My Mum,

 

I’ve been meaning to write a blog post about my Mum for some time.  Finally getting around to it.  As you can see from the photos above she is lip-smackingly gorgeous!  Obviously that’s where I get my good looks from!!

My Mum has been wonderful to us lately. In fact, she’s always been wonderful, but lately we have really noticed it.  She is a pillar of strength; always there when we need her. The last few months she has taken my kids for me so that I can have a break, she has babysat for me, she has taken the kids to the zoo and the aquarium, all so that I can have a break from them – and they can have a break from me. I don’t know what I would have done without her.  She has baked with the kids and left my fridge full of yummy food on numerous occasions.

And to top if off she has allowed Marty to move into her house, without any question of how long he can stay. She has housed and fed him, been there for him, and generally mothered him.  Without her the last few months would have been unbearable. And so I am eternally grateful to my Mum for being the strongest woman I know, and one of the most selfless people too.  She genuinely cares about her family, and always thinks of others first. She is a woman I aspire to be and I hope she knows how much I love and respect her.

Back to school

Wow! Barney is like a new boy! Anyone who reads regularly will remember the trouble he had last year at school. At the worst point it was taking me three hours to get him into class. The very worst day ever resulted in a horrific situation where he threw himself at the classroom doors and window - a very upsetting experience for him, myself and the other children in his class, which resulted in his teacher crying at one point.

So as you can imagine I was dreading the new school year. Barney started P3 last week. His class is in a different part of the school, his morning routine has totally changed. Instead of taking him into school late and sitting in the staff room with him until he was ready to go in, I am now taking him directly into the classroom ten minutes before the other children arrive. We put his timer on, sit and read a story and then I leave as the children come in.

I can not believe how well Barney is doing! He hasn't shed a single tear. He hasn't panicked. He has been brave when he felt scared. Basically he is doing far better than I ever imagined possible! I am so proud, and so releived. The school situation last year resulted in him being medicated and was a really worrying time. This new Barney is just doing wonderfully.

I don't know if it is because he is a little older, or because of all the therapy, or the medication. Or even because there is less stress in the house now that his Dad is living elsewhere. But whatever it is (perhaps a combination of all the above) it is working wonders. And I am so, so, happy about it. I hope it lasts. Well done little Barney.... Mummy is once again, so proud.

Crashing back down to earth

I’ve come crashing back down to earth today with a very sudden, solid thump.  I shouldn’t complain as I’ve had a brilliant week. Marty took the kids for two days, and then my fearless mother took them for three days. My wee sis and her hubbie took the older two camping at the weekend as well. So I had a true break from the stress of daily life.  And I enjoyed it thoroughly. I ate and drank far too much, did far too little, did almost no housework what so ever, and met up with friends every single day.  I am now totally broke, suffering physically from so much neglect, and shattered! But a different kind of shattered to the norm.  Ahh yes, it was good.

I really enjoyed the chance to spend more time with friends, and to cultivate some newer friendships with people who I hope will remain lifelong friends.

It was wonderful to get the kids back today. I’ve had more cuddles from Rosie today than ever before, and she’s been so happy to be home.  I do really miss my littluns when they’re not here.  But at the same time, I now feel really down. The impending doom of the new school year starting next week.  Badgers final GCSE year, Barney’s un-doubtable daily panic attacks as I try to get him into school. The monotony of every day routine and school life all over again.  I’m really not looking forward to it. And this year I am doing it all alone.  I know it will be ok, but right now I just feel like running away.

I’ve been thinking lately about where to go with life now. I have my nutritional qualification now. The plan was for me to pursue that this year and get my business off the ground, whilst Marty took care of the kids and house. But that can’t happen now. So what do I do? Just sit about being Mum and watching life speed on without me?  I’ve realised now that I have absolutely nothing here in Banbridge. No job, no husband, no friends, no reason for being here – apart from my house and the kids who have schools and friends here. I have friends but not one of them lives in Banbridge. I don’t know. Half of me is thinking about selling this big house, giving Marty his half of the money and just moving on. Moving away. Expecting nothing from him and being free. 

I probably just need a good sleep.

Proud Mummy Alert!

I was so proud of Barney this week. He attended a summer scheme especially for kids on the spectrum. His therapist phoned to say there was a place on it and she felt it would be really beneficial for him. The poor kid was a nervous wreck. A new situation, new people, the unknown - an Aspie nightmare.

I convinced him to give it a try as I know theres not a hope in hell of him attending a regular summer scheme, and I thought mixing with some other kids who think like him might help him. He only gets to attend twice before school starts. The scheme has just 4 children in it, so it's pretty intense. Four kids and six adults! That's some ratio! When he found out there would only be three other kids he felt better about going, but when he walked in and saw all those adults he freaked out. He was very upset for 5 minutes or so but then F (his therapist) and I managed to persuade him to go in, with his timer, for 5 minutes at a time, whilst I sat in the kitchen.

I was so proud of him for giving it a go. After 5 minutes he was having the time of his life! I could hear him above all the other children, laughing and giggling. All the kids helped make him a Spongebob scene to get settled in, as Spongebob is one of his favourite things.

Each child is making a huge collage of themselves. They drew around the kids on a big sheet of paper and are filling in the outline with photos, art work and various different activities. Next week he will get to bring this life size montage home with him. He can't wait to go back.

Since he was so brave, and I was so proud, I bought a huge chocolate cake to celebrate :) This made him very happy. He came out of the summer scheme saying "Mum, those kids all seemed normal to me!" And so I was able to say that yes kids with autism are just like everyone else in lots of ways, and that autism is only a little part of them.

Girl Friends

I've been thinking lately about how lucky I am to have made some absolutely fabulous friends over the last few years, and to have kept some amazing women in my life since childhood. I was brought up not to treasure friends and often remember the 'church' subtly trying to discourage friendships outside of the fellowship. But despite their negative inflluences I always treasured every friend I have ever made. I think I am a good friend, and I value my friends with all my heart. When leaving the 'church' we left behind 90% of the people we had grown up with, had social lives with and were literally cast out as some sort of leper.

So, although it's not a long blog post, I just wanted to say a huge thankyou to the women in my life, who have been a tower or strength to me over the last 3 years (and beyond for some). I treasure each of you girls with my whole heart. Each one of you offers different qualities, opinions, ideas and laughs. Some of you do coffee with me and let me moan about school issues and sleepless nights. Some of you have listened to me for literally hours whilst I've poured my heart out to you. Some of you offer me fun, distraction and wonderfully happy times. Whatever you offer to me, I hope I give back something of value to you.

So to each woman pictured below, I want to say that I love each of you and am forever grateful to have known you. May we all be lifelong friends and never lose touch.

4th August 2010. Emilys first real walk. She has taken about 3 steps before - for chocolate. But this was her first proper walk :) Excuse the cute, dimpled bare bottom.

No Surprise

Every time I listen to this song I end up in floods of tears. But yet I keep listening. It feels good to let it out. I've been coping totally alone for about 3 months now and am mostly fine. I'd say I'm doing really well actually, considering. But when I heard this song and read the lyrics it was as if someone had totally epitomised everything that I've been unable to say.

Don't get me wrong. I think ours has been the most peaceful, respectful breakup that I've ever known. But still, 16 years have passed by. There are bound to be some sad feelings. And at the moment I really feel very sad. I'm finding it hard mostly because I seem to be the only one looking after the kids the majority of the time. And anyone who's spent a day in my mad house has probaly been happy for peace and quiet at the end of it! haha. Yeah, I'm needing some peace and quiet I think.

I'm not surprised that I have once again turned to music to help me heal. I always do. Last year when I went through a lot of shit with someone, and after coming out of the church, I used to play Apocalyptica's 'I dont care' every day. I'd sing as loud as I could to it and it was as if the words and music would get out the feelings I had trapped deep inside. It is still a song that I turn to if I ever feel angry. Which I do, a lot! Lol.

Maybe I've trained in the wrong profession! Perhaps music therapy would have been better suited to me! On a positive note I have just finished my nutrition course now and am waiting for that peice of paper that allows me to work (as if I well ever get time!) as a nutritional advisor.

Amazingly the Maize Maze Amazed me.

Marty's parents were over visiting last week and so we took a day trip. Barney didn't want to go anywhere further than 15 minutes drive away which was proving to be a problem. We all wanted to go to the Maize Maze in Castlewellan but he wasn't having any of it! It wasn't until I found that they had a website and that it was full of pics and videos of the maze and activities, showed it to Barney and then he was all set for going! I really need to remember that he needs visual prompts to allow him to really accept new things. It's so simple but I so often forget.

The maze in Castlewellan is one of the few NI activities with a good website. Having videos and photos made it a gazillion times easier for Luke. I wish all family friendly places would do the same so that our autistic children can prepare more for days out.

So we all had a lovely day. Not only did we have a good go at the maze, but there were other things there too, such as a bouncy castle, sand pit, toddlers play area, swing ball, massive slide and football games. It was good because the maze was great for the teenagers and adults, but there was also something for the little ones.

Badger and his Grandad made one team, whilst Marty, myself and Barney were another team. We raced teams through the maze, searching for dinosaur clues. There were points when Barney really wasn't handling the whole maze thing, but a really nice guy who worked there gave him a map and that gave him something to focus on. I think his main problem was not knowing how long we would be in the maze. Time is always a big issue for him, and without his visual timer he is often more anxious.














A good time was had by all. Rosie played football with her Daddy. I beat Badger several times at swing ball, whilst he injured his Dad quite painfully in the family jewels with the same swingball! Rosie played for hours with her Granny in the sand pit. Tarja wasn't there as she was away with friends for a few days.

Afterwards we headed into Newcastle and ate fish and chips on a windy beach. I just love being anywhere where I can see the Mourne Mountains!

Recurring Dreams

This is the second time in recent years that I’ve been experiencing recurring dreams. I have heard that dreams that keep coming to you over weeks, months or years are trying to tell you something important. I used to have the same recurring dream that came about every month, or every few weeks.  It was the same every time. I would be walking around my house (I always knew it was my own house, even though it wasn’t actually a house that I’ve ever lived in) and I would discover a room, or rooms that were not being used. I would come up with all sorts of plans for this room and would feel irritate that it was being wasted.  I knew what the dream meant. When I went through a bad patch my dream changed slightly. Instead of discovering unused rooms and making plans for them, I would notice that my house was rotting, going mouldy and nasty.  Both these dreams meant something obvious to me.

Now I am having a new recurring dream. I have had it before but it didn’t come so often. Maybe once or twice a year. Now its every few weeks.  In this dream I am trying to get to the bottom of a very high rise building. Think of the twin towers. That sort of size. I try to take the lift down. There are always others waiting for the lift too. When the lift doors open everyone piles in without seeming to notice or care that the floor of the lift is made of carpet and is all saggy and coming away at one side. The lift floor is about to fall out.  Either I notice this and won’t go into the lift. Or I go in and then the floor starts sagging and I am left trying to hold on for dear life, waiting desperately to get off at the next stop before I fall to my death! And the other passengers are all chatting away happily.  I either get out of the lift, or don’t go in the lift at all – and start to take the stairs to get out of the building. But because the building is so huge it takes me hours and hours to climb down the stairs. And to top it all off I have extreme vertigo the whole time and am falling all over the place, nearly falling over the stairs sides and down the huge fall to the bottom.  I never make it out of the building before waking up and seem lost in a dizzy place, destined to fall to my doom! I don’t really like this dream, as you can imagine!

I have a fair idea what it might mean too.  I might write another post sometime about what I think these dreams mean, but would welcome your suggestions as well.

Fun times

Intensive Intervention

Over the course of the summer holidays Barney is undergoing some intensive early intervention, provided by the Autism Intervention Team. ‘F’, the therapist he has been seeing over the last few months is organising this. Barney will be going to see a support worker weekly at the Autism Centre in Newry, whilst F works with us at the same time, in a room with one of those one-way mirrors. Then the support worker will be coming out weekly to the house as well to work with him. Added to that his Occupational Therapy appointments and he has quite a packed summer!

 

A lot of the work seems to be based on organising schedules and routines. The idea is that these will calm him and help to reduce his anxiety.  They have made up all these laminated schedules for him to work from, based on a Spongebob theme, as that’s something that he really likes. We have to schedule the entire day, from breakfast through to bedtime. Every time it is time for him to move onto the next task, I give him a Spongebob token and he sticks it to his chart and takes the next activity off his schedule to complete. Each day he has three therapy cards to complete as well. The therapies he can chose from each day are on the ‘Choice Board’. Each time he completes one he gets a star, and if he manages 3 stars a day for a week then he gets a surprise.  Therapies range from deep massage, pressure therapy, deep hand and wrist massage, trampolining, resting under weighted blankets, to simply time out in a quiet place.

Our hallways is fast becoming a notice board for all things laminated and velcro’d.  It’s actually not that easy to get used to. Having one of the most unorganised women in the world as his mother doesn’t aid the process either!  We did half a day of the schedule today and then I totally forgot to keep updating it, and it wasn’t until bedtime that we realised we’d neglected it.  Doh! 

Dear Friends,

Dear Friends,

If you matter, then you already know the details. It’s good to have friends. Good friends always know the right thing to do. They don’t swarm overhead like a pack of vultures. If you are a close friend then you already know that I am happy, and that Marty is happy too. Sure we have our ups and downs. We are only human after all, and life is never perfectly blissful happiness. And if it was I’m sure we would all be boring nitwits. A bit of a challenge here and there can be very character building.

Marty is the most amazing person I have ever known. A very selfless person, witty, romantic, charming, energetic… amongst so many other things. He has helped me through the toughest times in my life, and shared the happiest moments as well. His boundless energy is inspiring. The man is like a machine! He loves buying presents, and springing surprises on people. Once he took me to New York for a surprise. He has been my dearest and closest friend since the age of 16. He has saved my life on more than one occasion. We will always be the best of friends. That is something people find hard to understand, or believe.

Why do people think that separation only happens when life has gotten too awful to bear? Maybe it is that way for most people. I guess the majority of people are scared of change, fearful of making mistakes, full of ‘what ifs’. Why do people let life get to the stage where it is too awful to bear? Why do they keep plodding on until both parties absolutely hate each other and can not spend a single moment in each others company any more? Isn’t it more sensible for the sake of everyone involved to sort things out whilst both are still friends?

I’m sure people have all sorts of opinions on the subject, but I just don’t really care for anyone else’s opinions. People will say that if things aren’t that bad then you should remain together. That’s their opinion and I don’t agree. And since it’s my life and not theirs I choose to do what I think is right; not what is least shocking for others. And I don’t ever want to get to the stage where we can’t be friends; where we have to drop the kids off in each others driveways without any communication, for fear of an unsightly scene or row. Now surely that would be worse for the kids?

The facts of the matter are that I grew up in a totally warped cult church. Looking back I have no idea how my parents were able to live that way. But they did, and so we had to as well. There are many aspects of that church that are totally f****d up; one of which is their dating policy. As a 16 year old I was only allowed to date if it was with someone I would consider marriage with. If marriage wasn’t on the cards after a few months, then the relationship was ‘advised’ to end. Not that it was possible to actually have a healthy relationship with the opposite sex. Alone time was not allowed, chaperoning commonplace; it was virtually impossible to tell if someone was good marriage material in that sort of situation! Many young girls in that church got married whilst still children. I was one of them. Fortunately for me, my fella turned out to be a real gem. Others were not always so fortunate.

At 16 or 17 years old you are still a child. Why on earth do people let kids get married? Are they really so fearful of sex outside marriage leading to eternal damnation that it is considered the better option to marry the children off? They might not be married to someone who really suits them, they might never have lived on their own or have any experience of adult life, they might not know who they are or what they believe or where they want to go with life – but at least they wont commit fornication and thus burn in hell forever!

As one of the lucky ones I have had 16 wonderful years married to the most awesome person that I’ve ever met. And I don’t regret a single day that we have known each other. What I do regret is that I never had the chance to learn about myself, be myself, express myself as an individual, and to grow. Marty understands this. He knows how I feel. Do you have any idea what it must be like to know that the life you are living was never really your own choice? That people or organisations forced you to follow paths that you would not have chosen if you had had freedom of will, self identity and security? You feel trapped. You start to get bitter and angry.

I have never, ever, lived as a single person. I have never had a chance to know myself or to spend time with myself. Without going into details, that has given me ‘issues’. My good friends know exactly what I am talking about. So no need to go into it here. But Marty, being the wonderful person that he is, understands. We need space from each other. We need time to grow. We need a lot of things that being together can not provide. But we will always love each other, and we will always remain close. We will be in and out of each others houses and lives daily. Some people might not understand this. How can a separation be happy? The fact is, that it is, that we are and that we hopefully always will be.

Dear Vultures,

Dear Vultures,

What would you like to know? Would you like me to spin you a tale full of heart ache, trauma, lies and deceit? Would that fill your hunger for juicy gossip? Shall I tell you about how bad things have been, how unhappy everyone is? Would you like to revel in our misery and make your own sorry lives seem better for a while? Oh, yes, for things must have been absolutely awful. It must have been hard to carry on. Perhaps there were days when I thought it would be easier to end it all than to continue living this awful life? Perhaps every morning I would wake with that dead feeling in the pit of my stomach, wondering how I would get through another day? You tell me that I hid my misery well, that I appeared to be happy and that you can’t quite believe it. You want to know the details; what actually HAPPENED. You haven’t kept in touch with me for many, many years. You don’t contact me during the happy times to say ‘thinking of you’. So why now, when you think that my world is ending, are you so suddenly overcome with a need to tell me how sad you are on my behalf? Could it possibly be because you want to know the details? Or better still, why not just contact my real friends and ask them what’s going on? Perhaps they can feed your hunger for a while.

Would it excite you to think that I had locked myself away in my room, unable to cope, unable to eat, sick with heartache, eyes puffy with tears? Perhaps I could take to the bottle and drink myself to numbness for your titillation. Would you like to know if people are around me, supporting me at this time? You must think I am totally alone, for it appears that I must need your assistance, despite the fact that you barely know me/do not actually know me/don’t ever speak to me. In fact it is not even your assistance that you are offering. You just seem to think you have a right to know “what’s going on”. Perhaps you are one of the ones that think it would be better that a parent actually died than split up, for the sake of the children? Oh yes, I have heard that said. Shall I tell you that my children are distraught? That they may never lead normal lives again because of the horror of the things they have seen? Will you be there for the children now that their parents have totally lost the plot? No? Oh, I see you just want the details. Ok.

Rest assured that your words of disappointment, sadness and disbelief do pierce my soul and pain me. They have not been wasted.

I hope Karma bites you in the bum.

It was only yesterday that I was 15

 

Ooooh the horror! Yes, this was me aged 15. Fifteen was my goth year. I started so innocent looking, and got darker as the year went on.

I am posting this because my first born son turned 15 last week, and I really just can’t quite believe it. When I look at those photos of me at that age and remember how things were, it’s quite scary. I thought I knew it all! I thought I had the whole world sussed out!  I loved my friends to bits, studied quite hard, but had a hell of a lot of silly fun too.  It’s a bit scary to think that Jimmie was born just three years after those photos were taken.

But enough about me. My Jimmie is now 15. The poor lad is the youngest in his year and so all his mates are turning 16. He is forever playing catch up.  Jimmies birthday always marks the end of the school year and the start of the summer holidays here in Northern Ireland.  To celebrate it we spoilt him rotten with presents (a newer, better phone with a camera, a big man size punch bag, weights, gym equipment, a new watch, clothes, chocs etc) and took him horse riding with his Aunties, Uncle and nieces.  I think he had a good day. I think he was pleased with his presents. The punch bag is certainly getting plenty of use. As is the phone!