I've been a bit short of inspiration lately. There is a lot of busy-ness at this time of year. I have been on the usual roller-coaster with my kids. A week ago I was fretting that we couldn't get S in to the pediatrician of our choice for 9 months; today I forgot even to make the appointment for the referral. I keep going backwards and forwards as to whether he is basically Ok but just on the hard work side of things, or whether something else is going on. I had some advice a few days ago from someone who does not know him very well, fairly generic advice about going to back behaviour-managing basics. When I sought this advice, I had reached the point where I was hardly interacting with S in the day; it seemed that I would be rewarding so much undesirable behaviour that there was nothing left to say or do together. I felt that I had reached a point of breakdown, and thus of failure. But I was consoled to hear that maybe that was exactly what needed to happen, and that it might indeed take a little while, but that he would in fact learn from my refusal to engage or respond to a great raft of troublesome behaviours. That's where I lost sight of what I was doing, I think; that if I refuse to respond for long enough, he does have the option of modifying his behaviour to get my attention. It feels a bit harsh, but I have to have faith that if he is basically doing OK, he is capable of going through this process. Meanwhile, we continue to try to organise support for P in and out of school; friends, therapies, teachers, reading, bills, worry ...
I knew I needed some kind of advice with Christmas coming up; always so much stress, although I have managed to carve out some nuclear-family time which is fun, and the boys are now old enough to look forward to seeing their extended family later in the day; it used to all just be strange, disconcerting, and tiring for them, and somehow we were always just expected to drag them to events when they would usually be napping, where people ate late & sat around a table for lengthy periods, & manage to relax & have a good time. Over the years the members of the extended families have had their own trials and are now less prescriptive about the whole business (as opposed to my side where no-one makes any effort to see anyone), but really, my idea of a fun Christmas is just to have the day with children & partner. The rest I do as well as I can because I know my boys need as much sense of a family as they can be provided with, & that is no mean feat given the materials at hand.
Friday, December 10, 2010
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
Mea Culpa
Sometimes I am clearly the problem.
I can rant, complain and scratch my head all I want at the mysteries of my children, but my own contribution to their difficulties can sometimes be writ painfully large. Since my last post, life with S has not been smooth. All the usual problems have worn down my patience. Last week we had a dreadful day where I could barely disguise my ardent desire to simply escape from him. I'm not proud of it; I'm sick about it, but all the same, that's where we ended up. It wasn't hard to tell that he was crushed. When he was finally asleep, I was consumed with anguish. I made some resolutions, and some phone calls, and have bent over backwards since to restore some trust and affection. But even in a few days, I've slipped backwards bit by bit as I try to weather wave after wave of negative behaviour; incredibly silly clowning, aggressive play, antagonising brother, engaging in interminable nonsensical conversations, including topics such as what he would like to eat. Today was another try-hard day on my part, but I guess I am pretty tense; when he spilled a milk drink on himself and the carpet this morning (after being told not to muck around with it) I got angry. His response was immediate, heartfelt distress; it was clearly from the pain inflicted by my anger, cutting him to the core. It was terrible to hear. We cleaned up and fixed him up. We played most of the morning, not without some conflict; we must make an effort to clean up our toys, for instance, but instead of digging in, he did eventually help to pack up. So we were on a better, more co-operative footing. It is hard, sometimes, to feel good about the job that I'm doing.
I can rant, complain and scratch my head all I want at the mysteries of my children, but my own contribution to their difficulties can sometimes be writ painfully large. Since my last post, life with S has not been smooth. All the usual problems have worn down my patience. Last week we had a dreadful day where I could barely disguise my ardent desire to simply escape from him. I'm not proud of it; I'm sick about it, but all the same, that's where we ended up. It wasn't hard to tell that he was crushed. When he was finally asleep, I was consumed with anguish. I made some resolutions, and some phone calls, and have bent over backwards since to restore some trust and affection. But even in a few days, I've slipped backwards bit by bit as I try to weather wave after wave of negative behaviour; incredibly silly clowning, aggressive play, antagonising brother, engaging in interminable nonsensical conversations, including topics such as what he would like to eat. Today was another try-hard day on my part, but I guess I am pretty tense; when he spilled a milk drink on himself and the carpet this morning (after being told not to muck around with it) I got angry. His response was immediate, heartfelt distress; it was clearly from the pain inflicted by my anger, cutting him to the core. It was terrible to hear. We cleaned up and fixed him up. We played most of the morning, not without some conflict; we must make an effort to clean up our toys, for instance, but instead of digging in, he did eventually help to pack up. So we were on a better, more co-operative footing. It is hard, sometimes, to feel good about the job that I'm doing.
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