Say what?

Ah man. Life got busy.

Zoe girl has finally, finally been diagnosed with a delay in her expressive speech.
I am elated.

I am elated because I suspected this.

All mothers know what is going on with their children before anyone else does and I knew Zoe was miserable because she couldn't communicate. She was whining and shrieking and pointing and grunting all of the time. She was working so hard to speak with me. She was locked in her own little head.

So, as soon as she had a significant enough delay to secure an Early Intervention Evaluation, I got one. And now she has help. Lots of it. And I couldn't be more relieved because now my sweet girl can come out into the world and talk to me. I know she will have a lot to say.

She will receive speech services once a week (maybe twice if I can get her enrolled in a pending Boston program). Next week, she visits her Otolaryngologist to see if the fluid in her ear (Otitis Media with Effusion) has caused any sort of hearing loss. Most likely, this kind of thing can be corrected with tubes. I would welcome that as well because it would give her such relief. Of course, I have been very busy reading and learning about Expressive Language Delay and Otitis Media and the connection between the two. I now understand that both problems are common, however, arriving at this understanding makes me angry. I don't like that it took me this long to get both the information I needed and the level of knowledge I required to adequately advocate for my daughter. Zoe could have had services months ago.

The thing is, I feel as if Zoe has a sort of bottleneck of all this speech that can't come out. She runs to get me and pulls me to what she wants me to see. She comes and gets me if she needs help. If she wants me to play. To watch. To hug her. To get her her milk or Lovey or any of seven gazillion other things. We had set up our own little method of communication. Because she can't say "mommy" without prompting, she would scream for me in this certain pitch that she knew I recognized and I would come to her rescue with whatever she needed. Sign language has been really helpful in alleviating some of these issues. She now knows "help" and "diaper" and "more" and "all done" and "milk" and "juice" and "play" and "hurt". We always accompany the signs with spoken word and it seems to be giving her some relief. Today she was trying to tell me that something was wrong with her toe and I knew I had finally identified the problem because she kept signing "all done" when I touched a specific spot. She was crying and signing "all done". You cry and say stop when someone is touching something that hurts. It helped me find her pain and fix it.  That was incredibly liberating. We had a little conversation.

How frustrating must it be to know what is going on and know what you want to say and be physically unable to say it? Poor thing. She's stuck in a glass box.


Her language delay also seems to manifest itself in this constant crazy toddler stream of vivacity.  She's now enrolled in gymnastics twice a week and is loving it. It really seems to help with her boredom and energy level. One day, because he didn't have school (Zoe goes to Gynastics two of the three mornings Zach is at Pre-K), Zachary came along and got so jealous of the cool foam pit and zip line that I enrolled him in a class too. 

I love when they do things together.


Zoe will be attending a preschool program for two mornings a week in the Fall (this is going hand in hand with her speech services as we feel that exposing her to talkers and other SLPs will be a big help to her). Zach will be attending Kindergarten at the same school. 

With all of this scheduling and their classes and trying to get a few million other things together, I haven't had the time (really, energy) to get my ass in front of the computer and write. I'm here now though and hope to be here more often again over the next few weeks.

But, if I'm not, please know that I'll be back.
Life is just moving as fast as this kid raps.

Dinner's Ready

I know that it is possible to raise children who are eclectic eaters. Who sit down at the table and welcome new and interesting foods. Who seek opportunities to expand their fledgling palettes. Indeed, I think that my youngest is growing up to be one of these eaters. I am so grateful for that. She will eat anything.

My oldest however, often eyes food as the enemy. Though he begrudgingly follows the family rule that every new taste needs to be sampled at least twice per meal, that doesn't mean he likes it. He'll do it though. He listens. He is nothing if not extremely well-mannered.

My youngest, the adventuress.
My oldest, the tolerant bureaucrat.
Together, they are the perfect dinner time storm.

Here's the deal: Every day at around 3 o'clock, Zachary is engaging in some sort of quiet activity. It could be a craft. It could be a book. It could be building with blocks. It could be watching Curious George. But, every day at 3, while Zoe naps and Zachary plays, I begin the dinner prep.

Usually, if I am not sucking too badly as Chef-Mother, I have given dinner some forethought. I have come up with something new (will they like it?) or old (they better still like it!) and am busily throwing it together before the Diva Dynamo awakes from her slumber.

As I cook, I fantasize about a dinner where everyone Comes-To-The-Table-When-Called and Eats-What-I-Have-Cooked while Engaging-In-Stimulating-Conversation. We will have a Toast (Zach does this nightly) and play a round of Best and Worst (we all share the best and worst part of our days) and then laugh about whatever it is we are discussing. The kids will listen as Tim and I catch each other up and will interject with tidbits related to what we are speaking about.

Sharing the nightly meal is a big deal to me. I've read the studies. I know that the more often families eat together, the less likely the kids are to become mass murderers or jump off a bridge or smoke some Crack in my bathroom. I also know that eating dinner together makes it more likely that my kid will be able to do long division in her head and be able to identify an escargot fork.

So, every day, I continue to prep a meal at 3 o'clock and serve it at 5:15ish (The time when old people without teeth and young people with toddlers sit down to eat all around America).
I do this 
every. 
damn. 
day.

It should come as no surprise to my family when I yell "Dinner's ready". They should be prepared for this, shall we say-- predicable --turn of events. 

But every night,
every.
damn.
night. 
The same dance occurs.

"Dinner's Ready!" I announce.

BAM! Like the 5 o'clock express train, Zoe streaks across the kitchen floor. She is first to the table every night. In fact, approximately 20 minutes before dinner hits the table, she starts circling her chair and shrieking like a wounded animal who is also starving and severely dehydrated. She makes this noise even if she has a snack in her hand. She begs to be buckled into her booster. I comply. 


Arrow starts whining and wiggling for me to serve him his dinner. I forget to set up his dish before dinner almost every night because I am too busy trying to feed the humans I call my family. I put two scoops of kibble in Arrow's dish. He sniffs it and dismisses it. He walks away.


"DINNER'S READY!!!" I shriek.


My husband saunters downstairs from his office. If it's winter he decides that right now, at this exact dinner time moment, is when he has to add three more logs to the wood burning stove. And he has to stand by the stove and watch the logs catch fire before he joins us at the table. This fire watching will last until he can no longer withstand my bitching. Only then will he join us. (If it is not winter he will do some other small project-- like beginning to Spackle the walls --immediately before the meal) When he finally approaches the table he will make a detour for an extra ice cube or a special spoon, and then he will sit down.


"Zachary! Get to the table" I demand.

Zachary drags himself to the table. Sometimes he crawls over while trying to dig up the hardwoods with the top of his head. Picture a large pig snuffing mud with its snout while sprinting. That's the image I'm going for. Finally, he sits down. He informs me that his milk isn't cold enough. He feels cold. His napkin is not folded correctly. Anything to delay eating.


But, success...right? The four of us are around the table. I get us to at least this point every single night. If it's a good night (and this has happened approximately 3 times in the past 4 years) everyone eats and shares and relates and laughs and stays consistent with my aforementioned fantasy. If it's a normal night, dinner falls rapidly apart.

Zoe (who can not yet talk) begins to shove food in her mouth so quickly her cheeks puff out like small hot air balloons. She chokes the food down and regurgitates whatever doesn't make it. She spots the dog begging for scraps and attempts to share with him by flinging her entire plate off of the table and onto the floor. Tim or I pick up the detritus and salvage whatever the dog doesn't steal. We place the plate in front of her again as she swipes a dinner roll and chucks it at Zach's chest. Usually her aim is dead to nuts and the two of them share in a round of hysterics.


Zachary (who can talk very well) calls out, "Cheers! To Family!" and then engages us with tales of fighter jets that can fly "60 and 100" miles an hour (four year old speak for reallyfuckingfast). He regales us with stories of a child at school who hit another child and received a time out. We beg him to take just one bite. We play a round of Best and Worst. He nibbles a morsel of food off of his plate. Picture biting a Cheez-It in half and in half again. Then, eat half of that half. That is a Zachary size bite.


Tim and I have not yet taken a mouthful. Our food is congealing.


Zach announces he has to Pee. Zoe rubs salad dressing into her cheeks like it's Creme De La Mer. Tim's boss sends him a critical email. The cat meows a hello on the way to her litter box. Arrow farts.

Zachary takes a final bite and, ever the rule follower, clears his plate and places his milk back into the refrigerator. While he is on his way to the sink, Zoe tries to take his head off with a flying, half-eaten, Brussel Sprout.

She nails him.


My fantasy collapses.


But, I'll keep trying because I know that practice makes perfect and someday, before my children turn into surly teenagers, we will master the art of The Family Dinner.We already kinda have, don't you think?


Until then, I'll be here in the corner eating my Pasta Primavera.

Om.

I have anxiety.

Sometimes it's better. Sometimes it's worse. But it's always there. More and more lately, it seems to take over what I am doing at the most inopportune times. And it always drops in to say hello when things get chaotic.

There are times when my anxiety is social in nature (like at those big parties where I know some people but not others), and times when my anxiety is directly related to all that I feel that I have to do to feel calm again (Dry my hair. Fold the laundry. Write a thank you note.) Anxiety has the ability to make things that may seem small to others-like returning a phone call-feel really big to me. I don't feel anxious because I don't have confidence that I can do the things that need to be done. I feel anxious because even a small task gets added into the bucket of all tasks. I have a hard time differentiating which should take priority. All things on my things-to-do list feel big.

I have recently noticed that the sense with the ability to send me spiraling into a frenzy is that of sound. When there is too much noise, I start feeling anxious. If, say, the news is on in the kitchen and Tim is listening to music and the kids are playing loudly, I feel the need to put my hands over my ears. I have been known to turn down the volume on the television in other people's homes. Not because I am trying to demonstrate my dislike of T.V., but because I know that turning down the sound is directly proportionate to turning down my anxiety.

My battle with anxiety kicked into gear after Zach was born and the baby monitor found its permanent place on my night table. I don't know about you other mothers out there, but when both of my children were babies, I was able to identify and hear a distinct change in their breathing that would signal to me that soon, soon, they would be awake. And if they were awake, that meant I would have to be awake too. And I didn't want to be awake. I was tired. So, that thought of the change in breathing caused me anxiety.

I hope I haven't lost you non-anxiety sufferers here.

In other words, just the thought of that change in breath, the thought of that sound, made my heart beat faster. I am willing to bet that if you hooked me up to a heart monitor, you could track the physical changes. The sound, the experience itself, doesn't even need to be occurring. Simply the memory of the experience can cause an attack.

Sure, there are lots of things that make me anxious and there are lots of things that I do to mask it. Take, for example, the fact that I do not use my hands for the first few minutes after arriving somewhere or doing something important. That means not holding a drink or a plate of food when I first arrive at a party. Even if I am not afraid-anxious and I am just excited-anxious, my hands are a sure tell. They shake. Uncontrollably. At my most recent job interview, (a few years back) I had to keep them folded in my lap and stall for time instead of handing out the lesson plan I had brought to share because I knew that my hands would tremble as I distributed the papers to the panel of interviewers. I didn't want to give myself away.

With the realization that I need to soon do something to help me better cope with feeling anxious (something other than cleaning or writing) I have been repeating a little phrase to myself every so often: Stop. Breathe. Listen.

This is something I tell my son to do all of the time. Something I tell my daughter to do-though she might still be too young to understand. I liken it to the cliched phrase of taking time to stop and smell the roses. I am trying so hard to slow down.

This evening as Tim and I were cleaning up after dinner I focused on the sounds around me. I heard my children laughing, then screaming, then laughing again. Zachary said to Zoe, "Come on, you can try to hold the broom!" Arrow made a weird moaning sound as he stretched out in front of the fireplace. The dishes made that clank (that always makes me feel happy) as they were placed in the dishwasher.

That dishwasher dish clatter noise has the power to whisk me back to laying in my childhood bed and listening to my mother in the kitchen. It's a good noise. A safe noise. It's as good as the return of the peepers to our stream in the spring. As good as my fingers clicking on this keyboard. As the sound of my ceiling fan turning.

Sounds are closely linked to memory. I often set a scene in my home by setting the sound. Try to think of what I am doing as being akin to selecting a playlist for a party. You probably don't want to get things bumpin' by queing up some Enya. It's kind of like that for me. I purposely work to create an environment that is audibly friendly. I don't necessarily try to control what happens. I just try to shape it.

Humor me for a minute and stir up some happy childhood memories of your own.
Go to that moment.

You there?

Good. Now, listen to what's going on. Dial in on it and really focus.

Are adults speaking loudly and laughing? Is the Charlie Brown Christmas Special on T.V.? Do you hear the ice cream truck? Crickets? Dogs barking? What is happening around you? What do you see? What do you hear? What do you feel?

Chances are, if the memory is good, then the sounds that go along with it still have the ability to make you feel great. Maybe I could argue that it starts in the womb with the shuuush shuuush of our mother's heartbeat. We try to reproduce that environment to calm our infants. We rock and shhhh. We place white noise makers in the baby's rooms. We employ fans. Play soft music.

Most of us know that if we want a calm baby, we need to set a calm scene.*

*I am not saying that it should be quiet every time your child needs to sleep. Conversely, making sure you don't create a hushed house will most likely make your kiddo a better sleeper because they won't need silence to drift off. I'm also not for a moment claiming to be Weissbluth or Sears. 

I'm just saying, for me (and therefore, for my family), a little zen goes a long way.