Give a fish...

The attitude of entitlement has me pissed off big time. Quasi-adults- people between 26 and 39+- who think that they are entitled to have life's problems solved to their satisfaction by resources outside themselves. I think about when I was in my late twenties and early thirties. The people I knew would never publicly talk about having to exist on bread and water, much less post it on FB. Of course, their money wouldn't have been spent on cigarettes, grand lattes, and drugs... they would have fed their kids. Their money wouldn't have been spent on premium cable, high speed internet, or top-of-the-line data plans for their iphones, either. Their kids would have eaten. A television in every room (including kid's bedrooms) didn't even occur to them. How can you consider yourself independent when you are living off of public assistance, charity, and private bailouts?

Remember the saying "Give a fish, they eat for a day. Teach them to fish, they eat for a life time"? There is a lot of truth in there. The real question becomes "What do you do when they decide learning to fish is too much work?" I don't comprehend. It is like I don't speak the same language and there are no translators around. I find it mind boggling.

This is my rant and a regular post will return tomorrow. I will go back to speaking a language I do understand.

Tudu is back!

Tudu is one of my favorite bloggers. She had to shut down for awhile, but she is back. Check her out at Finishing off my family. There are days she keeps me going.

Hope's Class May Have a Real Therapist

Hope's class has a new therapist. Third one in the 13 months we have had Hope. I met with him. He seemed almost lost and definitely uncomfortable. I had just about given up when he brought up her diagnosis. It turns out the school has Hope's diagnosis down as an adjustment disorder. After observing Hope for several hours, in her class, over the course of a week, the therapist spent hours going through Hope's records. The poor therapist was struggling to find a diplomatic way to tell me my daughter had Reactive Attachment Disorder. After I stopped laughing, I gave him a short history. He was amazed she is doing so well after only being with us for a year.  I guess everything is relative.

Hope's CSE

We had a CSE for Hope this morning. It was the first one for Hope without Mrs. V.S. Chairperson. Everybody was prepared with the materials needed. The speech therapist went over the speech eval done on Hope over the summer. She provided detailed information and well formulated goals for Hope's IEP. Hope teacher discussed where Hope was in the process of learning to read and said right now, Hope requires her one on one involvement to read. Nobody at the meeting seemed aware of district standards to be promoted to first grade. Mrs. Director will find out before we meet again.

I have 6 week programs reviews scheduled for both girls, back to back. I can't believe how smoothly this year is progressing. Not at all the black sinkhole of energy it was last year. Thank you, God! I really appreciate it!

God Came Swimming

Hope and GB at the indoor pool

The Dad's attempt at letting yesterday be a new day for Hope didn't work.  She made it through dance, but didn't last the party. Fortunately, it was only twenty feet to get out of the building. The Dad has had high hopes for the progress he has seen (and hadn't physically seen a meltdown, since he is usually not here for them) and was very disillusioned about Hope's rage. MK took him to the movies last night, but it didn't help.

We woke up this morning and I couldn't stand dealing with the behavior and attitudes that would have to be dealt with at church. Everybody needed something different. So we all went swimming. When Hope asked why we weren't going to church, I told her we were bringing God swimming with us. The kids burnt off some energy, the adults relaxed a bit.

All swum out

We have Hope's first CSE of the year tomorrow and do not see the shrink for another three weeks. I hadn't thought the rages were gone, so I don't have as much to rethink. I decided some time ago that I would not be taking Hope out in public by myself and that is still true. The Dad has to figure out for himself what he thinks they can handle.

The Good, the Bad and the Ugly.

The Good: It was school pictures yesterday and Hope held it together.

The Bad: As soon as I took her homework out of the book bag, the Hope I know so well was with me. Arms crossed, face set in a glare, and the traditional "You are being mean to me".

We took GB to her gymnastics class. GB had an outstanding 90 minute class. It was non-stop movement. Hope got no homework done. Afterwards, we met friends at Fri*ndly for dinner.

The Good: The Dad was there so I didn't have to deal with Hope's rage by myself.

The Ugly: Hope refused to eat, screamed, yelled I was hitting her (I wasn't) and that I never let her eat. I eventually figured out she was not going to stop (duh) and went to take Hope to the car. She immediately got physical. The Dad picked her up and carried her out. This particular Fri*ndly's is in a large mall. As the Dad carried her out, the manager of the restaurant stopped me to see if a coloring book or a balloon would help. By the time I got away from him, The Dad was 40 feet ahead of me. Hope was trying to bite and punch him, all the while yelling that he was hurting her. They received a mixed response; some people said it was good to see a parent that could do the tough things; other people said that poor child. We made it to the car without the police being called on us. I stayed in the car with a kicking, screaming Hope, while the Dad went back to the restaurant. I played 8 games of Word Warp on the ipad while Hope screamed. When the Dad was finished and brought GB back to the car, he was still shaken.

This morning it is like nothing happened. Hope is at her dancing lessons and I think the Dad is going to take her to a birthday party this afternoon. I, personally, don't plan on ever bringing her out in public again. The Papoose board is too heavy to carry around.

Held Hostage By A Cat

I have a beautiful, cameo cream Maine Coon cat. She has a lot of strange habits. She nibbles on my ear at night, makes nests out of blankets, and loves to pull the magnetic end of my MacBook charger off. The wire has been pretty beat up and finicky as to whether it will charge or not. I decided to use electrical tape to fix it. I carefully wrapped the electrical tape around the damaged part of the wire. Now my MacBook won't charge at all. I ordered a new charging unit. It was suppose to come yesterday. Last night I received an email from Apple saying it was delayed. No new date. My charge on my MacBook is almost gone. I guess I will have to be quiet until the cord comes.