I didn't post this last night. I fell asleep after having a very rough time with my children. My husband and I are trying to figure out some things because we're getting behaviors consistently we don't like. The reasons they're showing up with my son and daughter are different, but they need to be addressed. I lost my temper badly at them and did a good bit of yelling. Strange to say it, but it was productive yelling—they heard me finally, they understood why I'm so frustrated and get so angry—and they want to do better. We're working on how we can, as a family, foster better behavior, more kindness, less bickering, less defiance, and basically better relationships between all of us.
That being said, I was so mentally frustrated when my husband got home from work. I told him he was up and I lay down on the bed—and promptly fell asleep around six o'clock. He gave them baths after dinner and got them to bed without me waking up, which must have meant I was tired because it happened all around me.
Let me back up to earlier in the day though. I had posted that I was hypotensive because of a medication I'm taking and wasn't able to run. I planned on doing an experiment to see if I could have a few hours window when the drug wasn't active to run and hopefully have normal blood pressure.
Yesterday was the test, and the good news is within that short running window, I can run unimpeeded. I was able to run six miles yesterday without much tiredness or effort. It's a huge relief. I can train for the half marathon in November and not only that, I'm about half-way there in my training, meaning I haven't lost all my cardiovascular health and my muscles remembered how to run. This is excellent news since I think I've only run twice since November of last year.
I was out with Aunt Margaret, who is training for the full marathon in November. She and I ran in the large wooded park across from my neighborhood up until the point I needed to turn back and head home. She continued towards "The Hateful Route," a very hilly part of the trails with switchbacks and rapid elevation changes (otherwise known as hills) while I went back the other direction, which also has hills, they're just kinder ones.
I had gotten almost back to the water station when I saw a gentleman walking with a blind cane. I stopped and introduced myself, saying my seven-year-old was blind and did he find walking in the park safe and did he think my daughter would like it.
It was mostly a way to begin a conversation with someone who is blind, I wasn't entirely sure what my motivation was in talking to him other than here was a blind person, walking alone with his cane in the park with bicycles, runners, dog walkers and horses passing all around him. I was interested in his experience and if he had any advice.
He said he thought walking in the park was not only doable, but it was also cathartic to him, the sounds of nature all around him. He not only walked the larger bike and bridle paths, he took the more difficult and narrow trails as well, although he said as his vision continued to decline (he has a three degree angle of fuzzy sight left in one eye only) he had done a good bit of falling and had to learn to be more cautious.
He said he would love to meet my daughter and me one day and walk together. I got my phone out and messaged William with my contact information. I got home and told my daughter about the new friend I had made. I had mentioned to him how she was in denial that she was blind. He has retinitis pigmentosa, a progressive disease that has slowly robbed him of his vision since his twenties. He said he understood that, even though he's retired now and has been dealing with the vision loss for decades, he's still in denial that he's blind.
We messaged later about a walking date in early October when my daughter is tracked out of school. I told her he was blind but loved to do art and perhaps we could walk and talk about the art they each like to do. I have to approach things carefully with her, so she doesn't think we're doing something simply because she's blind. Fortunately, she was receptive to the idea. We'll be walking with our new friend William in October. I'll let you know how it goes and what we learn. I am so glad I stopped to say hello.
The Big Boy Update: My son has had a lot of screen time this weekend. We've had things we did, but my husband and I have been busy, and it's easy to let him watch television (YouTube) or play games so we can get things done and do things with his sister. We don't like it when we let this happen. He loves it, but he needs to do other things. His friends are back now so this week he'll be outside a lot more. Hopefully, it won't be so hot.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter is all about books. Audiobooks, braille books, books being read to her. I think she's in the middle of three books at once right now. I'm so glad she's gotten interested in books given that her vision is so minimal she can't use the iPad for anything other than an audio source.
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