Babies eating bananas

I have found there is nothing funnier than my baby eating bananas.  Like a real banana, chopped into a million tiny little pieces.  He thoroughly enjoyed the taste and texture, but quickly discovered it was far more interesting to squeeze and smash them between his fingers.. and THEN try to put them in his mouth.  This = fun for me to watch.

In other news, had a fabulous and much needed weekend of the hubs being off work!  We went to dinner with the bro on Friday night and spent the rest of the weekend chilling.  The in-laws came over tonight for dinner and they actually liked the dinner I made.  This made me happy! 

The kids played outside with the neighbor girls, who Mr. Pants lovingly refers to as his "girlfriends".... I was all busy fixing the food for our dinner and happened to glance out and see all of the kids on the hill with a giant hole and a shovel.  Is it bad that I cracked the door and yelled, "Where is Mr. Pants?".  Once The Dude pointed to him and I was assured Mr. Pants was NOT in the giant hole in the ground, I shut the door and went back to cooking.  I really didn't think to ask (until hours later) what the hell they were doing with a shovel and a giant hole.  Turns out they were making an animal trap.  Hm. Ok.  I like that better than video games so it's cool.

So... The kids are in bed, the hubs is here.. I'm going to try to catch a short movie with him before he konks out in front of the fireplace AND before Mr. Pants comes running down the hall with his midnight - drink of water, has to go pee, can't sleep, not tired, hoooooongry, bored, needs to watch a movie-episodes. 

Hubs starts 6:30a-6:30p tomorrow.  Thank God it's back to the land of the living for a month. 

Yeah, OK lady

So I was reading a blog post from a woman who is also a police wife.  While I think she makes some very good points almost every post, I was a little surprised by some of the things she said on this one in particular.

She was going on about how our men have the toughest jobs and how hard it is on them and we should just not be b*tches and be more understanding because "what if they don't come home". 

And I was practically standing in my chair yelling, "Yes, what IF he doesn't come home".  We live every day with that very assumption.  If he doesn't come home, I'm going to do exactly what I do now.  Everything.  By myself. (yes I am very much generalizing)

I think (and just being frank here) there are actually PO wives among us who forget that in many, many, many police marriages, the wife is every damn bit as strong as the husband. 

The wife is the one who manages an entire brood, defends her lifestyle and choices to friends and family who may be totally unsupportive, goes it alone day in and day out, cooks, cleans, learns to prepare for a home invasion, knows where the gun or the bat (or both) are located for handling those 'strange noises' in the middle of the night while he's out on duty...

It irritates me when some police wives act as though we aren't supposed to be human beings.  It is comparable to a citizen who "doesn't get it" saying - "tough shit - you knew what you were signing up for".  I just think it's unfair when people - anyone- acts as though police wives are supposed to go around swearing that life is wonderful every day.  Some days it sucks.  Period.  There is nothing that will make it better.

Sometimes it sucks for a month at a time, or for years at a time if you're going through drama like an investigation, a department shake-up, a lawsuit, etc. 

I love hearing opinions, and lots of them; but I do not like someone telling me I don't have the right to feel overwhelmed, sad, disappointed, frustrated or any other perfectly normal human emotion because it might serve as a distraction for my hubs' job. 

Things don't suck all the time, but when they do - they do, and it should be ok to say it without someone criticising.  Something good old Meadow said once is, "I don't go around worshipping my husband, knitting little badge-shaped slippers and baking cookies for him at 3 in the morning".  And God love her, because that is the one mindset I made myself borrow from her.

When my hubs teasingly asked, "Why didn't you call me when I didn't call you on my way home from work tonight?" (as I am half-snoring because it's 3am).. I replied, "Oh, I just figured you were dead." 

That's how we roll.  Gotta keep it real.

 

Police Wifin' It

The past three weeks (God it feels SO much longer than that) have been a major adjustment in our house.  Hubs began 12 hour shifts of 6:30p-6:30a.  I suppose on one hand it's nice because he works like 2 on 3 off and now actually gets every other weekend off, but holy crap.  I never realized how much those 4 extra hours a day meant to us.

Don't get me wrong, I am thankful as hell that he has this job, but I am struggling big time to juggle the life right now.  As you all know, meals missed is a regular thing, but now we don't get a single meal a day together.  He is gone before dinner and sleeps through breakfast and lunch.  I have made ridiculous use of the crockpot so that there is always something hot ready for him to eat.  But just watching him eat something across the kitchen, holding over the sink while we casually chat is ancient history now.  God I miss that.

The kids are having a hard time adjusting, too.  At least I'm not the only baby ha ha!  I open my eyes each day to Mr. Pants hovering over me asking in a really loud funny whisper, "Where's dad?".  I guess it is now instinctual for them to start the day knowing if daddy is home or not.  If he is, I am left in the dust (lol) and the pitter patter of little feet goes downstairs to jump in the pile of blankets on daddy's bed and wake him up.

I know that as we have surely all experienced, as soon as I get used to this schedule, his next 7 duty days will have flown by and we will be into 6:30a-6:30p! 

The baby had a horrible night last night.  He was up all night screaming like a banshee.  Poor baby, I think it's his top teeth coupled with an upper respiratory nastiness we've been passing around.  I was so tired I could barely see straight.  Hubs was so sweet and helpful.. he was off last night and at one point I told him I don't know how he does it.  I'd be asleep in the squad car by midnight.  He smiled and said, "Eh... I'm a professional, ok?!".  (mimicking the guy from Ferris Bueller's Day Off)... we chuckled and I felt my spirits rise.

And then the screaming started again!  It was rough and I felt defeated, but hubs stayed up with Mr. Baby and me all night helping out.  It was so nice not being alone.  I made sure to tell him I honestly wouldn't have survived the night without him being here.

Tonight while actually carrying on a nice conversation over the phone, dispatch busted in with a burglary in progress and rattled off the description of the dirtbag.  No "goodbye", just click.  C'est la vie. 

It's the life!

Be Enlightened

A wonderful video which expresses so much of what is "wrong" with public education. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zDZFcDGpL4U

Keep on keepin on

I believe last week was an attempt to see how many doctor visits I could make.  Quinn was not acting himself.  He is usually quiet, mischievous and funny.. but I suddenly found him waking a lot at night, throwing himself backwards in crying fits.. so we spent Tuesday evening at the doc.  He has an ear infection.  Poor baby.  The antibiotic is helping a lot and he's trying to get back to his little old self.

Mr. Pants really wasn't acting any differently than he normally does, but he just had that "look".  I'm sure any of you mothers know what I mean.  He just looked not right to me.  He started coughing a lot at night which is always a key that something is going on.  He has a mild asthma that only acts up whenever something respiratory is happening.  Thank God he doesn't have allergies.  Anyhow, took him to the doc on Thursday and turns out he has a massive sinus infection and needed some more albuterol for his nebulizer.  The doc had to show me the inside of his nose because I just couldn't believe it.  He had no drainage, but one look with the right tool and holy cow.  YUCK!  He is also on antibiotics now and is doing his breathing treatments twice a day. 

The Dude is hanging in there.  I hadn't posted this previously because, well, we had so much other crap going on...

He had been tested in Kindergarten for some academic markings - and through that we found that he learns at an accelerated rate.  He just "gets it".  Sometimes he can't tell you how or why (as in showing you his work on math problems), but he gets the right answer every time.

Throughout elementary school we struggled to help communicate this to his teachers.  He would whiz through his work, finish early and then have zero realization that other kids were still learning, working or taking their test.  This turned into teachers giving him extra work, busy work or simply getting onto him about being irritating.  It made it unpleasant at times for the poor kid.  He survived though.

Now we've come into middle school.  And he hates it.  He is bored to death.  Not in the I'm so smart and I know everything sense.  But in the I-hate-block-scheduling sense.  His classes meet every other day and when they do meet they are almost 2 hours in length. 

Here is where the new issue arose.  After realizing something wasn't right, we took him again for specialized testing with the same professionals.  Turns out he has a very atypical form of ADHD.  (I rolled my eyes and was totally ready to dismiss this at first).  ADHD-Predominantly Hyperactive/Impulsive type.

I remember sitting there shaking my head "no" as the clinicians were showing me their 12 page report of findings.  But then I stopped and actually listened to what they were saying.  And then it all made sense.

The Dude learns at such a fast pace that block scheduling is killing him.  The clinician told me that The Dude learns something in 20 minutes for example and then has to sit in class for another hour and a half.  It's like slow death for him.  Unfortunately his teachers don't allow him to move ahead to the next assignment, the next chapter or whatever.  They tell him to find something to do that will keep him busy.  Which then turns into him getting antsy, impatient and impulsive.  He starts doing things out of boredom without really thinking them through.  There is no realization of a consequence.

I told the clinician that the only familiarity I had with ADHD is that 1) it's way over diagnosed, 2) medication is pushed on those kids, 3) those kids can't control themselves and run around slapping everyone.

She reassured me that it is sometimes MISdiagnosed, that medication is in fact an option for SOME kids, but NOT mine.  She explained that the medication is mainly for kids who have the more typical form which involved the inability to focus or pay attention.  The inability to filter out distractions.  She also reassured me that not all ADHD kids run around slapping people.  Sorry, that's just my humor in dealing with this.

The challenge the last couple of months has been getting his school district on board with the accommodations he needs.  They are slight/minimal, but for some reason the school doesn't care.  It seems they aren't concerned because my son does score in the above average range on all of his standardized tests, with the exception of writing.  They don't seem to care because he, by all outward appearances, is a well-adjusted kid.  They also don't care because he maintains high average to above average grades.

Which makes me want to shake someone.  I probably sound like an overbearing crazy woman.  But I see his struggles.  He is my first baby.  I pushed him to do everything because I thought that's what I was supposed to do.  It's what is common in so much of society.  Crawl early, stand early, walk early, talk early, read early.. do more, do better, do it younger.

Now he is suffering the consequences of my actions.  He can read at the college level.  He can infer often times what the meaning is.  But he doesn't have nearly the understanding he might have if the focus had been on comprehending instead of rote memorization of letters, words and sounds.

I hope I can help fix this.  It's really challenging to undo so many years of this.  I was a public school kids and so was hubs.  In an upcoming post I will talk about my thoughts and feelings on education in this day and age.

I'm sure we will figure things out.  Will post more later.