Insanity Isn't Hereditary

What happens is the child does something crazy, which drives the parent crazy.  Then the parent does something crazy which drives the child crazy.  See?  It's not hereditary, it's a freakin' infinite loop.  I came to this realization at 5:50 am today.  I being sound asleep, was not expecting there to be a tall, dark shadowy figure standing a foot away from my face. Well in my defense, she was tall because I was laying down and quite honestly, she was pretty menacing.  Did I mention also that I was sound asleep?

A voice suddenly popped, "Mommy, you LIED to me"  Ok...I lied.  Sure.  Who the Hell are you?  She steps closer and I can see it's Connor.  A pissed off Connor.  "You lied to ME!"  

Suddenly it returns to me.  Ted and I promised Connor that Ted would put Monty the cat to sleep in her room when he went to bed.  Now apparently when Ted went to bed he couldn't find the damn cat so he just came to bed.  I mumbled something about not seeing Monty and then low and behold the little bastard appeared and Connor took him to her room for the remaining 30 minutes until she decided we were getting up.

Now the crazy part in this scenario, in case you missed it, is how did I end up being the liar when Ted is the one who didn't put the damn cat in the kid's damn room?  It's the same kid logic that convinced Tessi to argue with her father that he didn't know how to make porridge, walk past him out of the kitchen out to me in the living room to ask how to do it.  This is also the same mentality that let's Teddy think he can fool me when he says he just walked the dog when it's raining and both he and Damn Dog are dry.

The logic is that they are insane.  I'm not making a judgement, just a statement.  They are barking mad.  Off their nut.  Loonier than a tune.  Any euphemism you want.  It's the only reasonable explanation for their ability to remember you calling a classmate's mom a bit of a tart 3 years ago and mentioning that fact in front of her and still being unable to remember you saying find your school hat 30 minutes before you leave for school.  Or telling Grandma that Mommy's iPhone has an app that says the F word but won't say a single bloody word about the award they earned at school that week.

You can see it now, can't you?  That's just not normal.  And the dealing with that insanity, that incredible lunacy well....there really is no choice.  A loop of bat crap craziness is begun.  I can see all of this clearly now as I'm blundering my way through the morning.  I'm hiding in the computer room typing my missive and drinking my tea.  Once I get through the tea I should be able handle the inmates a bit better.  

Wait, I can hear it from here, the first fight has started.  Hmmm, may hide in here a bit more.

Manic Mondays

Here we are....the second week of school holidays. So far no one has called the cops on me...at least as far as I know, there may be a backlog. So I'm calling it good. Just took Tessi to school and Teddy and Connor are fighting over...as God as my witness, I have no idea. I just here yelling and I'm tuning it out. I'm going to wait until actually bleeding starts before I do anything. I'm not even 1/2 through my 2nd cup of tea for God's sake....no jury would convict.

Today we are meeting with Connor's pediatrician. In OZ you only see the pediatrician for serious things...everything else is done by a gp. Today I want to talk to the dr about Connor and her anxiety issues. I'm trying to get her looked at by Children's Westmeade Development Center, as suggested by her Kindy teacher. I would swear on my limited knowledge of Autism that Connor has Asperger's. This should be impossible since she started with a profound speech delay. But everything about her screams Asperger's. Inappropriate emotions, savant-like memory of the obscure and inane and zero memory of what the rest of us perceive as important.

I'm hoping to find some more insight into this insane affliction. 4 years of living in the Spectrum really hasn't taught me all I need to know. In fact, not even close. One of my favorite pearls of wisdom about all of this, "Something may be a definate sign of Autism; unless it isn't" I love that one. Meaning that lining up toys all in a row can be a massive red flag for Autism; unless of course your child just likes to line things up...then it isn't a sign. No wonder so many of us parents go barking mad.

So we'll see what Dr. Cohen says today. If anything. He may just tell me to unclench and relax. Oh so helpful. Another pearl of wisdom people have for parents of Autistics. Please do me one favor, those of you who do NOT have a loved one on the Spectrum. If only just today, if you meet someone who's child is Autistic, do NOT tell them to relax, that everything will be alright. As helpful as you think you are being; you really are being the opposite. We don't get to relax. We have to on guard all the time, watchful for new signs and symptoms to start therapy for and have to constantly explain our child's odd behavior and try to plan for the future. You see, for your children at ages 5 and 4, they still have boundless options. Mine do not. Mine already have limits and the more I do now...at a young age...the more of a chance they have in the future to exceed those limits.

Well, that turned out to be more of a rant than I was planning. Must be the cold medicine and the fighting over...sigh...still don't know what that was all about. If I'm honest though, I really don't want to know.