8/02/2013

Maybe the sun WILL come out…


My youngest.
He kills me.
He loves his school, we all know that. The first words out of his mouth each morning, before his eyes are even open, are about his beloved school. He loves it. The boy lives, eats and breathes school. Which we all love.
So one would expect a boy who’s on his way to his happy place to be the picture of enthusiasm and joy. Right? Not so much. Well, almost never. Most days see me walking my boy through the process of getting ready for school, with a little too much support. Ok, way too much support.
More days than not, my very physically capable nine year old not only needs me to pick out his clothes, but also get him dressed, wiggly toddler style. Bless his teachers who don’t blink an eye when I hand them his shoes, meds, and soggy cereal that were just a little too much to handle, and not really worth starting a war over.
With that in mind, when a morning starts with a bright eyed boy who comes to the kitchen on his own, finishes the breakfast that mom made without a fight, and goes to find something to wear with minimal prompting you can bet this mama having her own personal dance party in a private corner of her brain.
Because the boy found something to wear. Without playing the wiggly toddler game that hates.
And the BOY. GOT. DRESSED.
Did you get that my people?
And hope dares to invade.
Perhaps we’re beginning to see the fruit of our labor. All the hours of wrestling the boy into submission. The countless second chances we’ve given him to get it right. The untold fears we’ve calmed with our consistent and predictable behavior.
Perhaps we’ve stumbled on the proper combination of medication, attachment practice, self soothing practice, and so forth.
Or perhaps it will all hit the fan halfway to school. And my boy will show up worn out from screaming for a good 10 minutes of the trip.
But today there is no soggy cereal dripping all over my kitchen table from a boy who waited for his chance to create chaos when Mom wasn’t looking.
And today my boy said “Mom are you ok?” after accidentally bumping into me. (Ok, he did panic for about 30 seconds before he was able to make that verbalization, but the fact that he did make it is a huge victory for him)
Wanna celebrate with me? There’s a party in the back of my brain.

3 comments:

Aleta said...

PARTY ON! I'm happy with you :)

Anonymous said...

Yay :)

Stephanie Gau said...

I did my student teaching in an elementary school mild to moderate special needs classroom. Some of the kids had ADD, ADHD, Bipolar Disorder, and language barriers. I have to agree with Elissa, that times came that both frustrated me and made me feel like a role model for these kids. I am Bipolar MYSELF, so working with one child in that class in particular, taught me tons of stuff about having to live a CHILDHOOD with the disease. I was not diagnosed with the disease until after I turned 20. I thought it was hard for me then, to keep on studying in college, but I learned then, that it would have been even harder for this little boy to concentrate in the medium sized classroom he was a student in.

LinkWithin

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...