We’re falling head-first through the month of December towards the two-and-a-half week long period known as “Winter Break”, in which school will be non-existent and therapy will be spotty. As we look back on the mere 3-day break around the Thanksgiving holiday and transpose that on a longer time-span, I have a confession to make – I have no idea what we’ll do.
Here’s the deal – for the first time since Jack was diagnosed more than 20 months ago, Jack had a 5-day long period of nothing around Thanksgiving. No therapy. No school. No social skills or special needs music class. Nothing but time. Time is our enemy, really. Rather than look forward to the downtime with anticipation, it causes my boy all kinds of anxiety. Anxiety that seems to crush him under its weight. Anxiety that I can’t seem to mitigate for him or help him manage. …continue reading
Everyone reading here is familiar with situations where things don’t exactly go as expected. We all know the meltdowns, the tantrums, the refusals, the body drops. We also know the joys and the triumphs when things exceed our expectations. We all want those big family moments that others take for granted, but we’re always afraid about what we are going to get. At least that’s my problem (yes, I’m projecting a bit, but I’m pretty confident that I’m right).
My whole family was overjoyed in February when the phone rang with news that my brother had proposed to his girlfriend. They were planning a wedding 8 months away (yup, do the math….October). He is my only sibling and he is nearly 8 years my junior. My 3 children are his only nieces and nephews. He and his fiancé invited Big Brother and Music Man to be the ring bearers and Ballerina to be a flower girl (along with two of the bride’s cousins) for their big event an 11 hour drive away. Like I said, he is my only sibling and I love him dearly. And I love and genuinely LIKE her. There was no question that I was going to accept.
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