ibeachalot's Diaryland Diary ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Is it April yet? What a day I had yesterday. It never fails... when Kevin is out of town, all hell breaks loose around here. We had an appointment with Jameson�s preschool yesterday. He�s reading even better than Evan is. I�m so proud of him! Jameson is anxious to start school. He was upset that he couldn�t start yesterday. Later in the day, I had to drive past the school again and he got upset all over again that we weren�t going there to stay. I can see now that dismissal time each day will be a bitch. He isn�t going to want to leave. He�ll be going Tuesdays and Thursdays from 12:45pm to 3:45pm to begin. From there, they may increase the time he goes, if he does well and likes it, which I don�t doubt he will. His IEP states that one of the things they need to work with him on is staying on task. He has a very limited attention span. They want to eventually have him stay on a task for five minutes in any acitivty. That seems like a long time for him. I hope he can do it. They also want to work with him on his speech. The specialist said he has an amazing vocabulary, but his speech is somewhat behind where it should be, although it has improved substantially since they first began testing him. He sat down and read an entire Clifford book word for word. I thought maybe he had it memorized, since we have all the Clifford books at home. The specialist then gave him a book unfamiliar to him and he read that one, too! She was stunned, as were we. It was a second grade reader! My little man is reading! Anyway... we said our goodbyes to Kevin so he could head to the airport. He should have arrived in California around 10pm or so last night, although I�ve yet to hear from him. I know he�s going to be super busy today, so I don�t expect to hear from him until after his father's service. I wish I was there, too. It seems weird that Kevin will be there with Matthew, his ex wife and the outlaws, as if they were all still a family. It was different at Christmas, when I was included, too. I bet Mack would spin in his urn if he knew Debbie was there! ROFL! I went to Wal-Mart and Target on the way home yesterday in search of a car seat for Evan. Wal-Mart didn�t have the one I wanted, so I went to Target. They had one, but not exactly the pattern I wanted. Oh well. I bought Jameson a new book bag for school and a notebook so the teachers and I can stay in constant communication. I had to do this with Evan, too, when he went to that school. It helps me know what kind of day he�s having. I looked at purses at Target, but I wish I had thought to look at Wal-Mart. They always have a good selection of them there. Target�s selection was lame. I need a new purse. All my shit falls out of the one I have because the flap doesn�t close all the way over the top. I�m a purse-a-holic. If I had the room and the money, I�d have hundreds of them! When Evan came home, I decided to go to the grocery store and get something easy for dinner. He had had a rough morning, but I knew as soon as he got off the bus that he had a rough day at school, too. He was wearing clothes from the nurse�s office, which means he wet his pants. What am I going to do with this kid? He�ll be seven years old next month and he can�t seem to get himself to the john! Wetting his pants seems to go hand in hand with bad behavior, for some reason. Despite my knowledge of this, I stupidly went to the store anyway. Big mistake. Evan asked me for a treat. I told him if he was good while we shopped, I would buy him something small at the checkout. Well, I forgot. He reminded me, quite loudly and rudely, that I hadn�t gotten him anything. I had already run my debit card through the machine, so I tried to tell him I would go back through the line and pay cash for something, but he wouldn�t let me speak. Then when Jameson tried to say something, Evan hit him upside the head. I told him, �For that, you�ve lost your treat.� He proceeded to have a rage right there in the store, something he hadn�t done in ages. He screamed, hit me, kick me, dropped down onto the floor and called me every name you can think of. Naturally, a crowd formed. I thanked the cashier and left the store, as if Evan wasn�t there. Evan came up behind me and grabbed me by the shirt. If I didn�t have a hold of the shopping cart, I would�ve fallen to the ground. He then punched me in the back and kicked me in the backs of my legs. People stood and watched, stunned. I kept on walking as if I didn�t know him. Had I issued him an ultimatum, he only would have resisted more, so walking away was my only option. I know it sounds perfectly awful for me to say, but when he gets like that, I sometimes wish he wouldn�t follow me. I sometimes wish he would just disappear. Isn�t that a horrible thing for a mother to think?! I got to the van and he was standing right out in the middle of the parking lot, refusing to move. I reminded him that a car could swerve around the corner and hit him. For a split second, I wished that would happen. He still stood there. I got everything loaded into the back and gave Evan to the count of three to get into the van or I�d leave without him. Naturally, he tested me to see how serious I was. I was serious as a heart attack, because when he didn�t come to the van, I got in and started the engine. He ran up and begged for a second chance. When I gave it to him, he ran away again. I�m getting pretty good at ignoring the onlookers. They all stood there, shaking their heads. I bet they were evenly divided between those who thought I was a rotten parent and those who thought Evan needed a good swift kick in the ass. One woman walked by him and shook her head in disgust. Surprisingly, I felt quite defensive. I wanted to say, �Hey! This is my child you�re scowling at! You have no idea what he�s going through.� No one understands. I don�t understand, either. Why is this happening? Why must Evan be this way? I didn�t ask for this shit. I wanted to be a Mommy, not a case worker for the mentally ill. Don�t tell me I was sought out because I�m special. I�m just a normal person like any of you. You�d all deal with this if it happened to you, just like I try to deal with it from day to day. Anyhow... I finally got him into the van and we left. He had another semi-rage at home and I can�t even remember what the hell that one was about. I must have taken something away from him. Oh yeah, he smarted off to me so I took away his video privileges. The kids were wild all night, fighting and refusing to do what they were told. Griffin would not go to sleep and woke up five times all night. The last three times, I let him CIO. I hate it, but I had to get some kind of rest. This always happens when I�m alone with the kids. ALWAYS! Evan was quite remorseful this morning for how he treated me. I told him to think about it often, especially the next time he feels another rage coming on. Think about how I felt in the store where the cashiers know me by name, having him physically and emotionally abuse me. Think about how stupid I�m going to feel if I ever dare to set foot in that place again. I don�t mean to heap a burden of guilt on him because I know alot of this is beyond his control. But as he gets older, he needs to start taking control of this illness and be held accountable for his actions. he needs to realize that it doesn�t affect only him. Even with his remorse, he still threw a fit about getting dressed this morning. So needless to say, I�m exhausted today. I wish I had someone I could call and say, �Hey, could you take the kids for a few hours while I do last night�s dinner dishes that are still sitting in the sink, fold the mountain of laundry in the hallway and maybe catch a wink or two of sleep?� But I�m alone. Like always. *Deep heaving sigh* I guess I better go tackle those dishes and that laundry pile. Less than three months to my trip to California and man-oh-man do I need it! 1983 tonight, I promise. I'm wearing: blue flannel jammies, still even though it's 10am I'm listening to: "You'll Be in My Heart" by Phil Collins (my song for Evan) I'm eating/drinking: lukewarm coffee 10:02 a.m. - 2003-01-09 ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
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