I'm not entirely sure when it happened. I'm not sure when the Internet became our greatest weapon. I don't know if it's mothers or women as a whole that have done this to ourselves or if it's just a weakness of mankind. What I do know is that we have one of the greatest jobs in the world and if we don't start supporting one another we will be tearing each other down before it begins.
I am a working mother. There I said it. Not like you didn't all know, but just in case. I tried the stay at home mom thing. I can't do it. I put on 30 lbs of the lost baby weight that breastfeeding took away, I got bored cleaning my house and staring at a sleeping baby. I wanted to learn, to create, to GO BACK TO WORK! That being said I have lots of friends who are stay at home mom's. Some of them do daycare (our wonderful daycare was created because she's a stay at home mom). Some of them just absorb themselves into their children. I love them for their ability to do it. I wish I could.
Now I'm about to say something that will truly blow your mind. We are all good mothers!
OK take a step back from that.
As a working mom it is all too often that you are made to feel like you are missing out, you don't love your child enough and you can't handle "raising" them so you give them to someone else. I love my daycare lady but I'm pretty sure she isn't the one that has been sitting up reading multiple reports about my child, learning the ins and outs of IEP's and what my son deserves. I'm sure if she should ever need to though she will. That being said, all to often stay at home mom's are asked what they do all day. How do they contribute to the house? When will they return to work just so the rest of us stop feeling bad? Have you looked at the cost of daycare for just 1 child? Have you ever really looked at it? Daycare is seriously stupid expensive! Now Grayson has never been in anything but in home daycares. The price tends to be cheaper, he tends to get more attention despite his calm, relaxed personality and he's never lost in the sea of other louder children.
But this is not a rant on daycares. This is a rant on us, as mother's. We are all GOOD MOTHERS!
I was recently on a potty training post for Baby Center. It was one of their infamous lists of things you could do to make potty training easier. I didn't agree with at least 2 of them, but that's only because they don't apply to my child. As I'm scrolling through the comments I couldn't believe what I was seeing. Mom's from all over the country, fighting about the fact that some 4 years olds still aren't potty trained. Talking down to mom's who are struggling along with their child through potty training. Schooling working mom's on not being enough of a mom to be able to make it happen faster.
I think it's great if you are able to get your child to potty train by the age of 2. For the record though, this isn't a race. You will not get an award for your child being able to pee on a potty before mine. I mean I'll probably give you a good old fashioned pat on the back because my child wasn't ready and diapers are seriously expensive. But no college is gonna look at our children and say "Let's go with little Johnny, his mother potty trained him early!" As you all know Grayson is still potty training. We are getting close, he's starting to go #2 more frequently on the potty. We are spending less time doing dirty laundry from daycare. It's going well.
Until you walk in another mom's shoes, don't take the joy out of the hurdles she's overcome! We are ALL GOOD MOTHERS!
My last and final rant is about this latest obsession with C-sections. The whole if you had a C-section you just aren't mom enough. Ok ....seriously??? Did you have a baby? Did you adopt a baby and give it a loving home? Are you taking the best possible care of that baby and helping it grow, teaching it all you can about being a loving, gentle human being? Congratulations! YOU ARE A MOM! Whew. I'm glad we cleared that up. I would hate for someone to think that because I go an epidural at 2 inches, due to the fact that I was vomiting every contraction during my 12 hour labor would make me less of a mom. I would hate that someone would think my friend with back problems who had to go through 2 c-sections for her beautiful son and daughter without even being given the option to push wasn't a mom. I would hate for that woman down the hall, screaming in pain the morning before my son was born who really wanted a natural birth wasn't a mom.
We ARE ALL GOOD MOTHERS!!
This Mother's Day, after you've called your mom and hugged your kids, please just try something. Instead of looking on the Internet and seeing a post by another mom and thinking, wow she really is doing it wrong, or man I'm so glad I don't live her life. Take two seconds and just let that mom know you are there. You are supporting her in this crazy adventure called motherhood. You think she's doing it right. Let's try and make Mother's day about supporting each other and stop tearing each other down. Let's be be honest, we're aren't going to change the world, but in reality we are shaping it. With that I wish you all a wonderful, blessed Mother's day, and please just remember...
WE ARE ALL GOOD MOTHERS!
Sunday, May 10, 2015
Saturday, May 9, 2015
Star of the Week
Our little man was Star of the Week, which while it seems like something super cool for him it ends up being a way for the school to get supplies from parents. But regardless, it was our little man's turn. I had already arranged to have a half day from work on Friday due to his extended evaluation follow up so I just made it work out double duty and I was able to come in an observe him in his class, read a story to them all and get to see my little man in action.
Let me just say I am one proud momma! Grayson is doing unbelievably in his class. The first thing I got to watch was them all getting ready to go to the playground, being the Star of the week allows him to be the first to go out to the playground and he gets to pick his partner as well. He very clearly chose his friend Abby and off him and this adorable little brunette skipped to the door. He was super excited for me to be there and I think it limited a lot of his activities on the playground. But he was climbing up structures I didn't know he knew how to. He engaged with his peers, was eager to play with them.
From there we headed into centers and I got to watch him play a game with his peers and the speech teacher. He was very engaged with her and the game (a Snakes version of Chutes and Ladders). He loved rolling this big fuzzy dice across the floor and I am finally understanding where the phrases "I got it!" and " I did it!" have come from. From there we headed to another center in which they read a book about mom's and while I think he enjoyed the book it seemed to just make him sleepy, at one point his head was on the table. The third center they drew pictures and told why they love their mom's. Grayson definitely was trying to tell his teacher something but neither of us were really able to understand what exactly was coming out of his mouth.
(Grayson & Thermaputty)
After centers it was time for his IEP meeting. This might be the first time my little man has actually gotten sad about me leaving him somewhere. We had some clingy hugs and lots of requests for "Up!" but he realized it was snack time and was able to move on.
The meeting went fabulously. This was to go over the new OT assessment and to go over the further observation from the BCBA. First we had an update from his preschool teacher and his speech teacher, both of who agreed he is doing fantastic. They have already changed one of his goals on his IEP to focus on his attention to activities versus worrying about his ability to follow the routine and sit for table tasks with a group. Based on the small observation I had, I completely agreed with them.
The OT believes that he has some really strong fine motor skills and that a lot of them are developing. She did specifically mention his lack of ability with scissors but also followed it up with a how often do we really introduce 3 year olds to scissors. She will be adding a 30 minute pull out to his IEP every week. The BCBA had a lot more information to share. She quickly reaffirmed what she had stated in the previous IEP meeting, that she wants him there all day. She wants to begin to do morning sessions with some discreet trial training and to also expand it into some appropriate play, generalizing of all skills and more peer interaction.
What does this mean for Grayson?? Well starting August 31st (or around there) he will be a full time preschool student. He will be picked up on the bus around 8:30 arriving to school for 9. He will then have 3 hours of ABA work followed by lunch and then followed by 2.5 hours in his preschool classroom settings with his peers. At which point he will promptly return to daycare and fall asleep until we pick him up (I expect we will be keeping naps for quite a while with this schedule now). It has also been decided that Grayson will be in the summer program which lasts for 1 month from July 7th-August 7th. He will have preschool class 9-12 and then will follow it up with ABA and that will be 3 days a week.
After a fabulous meeting we then returned to his classroom, where I received a truly wonderful greeting from my little man and we began circle time. The star got to pick a song to sing, and I finally understood why he keeps running around the house singing sticky sticky bubblegum. Then I got to read his favorite book Pigs Make Me Sneeze by Mo Williams (seriously if you haven't read these books yet I highly recommend them). The kids loved it, the teachers enjoyed it, and Grayson was really excited I was there. Then we took his poster with all his pictures around circle and let all the kids pick their favorite one. It was an absolutely wonderful day. I am so proud of my little guy and the little person he's becoming.
Today, Wally took him to get his hair cut and Grayson not only wore the smock (something that's normally a very big fight) he actually sat through the whole hair cut with no tears and let her use the cutters!!! As I'm sure you can see from the photos below it was much needed.
In other news, Mother's day is tomorrow. We are going to the local Animal Shelter and visiting with some baby kittens. It has been about 8 months since our beautiful girl Sakura passed away. Her older sister Sashimi has been overly lonely lately and we think it might be time to bring in a new friend. Wally is really enjoying his job, he's doing very well and working super hard making us all very proud of him. He will be off to Chicago for the week of the 17th. I will be taking my first dip into the pool as a working single mom and frankly I'm not looking forward to it. Thankfully, we have Wally's parents near by if I do get into a jam and my job is very flexible in regards to my afternoon hours so I will be home early most of the days that week.
We will have a mother's day special post early tomorrow, I've been working on it for a while and I plan to share it with you all bright and early. Have a wonderful weekend!
Grayson Before Grayson After
Let me just say I am one proud momma! Grayson is doing unbelievably in his class. The first thing I got to watch was them all getting ready to go to the playground, being the Star of the week allows him to be the first to go out to the playground and he gets to pick his partner as well. He very clearly chose his friend Abby and off him and this adorable little brunette skipped to the door. He was super excited for me to be there and I think it limited a lot of his activities on the playground. But he was climbing up structures I didn't know he knew how to. He engaged with his peers, was eager to play with them.
From there we headed into centers and I got to watch him play a game with his peers and the speech teacher. He was very engaged with her and the game (a Snakes version of Chutes and Ladders). He loved rolling this big fuzzy dice across the floor and I am finally understanding where the phrases "I got it!" and " I did it!" have come from. From there we headed to another center in which they read a book about mom's and while I think he enjoyed the book it seemed to just make him sleepy, at one point his head was on the table. The third center they drew pictures and told why they love their mom's. Grayson definitely was trying to tell his teacher something but neither of us were really able to understand what exactly was coming out of his mouth.
(Grayson & Thermaputty)
After centers it was time for his IEP meeting. This might be the first time my little man has actually gotten sad about me leaving him somewhere. We had some clingy hugs and lots of requests for "Up!" but he realized it was snack time and was able to move on.The meeting went fabulously. This was to go over the new OT assessment and to go over the further observation from the BCBA. First we had an update from his preschool teacher and his speech teacher, both of who agreed he is doing fantastic. They have already changed one of his goals on his IEP to focus on his attention to activities versus worrying about his ability to follow the routine and sit for table tasks with a group. Based on the small observation I had, I completely agreed with them.
The OT believes that he has some really strong fine motor skills and that a lot of them are developing. She did specifically mention his lack of ability with scissors but also followed it up with a how often do we really introduce 3 year olds to scissors. She will be adding a 30 minute pull out to his IEP every week. The BCBA had a lot more information to share. She quickly reaffirmed what she had stated in the previous IEP meeting, that she wants him there all day. She wants to begin to do morning sessions with some discreet trial training and to also expand it into some appropriate play, generalizing of all skills and more peer interaction.
What does this mean for Grayson?? Well starting August 31st (or around there) he will be a full time preschool student. He will be picked up on the bus around 8:30 arriving to school for 9. He will then have 3 hours of ABA work followed by lunch and then followed by 2.5 hours in his preschool classroom settings with his peers. At which point he will promptly return to daycare and fall asleep until we pick him up (I expect we will be keeping naps for quite a while with this schedule now). It has also been decided that Grayson will be in the summer program which lasts for 1 month from July 7th-August 7th. He will have preschool class 9-12 and then will follow it up with ABA and that will be 3 days a week.
After a fabulous meeting we then returned to his classroom, where I received a truly wonderful greeting from my little man and we began circle time. The star got to pick a song to sing, and I finally understood why he keeps running around the house singing sticky sticky bubblegum. Then I got to read his favorite book Pigs Make Me Sneeze by Mo Williams (seriously if you haven't read these books yet I highly recommend them). The kids loved it, the teachers enjoyed it, and Grayson was really excited I was there. Then we took his poster with all his pictures around circle and let all the kids pick their favorite one. It was an absolutely wonderful day. I am so proud of my little guy and the little person he's becoming.Today, Wally took him to get his hair cut and Grayson not only wore the smock (something that's normally a very big fight) he actually sat through the whole hair cut with no tears and let her use the cutters!!! As I'm sure you can see from the photos below it was much needed.
In other news, Mother's day is tomorrow. We are going to the local Animal Shelter and visiting with some baby kittens. It has been about 8 months since our beautiful girl Sakura passed away. Her older sister Sashimi has been overly lonely lately and we think it might be time to bring in a new friend. Wally is really enjoying his job, he's doing very well and working super hard making us all very proud of him. He will be off to Chicago for the week of the 17th. I will be taking my first dip into the pool as a working single mom and frankly I'm not looking forward to it. Thankfully, we have Wally's parents near by if I do get into a jam and my job is very flexible in regards to my afternoon hours so I will be home early most of the days that week.
We will have a mother's day special post early tomorrow, I've been working on it for a while and I plan to share it with you all bright and early. Have a wonderful weekend!
Grayson Before Grayson After
Sunday, May 3, 2015
We survived...sort of
Well our first full week full of changes and adjustments has occured. It has been a long, grueling frazzling week but we have some how survived. Wally is loving his job, despite the super early wake up and the longish train ride. He's been rocking it though, and I'm so proud of him and this new adventure.
Grayson as always, has handled everything we have thrown at him. He started a new daycare on Monday, I cried walking back to the car, he made me chase him to say goodbye because he was already too busy for me. He had his first bus ride from daycare to school. I wish I could provide some feedback from that but he's not really sharing those details yet.
We have had some bumps in the road, specifically regarding his transportation. Grayson has ABA every morning 8:30-11:30. His bus was scheduled for pickup at 11:50 for drop off to school at 12:05. The plan was that the drop off bus for the AM preschool session, would drop off everyone and then would scoop up Grayson (and only Grayson) on the way back to the school. From what we have managed to put together, this is not occurring. Based on some daycare provided accounts, they are arriving at approximately 11:35-11:40. There have been words provided by the monitor on the bus who picks up my child saying things to the effect of don't make us wait, or late or delay us. The bus has had children still on it when picking him up, meaning that they are taking him to drop off other children.
After a very stressful, tearful conversation with the woman who runs transportation for the school I discovered she's just as upset about this situation as I am (you know minus the tears). My son is doing so well with his words, but this is one of the few times I wish he had more words. I want to know what this monitor person says to him while he's on the bus. I want to know how long he's sitting on the bus before he can go into preschool. I want to know how many kids are on the bus when they pick him up and how many of them he has to sit through them getting dropped off.
My son will always handle everything better then me. I have come to terms with this. I am sure that this bus ride is super exciting for him, I'm sure he flaps and flaps his little arms off as he drives through the town of Medway. I am sure he cries out "truck, car, red, tree" and a bunch of other words to describe the items he sees on the way. However, I am willing to bet this not so nice lady isn't looking back at him and smiling, that's she's not replying to him with friendly tones and pointing out other items in the surrounding. I'm also willing to bet that she's probably not providing him any feedback at all.
This is probably a really unfair assessment to make. I am absolutely willing to admit I am judging this woman based on a few interactions she has had with my completely wonderful daycare person who I am totally biased towards. It's entirely possible that this woman is just unable to express herself properly to adults but is fantastic when it comes to children. I am just taking a guess that all of that is unlikely. Sadly, this is the life I lead. The life where anyone my child comes in contact to I have to fear how they are going to react to his size, to his lack of words, his flapping, his occasional shyness and discomfort with loud noises.
Thankfully, we have received a very promising update. Things will be changed, attitudes hopefully adjusted and we should all have a much easier Monday. I hope to have a much different report tomorrow afternoon after Wally picks him up from daycare.
Special events this week: Grayson is star of the week for his class. We are making a poster for him to share with all his friends and I will be going in on Friday to read a book during circle and hopefully share in quite a bit of the actual class time before going into the IEP meeting. Photos will be provided, though limited due to the other students in the class. Have a great week everyone!
Grayson as always, has handled everything we have thrown at him. He started a new daycare on Monday, I cried walking back to the car, he made me chase him to say goodbye because he was already too busy for me. He had his first bus ride from daycare to school. I wish I could provide some feedback from that but he's not really sharing those details yet.
We have had some bumps in the road, specifically regarding his transportation. Grayson has ABA every morning 8:30-11:30. His bus was scheduled for pickup at 11:50 for drop off to school at 12:05. The plan was that the drop off bus for the AM preschool session, would drop off everyone and then would scoop up Grayson (and only Grayson) on the way back to the school. From what we have managed to put together, this is not occurring. Based on some daycare provided accounts, they are arriving at approximately 11:35-11:40. There have been words provided by the monitor on the bus who picks up my child saying things to the effect of don't make us wait, or late or delay us. The bus has had children still on it when picking him up, meaning that they are taking him to drop off other children.
After a very stressful, tearful conversation with the woman who runs transportation for the school I discovered she's just as upset about this situation as I am (you know minus the tears). My son is doing so well with his words, but this is one of the few times I wish he had more words. I want to know what this monitor person says to him while he's on the bus. I want to know how long he's sitting on the bus before he can go into preschool. I want to know how many kids are on the bus when they pick him up and how many of them he has to sit through them getting dropped off.
My son will always handle everything better then me. I have come to terms with this. I am sure that this bus ride is super exciting for him, I'm sure he flaps and flaps his little arms off as he drives through the town of Medway. I am sure he cries out "truck, car, red, tree" and a bunch of other words to describe the items he sees on the way. However, I am willing to bet this not so nice lady isn't looking back at him and smiling, that's she's not replying to him with friendly tones and pointing out other items in the surrounding. I'm also willing to bet that she's probably not providing him any feedback at all.
This is probably a really unfair assessment to make. I am absolutely willing to admit I am judging this woman based on a few interactions she has had with my completely wonderful daycare person who I am totally biased towards. It's entirely possible that this woman is just unable to express herself properly to adults but is fantastic when it comes to children. I am just taking a guess that all of that is unlikely. Sadly, this is the life I lead. The life where anyone my child comes in contact to I have to fear how they are going to react to his size, to his lack of words, his flapping, his occasional shyness and discomfort with loud noises.
Thankfully, we have received a very promising update. Things will be changed, attitudes hopefully adjusted and we should all have a much easier Monday. I hope to have a much different report tomorrow afternoon after Wally picks him up from daycare.
Special events this week: Grayson is star of the week for his class. We are making a poster for him to share with all his friends and I will be going in on Friday to read a book during circle and hopefully share in quite a bit of the actual class time before going into the IEP meeting. Photos will be provided, though limited due to the other students in the class. Have a great week everyone!
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