When we were building our house there were only a handful of houses in our neighborhood of over two hundred lots. At the time we were clearing our lot I noticed a small, spindly blackberry bush on the next lot over. I think I got four or five blackberries off it that season and by the time blackberry season came around again the bush was gone due to construction next door.
I like blackberries. I like picking them. I’m not sure why I like picking them because it’s always in hot weather and in order to protect your body from the brambles you need to wear long pants and sleeves. And while cotton only provides minimal protection, it’s better than nothing. Invariably I’d come home with pokes and scrapes but a bowl full of blackberries. And to get to the blackberries I had to travel to a location where I knew there were blackberries growing in a public place and get there before others had gotten all the berries.
So I was fairly happy to notice two years later down the hill in our back yard a blackberry bush growing. I was happy then but today I’m just annoyed by the menace. Blackberry bushes are highly invasive. It grows underground and appears meters away in the middle of the play structure no matter how much we cut it back. The bush is so fast growing my yard guys don’t even catch it in time before someone gets scratched by it, being children and not noticing it as the run and play around the yard.
I have the crew aggressively cut it back once or twice each year but it comes back more fiercely it would seem every time. I might be more amenable to the growth and expansion if there was measurable output of berries during the one month of the year the fruit is available, but this particular bush variety is the most armed and least producing type I’ve ever seem. That, and the few paltry berries we’ve been able to collect aren’t very flavorful.
I would very much like to remove the whole thing, only the bush isn’t on our property. It’s not on mine, or the other two neighbor’s properties that triangularly abut it, the bush being mostly on common property at the back of the neighborhood heading down a steep grade towards a creek. It’s property that won’t ever be maintained by the HOA unless there’s a real need so it’s more or less up to us as homeowners to decide what to do to manage it. At this point the general consensus is to keep it at bay and hope it will have a bigger crop next year. For now, I’m getting my blackberries at the farmer’s market and saving my skin.
The Big Boy Update: My son called me into the living room yesterday and said, “I have ear wax.” This was new. We don’t clean their ears much at all as they’ve never had an issue. I went and got cotton swabs and was told it was his left ear that had the wax. And he was right, it did. I checked his right ear too and it had a bit, but my son knew what he was talking about.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter was at our sitter’s house last night. She came home with Tristan and I asked her how the night went (knowing she had had a great time with the other four children who were also over there). She told me though, “it didn’t go planned as life”.
Sunday, July 2, 2017
Saturday, July 1, 2017
Maturing Beyond Her Age
My daughter’s therapist, Dhruti, recently sent us a forty-five minute audio file of the session she had with my daughter last week. She asked us to listen to it and then she’d call us. I dutifully played the whole file while getting housework done yesterday, wondering when I was going to get to the shocking or interesting bit but it never really happened. But I’ve learned by now and I knew there was more to what’s going on than I had training to understand.
A lot of discussions about food was had and when it was too late to have cookies at night. They played night time and discussions about being asleep and snoring were had and my daughter had them taking turns being the mommy and the child. At one point my daughter did ask Dhruti to cook her up and eat her. She wanted to have various parts of her body eaten up and giggled as it happened—was this the telling part? I really didn’t know.
Then Dhruti and I got on the phone and the good news is my daughter is processing everything she’s going through well. She’s working through it in her mind and in so doing she’s pushing boundaries, but she’s pushing boundaries knowing there will be consequences. The interesting thing is, she’s facing the consequences willingly.
My daughter wants to be nurtured, but she also wants to take care of people too, that’s just in her nature—something we see at home all the time as she does things out of kindness to help her brother or her friends as well as my husband and me.
The bottom line is all she’s going through and having to endure is maturing her beyond her years, but as difficult as that might sound, she’s doing it with grace.
The Big Boy Update: My son was mad. MAD, that we were talking when he was trying to focus on his work. He said out loud to the entire room, “stop talking our I’ll uppercut you.”
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter found something of mine and brought it to me yesterday. She was so excited about finding it she said after I gratefully accepted the hair band, “I really want to go back in time and do it all again, so could I have your hair bow back?” I gave it back and we reenacted the scene three more times with her being just as excited each iteration.
A lot of discussions about food was had and when it was too late to have cookies at night. They played night time and discussions about being asleep and snoring were had and my daughter had them taking turns being the mommy and the child. At one point my daughter did ask Dhruti to cook her up and eat her. She wanted to have various parts of her body eaten up and giggled as it happened—was this the telling part? I really didn’t know.
Then Dhruti and I got on the phone and the good news is my daughter is processing everything she’s going through well. She’s working through it in her mind and in so doing she’s pushing boundaries, but she’s pushing boundaries knowing there will be consequences. The interesting thing is, she’s facing the consequences willingly.
My daughter wants to be nurtured, but she also wants to take care of people too, that’s just in her nature—something we see at home all the time as she does things out of kindness to help her brother or her friends as well as my husband and me.
The bottom line is all she’s going through and having to endure is maturing her beyond her years, but as difficult as that might sound, she’s doing it with grace.
The Big Boy Update: My son was mad. MAD, that we were talking when he was trying to focus on his work. He said out loud to the entire room, “stop talking our I’ll uppercut you.”
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter found something of mine and brought it to me yesterday. She was so excited about finding it she said after I gratefully accepted the hair band, “I really want to go back in time and do it all again, so could I have your hair bow back?” I gave it back and we reenacted the scene three more times with her being just as excited each iteration.
Friday, June 30, 2017
My Eyes
This post is about eyes, but not my daughter’s for a change. I’ve had a lot done to my eyes, interestingly enough some of the same things my daughter has had done to hers, only in my case it was elective, done to improve my vision.
In 2013 I looked into improving my vision with LASIK but found out I wasn’t a good candidate because my corneas were too flat. What could be done was something called a “Clear Lens Exchange” that would not only improve my vision, it would arrest the progressing need for reading glasses due to hardening lenses we experience as adults, known as presbyopia.
The surgery involved removing my natural lenses and replacing them with artificial ones. It’s a very common surgery but most people know it by a different name—cataract surgery. A cataract isn’t something you grow, it’s something that becomes. It’s your natural lens but over time it’s clouded and the term used to describe the lens at that point is a cataract. In my case, I didn’t have clouded lenses so instead of cataract surgery (by name), I had “Clear Lens Exchange” surgery, which is the exact same surgery, only my lenses were fine other than the hardening, making it more difficult for me to focus and see some near and far distances.
The surgery on the left and right eyes were successful although some tweaks had to be done afterwards. The left lens is great for close vision but isn’t perfect at distance. The right lens is stellar at distance but can be annoying close up. And all that means my brain has to deal with one fuzzy image and one clear image when I’m looking at things close up. For distance my brain relies more on my right eye and uses the left eye for depth perception.
In the adjustments following surgery I had AK (to correct for the astigmatism in both eyes) LASIK in my right eye to fine tune the visual range and PRK in my left eye to adjust my focal length because the artificial lens didn’t settle in the position the doctor had targeted.
So both my daughter and I have had our natural lenses removed. She doesn’t have artificial ones implanted for a number of reasons due to her age and the complexity and state of her eyes. Next I had something done called a YAG Capsulotomy. The lens capsule that holds the natural lens in place in the eye is thin and crumples somewhat like cellophane once the artificial lens is implanted—artificial lenses being small, mechanical devices that take up far less space in the lens capsule than the natural lens.
The YAG capsulotomy is simply a laser that targets the lens capsule in the area of your field of vision and blows a hole in the capsule, affording you a clear, unobstructed or obscured line of sight. It’s an easy procedure in the office that takes five minutes with no discomfort. I literally only heard the laser pop and felt nothing.
My daughter has also had her lens capsules opened in both the front and the back. Her openings have been due to the lens removal and subsequent scar tissue removal in one eye. So we’re the same there. The only difference is I can see well without glasses and she can’t see at all.
And I’m enormously thankful for the vision I have, but it did seem to be getting to be a worse offset with the left and right. I noticed it most when reading to the children at night before bed. Since it had been over four years, I thought it might be time to go for a reevaluation with my eye surgeon.
And here’s what I found out. I have 20/15 distance vision, which is pretty nice—I had no complaints there. But my near vision was still 20/30, with the right eye being somewhat better were it not dragged down by the left. The near vision can be corrected, but there’s a catch—I would have to sacrifice the distance vision to bring the near vision in line with the other eye, that’s just how it works, the lenses can only do so much.
The doctor told me I had achieved optimal results but I had another option (one I had known about and had been doing for a bit before the appointment). I could work on the muscles of my left eye. Once the artificial lens in in place, there is no time limit on when you can work and develop the eye muscles. Just like you can get in shape by exercising in general at any age. There’s a chance I can bring the left eye closer in line with the right, mitigating some of the uncomfortableness reading and doing closeup work.
All I have to do is patch the right eye (or keep it shut) and do something that will push the limits of the focal capabilities of the left eye. So I’ve been working on it a bit each day. Hopefully I’ll see some improvement soon. For instance, as I type this I’m using only my left eye and while I can read everything, it’s not crisp. But I can tell my eye muscles are trying like fury to bring it into focus.
So if you see me looking like a pirate or think I’m doing a really long wink at you, I’m probably just working on my vision.
The Big Boy Update: At dinner my son declared, “I’m a dad that hasn’t had children yet.”
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter wanted to make a birthday present for our adult friend, Nitin, tonight as we’re celebrating his birthday at Movie Night. She didn’t tell me her plan and I think it evolved as we worked but she taped two pieces of paper together, drew a lot of things on it and had me write a birthday message to Nitin. Then she wanted to roll the two sheets into a cylinder and tape it. Her next idea was to cut a circle and tape it to the bottom of the cylinder. So I had to find my circle cutter because I can’t handle inaccurate cutting, but my OCD on things like that would be best addressed in another blog post. Anyway, circle cutter found and we had a red paper circle the same diameter as her cylinder. We taped it on and then she went to the candy bowl and put candy in it for Nitin. I’m not entirely sure how Nitin will be able to read his card, but it’s a pretty creative present from a five-year-old.
In 2013 I looked into improving my vision with LASIK but found out I wasn’t a good candidate because my corneas were too flat. What could be done was something called a “Clear Lens Exchange” that would not only improve my vision, it would arrest the progressing need for reading glasses due to hardening lenses we experience as adults, known as presbyopia.
The surgery involved removing my natural lenses and replacing them with artificial ones. It’s a very common surgery but most people know it by a different name—cataract surgery. A cataract isn’t something you grow, it’s something that becomes. It’s your natural lens but over time it’s clouded and the term used to describe the lens at that point is a cataract. In my case, I didn’t have clouded lenses so instead of cataract surgery (by name), I had “Clear Lens Exchange” surgery, which is the exact same surgery, only my lenses were fine other than the hardening, making it more difficult for me to focus and see some near and far distances.
The surgery on the left and right eyes were successful although some tweaks had to be done afterwards. The left lens is great for close vision but isn’t perfect at distance. The right lens is stellar at distance but can be annoying close up. And all that means my brain has to deal with one fuzzy image and one clear image when I’m looking at things close up. For distance my brain relies more on my right eye and uses the left eye for depth perception.
In the adjustments following surgery I had AK (to correct for the astigmatism in both eyes) LASIK in my right eye to fine tune the visual range and PRK in my left eye to adjust my focal length because the artificial lens didn’t settle in the position the doctor had targeted.
So both my daughter and I have had our natural lenses removed. She doesn’t have artificial ones implanted for a number of reasons due to her age and the complexity and state of her eyes. Next I had something done called a YAG Capsulotomy. The lens capsule that holds the natural lens in place in the eye is thin and crumples somewhat like cellophane once the artificial lens is implanted—artificial lenses being small, mechanical devices that take up far less space in the lens capsule than the natural lens.
The YAG capsulotomy is simply a laser that targets the lens capsule in the area of your field of vision and blows a hole in the capsule, affording you a clear, unobstructed or obscured line of sight. It’s an easy procedure in the office that takes five minutes with no discomfort. I literally only heard the laser pop and felt nothing.
My daughter has also had her lens capsules opened in both the front and the back. Her openings have been due to the lens removal and subsequent scar tissue removal in one eye. So we’re the same there. The only difference is I can see well without glasses and she can’t see at all.
And I’m enormously thankful for the vision I have, but it did seem to be getting to be a worse offset with the left and right. I noticed it most when reading to the children at night before bed. Since it had been over four years, I thought it might be time to go for a reevaluation with my eye surgeon.
And here’s what I found out. I have 20/15 distance vision, which is pretty nice—I had no complaints there. But my near vision was still 20/30, with the right eye being somewhat better were it not dragged down by the left. The near vision can be corrected, but there’s a catch—I would have to sacrifice the distance vision to bring the near vision in line with the other eye, that’s just how it works, the lenses can only do so much.
The doctor told me I had achieved optimal results but I had another option (one I had known about and had been doing for a bit before the appointment). I could work on the muscles of my left eye. Once the artificial lens in in place, there is no time limit on when you can work and develop the eye muscles. Just like you can get in shape by exercising in general at any age. There’s a chance I can bring the left eye closer in line with the right, mitigating some of the uncomfortableness reading and doing closeup work.
All I have to do is patch the right eye (or keep it shut) and do something that will push the limits of the focal capabilities of the left eye. So I’ve been working on it a bit each day. Hopefully I’ll see some improvement soon. For instance, as I type this I’m using only my left eye and while I can read everything, it’s not crisp. But I can tell my eye muscles are trying like fury to bring it into focus.
So if you see me looking like a pirate or think I’m doing a really long wink at you, I’m probably just working on my vision.
The Big Boy Update: At dinner my son declared, “I’m a dad that hasn’t had children yet.”
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter wanted to make a birthday present for our adult friend, Nitin, tonight as we’re celebrating his birthday at Movie Night. She didn’t tell me her plan and I think it evolved as we worked but she taped two pieces of paper together, drew a lot of things on it and had me write a birthday message to Nitin. Then she wanted to roll the two sheets into a cylinder and tape it. Her next idea was to cut a circle and tape it to the bottom of the cylinder. So I had to find my circle cutter because I can’t handle inaccurate cutting, but my OCD on things like that would be best addressed in another blog post. Anyway, circle cutter found and we had a red paper circle the same diameter as her cylinder. We taped it on and then she went to the candy bowl and put candy in it for Nitin. I’m not entirely sure how Nitin will be able to read his card, but it’s a pretty creative present from a five-year-old.
Thursday, June 29, 2017
The Most Joyous Thing
I think I may have mentioned before we have a purple yoga ball in the house. I don’t do yoga. That’s not to say I haven’t tried, it wasn’t for me, too much holding still. And here’s the think about holding still—it’s hard. Especially in the positions the yoga instructor tells us we’re suppose to be in. At any rate, my children love the purple ball.
It was an afterthought of a Christmas present from Santa on account of Santa only brings the children one gift a piece and the ones my children were getting this past Christmas were rather small in size. So throw in a five dollar yoga ball from China, blown up large beside the tree and surely it would be a happy Christmas morning.
Today, six months later, I don’t remember what they got as presents from Santa but that purple ball is still a big item in our house. It has a “home” beside the couch in the living room although it makes its rounds across all three floors of our house. My daughter is the ball’s biggest fan, having learned to do some impressive bouncing routines on it utilizing other pieces of furniture and scaring most adults in the vicinity who watch her when she does.
My husband sent me a text two days ago with the words, “I think the purple ball is the most joyous thing in the house” referring to my daughter’s infatuation with the ball.
Only now there is trouble brewing because my son has recently decided he wants to have time with the purple ball too. Mind you, he’s never cared about it before, but perhaps since it looks so very fun with my daughter launching her feet into the air, he wants a turn too. And this has lowered the overall joy of the purple ball, mostly because squabbling has arisen around it.
This may well be the next iteration of “the favorite seat”. My husband and I are already working on ideas to help the children come up with ways to manage time with the purple ball that doesn’t involve hitting, yelling or crying. We’ll see how well we’ve fared in a week after we count the bruises.
The Big Boy Update: My son got a card from one of his teachers thanking him for his end of year gift. As he opened the laser cut, multi-colored card he exclaimed, “what a work of art!”
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: At dinner last night my daughter asked, “who’s at the head of the table” since she couldn’t see who was sitting where. Her following question was a surprise but I suppose followed logically, “well, then who’s the armpit of the table?” My husband explained that he and I were sitting across from each other so he supposed we’d be the armpits. My son was a step ahead though and said, “no, daddy and mommy would be the arms of the table. The armpits would be the next level down.”
It was an afterthought of a Christmas present from Santa on account of Santa only brings the children one gift a piece and the ones my children were getting this past Christmas were rather small in size. So throw in a five dollar yoga ball from China, blown up large beside the tree and surely it would be a happy Christmas morning.
Today, six months later, I don’t remember what they got as presents from Santa but that purple ball is still a big item in our house. It has a “home” beside the couch in the living room although it makes its rounds across all three floors of our house. My daughter is the ball’s biggest fan, having learned to do some impressive bouncing routines on it utilizing other pieces of furniture and scaring most adults in the vicinity who watch her when she does.
My husband sent me a text two days ago with the words, “I think the purple ball is the most joyous thing in the house” referring to my daughter’s infatuation with the ball.
Only now there is trouble brewing because my son has recently decided he wants to have time with the purple ball too. Mind you, he’s never cared about it before, but perhaps since it looks so very fun with my daughter launching her feet into the air, he wants a turn too. And this has lowered the overall joy of the purple ball, mostly because squabbling has arisen around it.
This may well be the next iteration of “the favorite seat”. My husband and I are already working on ideas to help the children come up with ways to manage time with the purple ball that doesn’t involve hitting, yelling or crying. We’ll see how well we’ve fared in a week after we count the bruises.
The Big Boy Update: My son got a card from one of his teachers thanking him for his end of year gift. As he opened the laser cut, multi-colored card he exclaimed, “what a work of art!”
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: At dinner last night my daughter asked, “who’s at the head of the table” since she couldn’t see who was sitting where. Her following question was a surprise but I suppose followed logically, “well, then who’s the armpit of the table?” My husband explained that he and I were sitting across from each other so he supposed we’d be the armpits. My son was a step ahead though and said, “no, daddy and mommy would be the arms of the table. The armpits would be the next level down.”
Wednesday, June 28, 2017
So Happy To Swim
My daughter hasn’t been able to get her head (well eyes) wet for weeks now due to the surgeries she’s had on both eyes. She’s been better about keeping her eyes dry more so than we have. On the few incidences where she got wet, for instance in our friend’s pool in Maryland, she burst into tears and got out of the pool because she was so upset.
In the bath she’s been the same little diligent child she always is. Recently she’s wanted to wash her own hair and has gotten pretty good at it. As she was leaning back in the tub to rinse last night I told her, “you didn’t get the very top part near your forehead”. I was surprised when she said, “but I can’t get my eyes wet.”
I told her there was good news, she could now get her head wet and could even go under water. There was this serenely happy look that came over her face—the face of my child who loves nothing more than spending time underwater in the pool. She asked me again to make sure she’d heard me right and then asked again if it was okay to go under in the tub. “Go ahead”, I said, and she dove under without another word.
Getting her out of the tub after that was a challenge because she wanted to stay under water and see how many seconds she could last and could we please count again to see if she could beat her record. Today our sitter was picking up the children and I suggested the pool because we were cleared for swimming.
My daughter was at the pool until well past dinner time, happily swimming and going under water as much as she pleased. It’s almost the end of June, she’s waited a long time to swim, hopefully she can make up for missed time in the next few weeks before we go back to Detroit for potentially more surgery.
The Big Boy Update: My son and his friend set up some NinjaGo Lego characters in a certain configuration. It looked like a little Ninja army aligned for battle. My son asked me to come in and take some pictures. Then he wanted dad to see. But when we came downstairs instead of suggesting I show the picture he said to his father instead, “we have a picture but I’d rather you see it in person. Those pictures are just to remember it.”
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter had lost one of her arm muffs the other day. She had all four in her hands when she was going up the stairs but at the top, only three remained. I told her I’d help her find the missing muff, heading back in the direction we’d come. She yelled out in a very worried voice, “go look everywhere!”
In the bath she’s been the same little diligent child she always is. Recently she’s wanted to wash her own hair and has gotten pretty good at it. As she was leaning back in the tub to rinse last night I told her, “you didn’t get the very top part near your forehead”. I was surprised when she said, “but I can’t get my eyes wet.”
I told her there was good news, she could now get her head wet and could even go under water. There was this serenely happy look that came over her face—the face of my child who loves nothing more than spending time underwater in the pool. She asked me again to make sure she’d heard me right and then asked again if it was okay to go under in the tub. “Go ahead”, I said, and she dove under without another word.
Getting her out of the tub after that was a challenge because she wanted to stay under water and see how many seconds she could last and could we please count again to see if she could beat her record. Today our sitter was picking up the children and I suggested the pool because we were cleared for swimming.
My daughter was at the pool until well past dinner time, happily swimming and going under water as much as she pleased. It’s almost the end of June, she’s waited a long time to swim, hopefully she can make up for missed time in the next few weeks before we go back to Detroit for potentially more surgery.
The Big Boy Update: My son and his friend set up some NinjaGo Lego characters in a certain configuration. It looked like a little Ninja army aligned for battle. My son asked me to come in and take some pictures. Then he wanted dad to see. But when we came downstairs instead of suggesting I show the picture he said to his father instead, “we have a picture but I’d rather you see it in person. Those pictures are just to remember it.”
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: My daughter had lost one of her arm muffs the other day. She had all four in her hands when she was going up the stairs but at the top, only three remained. I told her I’d help her find the missing muff, heading back in the direction we’d come. She yelled out in a very worried voice, “go look everywhere!”
Tuesday, June 27, 2017
I Should Have Known Better
I made a mistake with my son today. I didn’t realize it until it was too late at which point I was doing damage control and apologizing to my husband for the error in judgement. In hindsight, knowing my son’s temperament it should have been obvious, but that’s what hindsight is all about, isn’t it?
My son has been in need of new shoes for a while. We weren’t really paying attention to them mostly because he wasn’t complaining and also because children wear out shoes so quickly it seemed like we’d just bought him his last pair only a few months before. He has two pair of shoes, one pair was older and had a velcro detachment problem in which the velcro was separating from the backing, causing the shoe not to remain closed—on both feet.
The other, newer pair was having a sole problem. Sections of the sole kept coming off, which wasn’t a real problem because he wasn’t going to wear out the shoes to the point he couldn’t wear them before he grew out of them, but it was getting a bit extreme and my husband decided to bring out the gorilla glue and duct tape yesterday to try and fix them temporarily until we could get him to the store to be measured and new shoes bought.
Today after camp while I was with my daughter at her Orientation and Mobility session with Jane, my husband took my son to the shoe store. When we got home my son smiled and asked if I could tell what was different about him. I pretended it was his hair, maybe his shirt, wait a minute—did he have on new blue and grey shoes?
He was happy running around in his shoes for the next few hours and that’s when I made the mistake. I asked him if he wanted to throw away the shoes that were frustrating him because they wouldn’t velcro closed? He wasn’t sure but decided the best thing to do was put them in the very large trash bin in the garage.
Great, shoes in the trash, my son participated and that’s when it all went wrong. My son realized something he loved was now gone. GONE. He was upset. He wanted them back. He was in the garage trying to climb into the dirty trash bin with the lid over his head to get them back. He was crying; he was angry; he was bereft. And we told him in the kindest of terms (and then in more firm terms) he wasn’t going to be pulling them out of the trash can and neither were we.
He might be over it now, but that’s only because he’s asleep. He was so mad at one point he was throwing his new shoes around, saying he hated them. I hope he’s okay in the morning and has forgotten about his old, beat up, non-functional shoes.
The Big Boy Tiny Girl Boat Conversation: This morning in the car my son asked his sister, “do all boats go on water?” She thought for a second and replied, “I think so, unless they’re parked on land.” He refined his question to see if he could trick her by asking, “but do all boats move on water?” She thought about this and told him, “said sailboats need wind to move.” This was apparently the right answer because he told her, “you’re correct.”
My son has been in need of new shoes for a while. We weren’t really paying attention to them mostly because he wasn’t complaining and also because children wear out shoes so quickly it seemed like we’d just bought him his last pair only a few months before. He has two pair of shoes, one pair was older and had a velcro detachment problem in which the velcro was separating from the backing, causing the shoe not to remain closed—on both feet.
The other, newer pair was having a sole problem. Sections of the sole kept coming off, which wasn’t a real problem because he wasn’t going to wear out the shoes to the point he couldn’t wear them before he grew out of them, but it was getting a bit extreme and my husband decided to bring out the gorilla glue and duct tape yesterday to try and fix them temporarily until we could get him to the store to be measured and new shoes bought.
Today after camp while I was with my daughter at her Orientation and Mobility session with Jane, my husband took my son to the shoe store. When we got home my son smiled and asked if I could tell what was different about him. I pretended it was his hair, maybe his shirt, wait a minute—did he have on new blue and grey shoes?
He was happy running around in his shoes for the next few hours and that’s when I made the mistake. I asked him if he wanted to throw away the shoes that were frustrating him because they wouldn’t velcro closed? He wasn’t sure but decided the best thing to do was put them in the very large trash bin in the garage.
Great, shoes in the trash, my son participated and that’s when it all went wrong. My son realized something he loved was now gone. GONE. He was upset. He wanted them back. He was in the garage trying to climb into the dirty trash bin with the lid over his head to get them back. He was crying; he was angry; he was bereft. And we told him in the kindest of terms (and then in more firm terms) he wasn’t going to be pulling them out of the trash can and neither were we.
He might be over it now, but that’s only because he’s asleep. He was so mad at one point he was throwing his new shoes around, saying he hated them. I hope he’s okay in the morning and has forgotten about his old, beat up, non-functional shoes.
The Big Boy Tiny Girl Boat Conversation: This morning in the car my son asked his sister, “do all boats go on water?” She thought for a second and replied, “I think so, unless they’re parked on land.” He refined his question to see if he could trick her by asking, “but do all boats move on water?” She thought about this and told him, “said sailboats need wind to move.” This was apparently the right answer because he told her, “you’re correct.”
Monday, June 26, 2017
Eating With a Fork
My daughter is lost in a land of near blindness, which is a change from what she was able to see two months ago. She’s regained a small fraction of the small fraction of sight she had and we’re grateful for that because she doesn’t bump into things as much as she did before, but it’s still hard for her to get around.
One of the things she started doing that was new when she lost complete sight was rebelling when eating her food. She couldn’t see anything, including where the bowl was. When she found the bowl she couldn’t figure out where the food was in the bowl or how much was on her spoon or fork. To sum up, it was hard to get the food in her mouth.
Her play therapist told us to put constraints on her, to exert control on her environment because she was feeling so out of control. Instead of this being a punishment, this would help her. We were told to tell her if she wasn’t willing to use the fork to eat her food (eating with her hands not allowed) then we could either feed her or she could wait to eat until she was ready.
I thought this would be tough for her, but it was the right advice because she understood it, even if she didn’t like it. It’s made her more willing to listen to us as we give her advice on how to use a fork (a tricker thing to do than you might think since you’ve been doing it for so long). Stabbing just doesn’t capture the food. You need to stab and then push in an arc against the bottom of the bowl into the side to make sure you get good purchase on the food.
My daughter still doesn’t want to always eat with a fork, but since we starting requiring her to use one correctly, she’s gotten a lot better at it.
The Big Boy Update: My son found a lightbulb my husband had sitting out on the counter to be replaced this morning. He put it over the top of his head and said, “if you see a lightbulb, do this and say, ‘I have an idea’”.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: I bought some little arm muffs from China and when they arrived in the mail I gave them to my daughter. They’re basically loose furry wrist bands, two in black and two in white. A lot of times things you think will be exciting to you child turn out to not be and then things you think they won’t care about they can’t put down. I had those little furry muffs for several months and didn’t give them to her until last week. She’s worn them around all day and even to bed, loving them and being particularly interested in only wearing the white on her wrists and the black on her ankles. I only wish she could tell the colors herself when she’s putting them on.
One of the things she started doing that was new when she lost complete sight was rebelling when eating her food. She couldn’t see anything, including where the bowl was. When she found the bowl she couldn’t figure out where the food was in the bowl or how much was on her spoon or fork. To sum up, it was hard to get the food in her mouth.
Her play therapist told us to put constraints on her, to exert control on her environment because she was feeling so out of control. Instead of this being a punishment, this would help her. We were told to tell her if she wasn’t willing to use the fork to eat her food (eating with her hands not allowed) then we could either feed her or she could wait to eat until she was ready.
I thought this would be tough for her, but it was the right advice because she understood it, even if she didn’t like it. It’s made her more willing to listen to us as we give her advice on how to use a fork (a tricker thing to do than you might think since you’ve been doing it for so long). Stabbing just doesn’t capture the food. You need to stab and then push in an arc against the bottom of the bowl into the side to make sure you get good purchase on the food.
My daughter still doesn’t want to always eat with a fork, but since we starting requiring her to use one correctly, she’s gotten a lot better at it.
The Big Boy Update: My son found a lightbulb my husband had sitting out on the counter to be replaced this morning. He put it over the top of his head and said, “if you see a lightbulb, do this and say, ‘I have an idea’”.
The Tiny Girl Chronicles: I bought some little arm muffs from China and when they arrived in the mail I gave them to my daughter. They’re basically loose furry wrist bands, two in black and two in white. A lot of times things you think will be exciting to you child turn out to not be and then things you think they won’t care about they can’t put down. I had those little furry muffs for several months and didn’t give them to her until last week. She’s worn them around all day and even to bed, loving them and being particularly interested in only wearing the white on her wrists and the black on her ankles. I only wish she could tell the colors herself when she’s putting them on.
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