimes after receiving a massage or AT lesson. I have wondered if I could approach being me with this goal in mind of finding the still point for my whole self, finding the still point for how I perceive my children. It feels clean and calm.

May you move flexibly and easily through whatever pressures you encounter, may you respond to your own habits with love as if each one was new and fresh, may you find your still point, and may you receive a huge hug for just being you.

May 22

Carl and I had an amazing time in Scotland. It is one of the most beautiful places I have ever been. We had incredibly good weather. It was often cold and windy, but also sunny. For our hike on Skye it was so warm and sunny we got sunburned! In Edinburgh we walked the Royal Mile so many times we lost count. Everything on the home front went smoothly and we are so grateful to everyone who made our trip possible, most especially Sonia and Grandma and Grandpa.

While we were away the girls attended a princess-themed birthday party. There were several dresses and costumes available, to Amy’s delight. Sarah wasn’t really interested in any of them. Then she saw a baseball hat and happily donned that as her costume.  At another point in the party she was wanting food and not wanting to wait or do other things. She sat at a counter and said, “I am not a happy pig.” Yay for Mo Willems for providing the line. Yay for Sarah for choosing it!

One night this week when it was time to get ready for bed, Sarah opened the toothpaste by herself by unscrewing the lid. It is a flip-top lid that can even be challenging for grown-ups so we always open it for the kids. I love that Sarah figured out a new solution all by herself.

Carl visited the Catholic school that I mentioned in my last update. He liked it as much as I did so now we are all set for Sarah’s school for next year. I told the public school to stop everything that was in process for Sarah and I will fill out the paperwork for the Catholic school. I am so excited and relieved to have found a place that feels so right. Did I mention that she will be a first grader? One of my concerns if she was to attend public school was that they would put her in a grade that matched her age rather than her developmental age. First grade is perfect. It is exactly what I wanted. Finding this school cements my love for Sarah’s current school even more since it was the current preschool assistant who gave us the information, even though that assistant hasn’t had Sarah as a student and she and I haven’t even met. I feel very well cared for by life.

Reentry into daily life has felt a bit rough this week with jet lag and attempting to catch up on everything. Reentry is always this way and I am surprised by my struggles each time. I feel slow and ponderous, whiney, grumpy, and stern. I have also had many snuggly easy times, but they haven’t been the salient feature of my week. Time to focus on them more and on the grumpy times less.

Yesterday Carl taught the girls to hammer nails. It was super adorable. Earlier in the week Amy was singing about her clothing color choices and Carl joined in by singing about his clothing color choices. There are so many parenting moments that he does so beautifully that they seem like works of art. I feel so blessed to have him. I am also so blessed by Sarah’s spunky, cheeky light and by Amy’s overflowing love. 

May 8

Sarah has had more struggles at school this week, so much so that she came home early on Thursday and we didn’t even try on Friday. We realized that sometimes she was using crying and upset to get out of the room to see Sonia so we experimented with having Sonia not be outside the room (just hidden downstairs so that she was available if things got so difficult that Sarah needed to go home but Sarah didn’t know she was there). I don’t know if Sarah then upped the ante of increased crying and upset as an attempt to see if that would get her to Sonia or if the hard times would have happened anyway. Next week we will experiment with going to the other extreme of having Sonia in the classroom with Sarah, not just as needed but as an active helper to see if we can help Sarah re-engage and let Sarah and her teacher have new experiences with each other, outside of the frustration. This is not at all how I expected Sarah’s school year to go. If anything I would have expected the reverse, of more troubles at the beginning of the year and less at the end. I’m glad we have the flexibility to keep trying new things.

We visited a possible new school for Sarah for next year so now we have a couple of options and just need to take the next steps with each to gather even more information. The new option (new for us, not that it is a new school) is a Catholic school with a classroom just for kids with Down Syndrome or Autism with a 1:3 teacher: student ratio. They do a lot of inclusion with the neurotypical classes, but flexibly depending on what each student is ready for. The main thing that impressed me was their flexibility and desire to work with me throughout the process to fit Sarah’s needs and strengths the best. I know this is the aim in the public schools as well, thus the IEP, but I was still impressed with the responses to some of my concerns and questions. I asked the people at the Catholic school how they respond to a student crying. They said they would want to talk with the parent to understand the motivation behind the crying (attention, getting out of something, sensory discomfort, etc) and come up with a plan for responding. The private school even has the option of a modified school day (fewer hours) if we feel that would be best. 

At one point while visiting the school, the person showing us around asked Sonia and I what we thought Sarah’s greatest strength was. When Sonia was asked, I was taking Amy to the bathroom so I had no idea of what her answer had been when I was asked. We each said that Sarah’s greatest strength was how she connected to grown-ups! What an awesome thing that we both had the same answer (it must be true!) and that that would be the strength of someone who used to have trouble connecting. Go Son-Rise! In terms of her greatest need, I think it is connecting to other kids (aside from Amy, with whom she connects well). Academically, I think her greatest strength is reading and the area of greatest need is math.

In the Jenny-headache-journey… as I become ever more aware it is fascinating to notice things in new ways. While visiting the new school was an exciting thing, when we were done I had a roaring shadow of a headache (still not real because of my meds). I was totally not being present with my body and what I was doing with it (probably not breathing fully, probably tensing all of my muscles). Wow. This may seem like an obvious connection but it is actually quite novel to see the relationship so clearly, thus being able to take direct and immediate steps to ameliorate the situation. 

On Tuesday we visited Amy’s school for next year for a “meet and greet” with the teachers and other new families. I had both girls with me due to the time of day. It was a bit stressful for me getting out of the house on time and then the setting was not quite what I expected. I felt stressed and anxious regarding some of Sarah’s behavior, horrified that I was embarrassed, and like I was radiating the heat of discomfort. I felt a bit mad that the setting was not as I had understood from the description, but it seemed like I was the only one to have a tough time. On the plus side, this pointed out how I still have fears/beliefs/tight spots that I thought were gone. On Wednesday I felt exhausted and drained and raw. Again, it was interesting to see how deeply and fully I felt the parental hot defensive feelings from Tuesday. I haven’t felt those feelings in a long time, but it used to be a frequent occurrence when Sarah was much younger. I just fear that I am being judged (or that Sarah is being judged). It doesn’t actually matter if I was. What matters was the all-systems-are-go experience of it all and how draining it was. I am grateful that I don’t often experience those feelings, grateful that I have arranged my life in such a way that settings that might trigger it are few and far between. I just didn’t realize I still had some clearing work to do there. 

Tuesday evening I had my headache-journey-massage-therapist J. come to the house and work with Sarah. Awesome! She allowed the work and would sit up in between moments of contact from J. to talk to us (I stayed in the room) and give me chin presses. After some work on her jaw, J. asked how she felt and she said, “better.”  The day after the session Sarah was talking about it some and I asked if she wanted another massage from J. and she said yes. Totally awesome! J. was exactly as loving and connected as I want all people who interact with Sarah to be. 

In general Son-Rise Program news, there is a new scientific study supporting Son-Rise! http://www.esciencecentral.org/journals/training-parents-to-promote-communication-and-social-behavior-inchildren-with-autism-the-sonrise-program-2375-4427-1000147.php?aid=66836

When G. arrived on Friday for his time with Sarah, Sarah said, “G.’s car is missing a hubcap.” I asked if they had ever discussed this before. He said no. I didn’t know she even knew what a hubcap was! 

Friday the girls and I just stayed home all day and it was wonderful. Sarah needed a break from school, Amy’s school was going on a field trip that she didn’t want to go on without me (and I didn’t want to take both girls), and it was so great to not feel any time pressure to go anywhere or do anything. We also needed to fill up our snuggle tanks because today Carl and I leave for a week in Scotland. Woohoo! Sonia will be in charge of everything, with the help of her/Carl’s parents who will stay in our house. We will also have our wonderful volunteers and sitters helping. To all those making this trip possible, THANK YOU!! (I will not be writing next Sunday).

Happy Mother’s Day to all who are mothers, to all who mother anyone or anything in anyway, to all those who help me be a better mother, and to my own wonderful trio of mothers (birth, step, in-law). I am one lucky woman. The river of determination and perseverance and love that runs through me is fed so strongly and steadfastly by my mom that I cannot imagine any of my journeys without her. The way she parented me is what I aspire to in my own parenting. So many people say that they want to be different parents than their own. I feel blessed to want to be the same. I have always felt cherished and supported. I am so thankful for the support of all six of my parents (birth, step, in-law). I also feel extremely grateful to Carl and Sonia for helping me be the mom that I want to be. It is an amazing thing to have had an assistant mom for these past few years. It is an amazing thing to be married to someone who can see my lowest, most-struggly, most ire-filled, most tear-filled moments and still love me and listen so that I can step back into my best self. Everything wonderful and challenging in my life all helps me steer towards being more of the person and parent I want to be so I am really grateful for all of it.

Thank you readers for witnessing my motherhood journey with love and attention. You are a part of it. Happy Mother’s Day to all of you.

May 1

In an effort to increase how much the girls drink, I was looking at various box juices and discovered a gem of an item. Ella’s Kitchen smoothies are fruit, veggies, and water. Unfortunately, Amy doesn’t like them. Sarah, on the other hand, helped herself to 4 of them yesterday morning before I realized what had happened. I think she was just so excited to drink something from a box shaped like the boxes Horizon milks come in, which she used to have when she was much younger. And they are tasty! Today I told Sarah she could just have one. When she finished it she got up and put it in the trash independently and with no prompting. I don’t often remember to ask the girls to throw away their trash so that is extra awesome that she did it. She also went to put something in the recycling today, also with no prompt or request issued.

Earlier in the week Sarah discovered part of her iphone (my old one that we thought we disabled as a phone) and found a semi-hidden texting function. She proceeded to send several texts of gibberish to one of my friends. All I can say is thank goodness it was to a friend! We have now made that impossible (which we thought we had already done).

At one point it was awfully quiet in the family room and I wish I had investigated sooner. Amy took a pair of scissors to the flap of the play tent. Argh!!!!!! She also snipped a bit off a costume ribbon and scarf. She claims she didn’t know she wasn’t supposed to. I then tried to name every cloth item possible to tell her she is not allowed to cut them. Scissors are back to being allowed only under adult supervision.  (Before this moment they only used them in the dining room at the art table on paper, which is now the absolute rule going forward.)

There are days that I didn’t have much time for constructive rest or that I only did 5 minutes a couple of times. The days that were less busy and that I had more time to rest and actively let go I felt like I was also more of the parent I aspire to be. I think I don’t have time to not do my constructive rest. I can feel ridiculous and indulgent with how often I lie down, but it really is a gift to everyone around me if I do it! I am a much nicer person and parent. I think the same goes for making time to see clients, which I have always known was important for me for myself, but now I see that it feeds into me being more loving overall. As does receiving thoughtful, attentive bodywork. It is important to have such moments of experiencing each action as filled with loving intention and purpose. I am then refreshed in my intention to live my other moments with love and thoughtful purpose.

And now it is obviously time to lie down.