We've Got the Moving Blues

We closed on our new house today. 

It’s a bittersweet moment. When we first moved into the tiny town we live in, we promised our kids that unless something big happened, we would be there long enough for them to finish school. Well, something big happened. My husband’s company had a huge re-org, and the end result is that he’s being transferred from a work from home position to an office-based one. And we, our three kids and our five cats are moving 400+ miles back down south.

The logistics are enough to make my head explode. Especially when it’s overlapped with the kids’ end of the year activities and working out the last two weeks at my current job. The truth is, my coping skills are exhausted, and I can’t WAIT to finish work and school so I can just focus on one thing at a time!

We’re all a little back and forth on how we feel about the move itself. The house we’re buying is gorgeous, and big enough that the kids are all actually going to have their own space. Which is something we definitely don’t have right now. (G-money just wants a room big enough that he can set up his computer instead of gaming in the dining room. That's how sad his current room situation is!)They’ll be closer to the grandparents and the cousins. 

It doesn’t snow nine months out of the year, so it has that going for it, which is nice.

On the flip side, kids are less than thrilled to be leaving their friends. I really like the job I’m giving up, even though I’m fortunate to have another already waiting for me. And of course, Princess C just got back to school, and her BFFs and her boyfriend are all within walking distance of us right now. So I’m sure that’s going to trigger some meltdowns.

I guess right now, all we can do is wait and see. And hope spending 8 hours in a vehicle with 5 cats isn’t the debacle I think it’s going to be!

I'm a Bad Mom (Or, Down with the Mommy Guilt)

While watching “Bad Moms” with my husband this afternoon (the second time I’ve seen it since it came out) I caught myself thinking over and over again-that’s me. I’m a bad mom. 

I don’t volunteer at my kids’ schools. (I work two jobs.)

I don’t spend hours making food for bake sales. (The school would just reject it anyway, since it doesn’t come with a pre-printed ingredients label.)

I refuse to do my kids’ homework. (I suffered through 8^th grade algebra, you can too.)

I don’t buy or pack my kids organic foods. (There are a few we splurge on, but seriously. That shit’s expensive.)

I make my daughter walk to and from her afterschool activities. (We live less than a mile away, she’s got this.)

I don’t sign my kids up for a million activities. (Been there. Done that. Have the ulcer.)

For the most part, I think we’re doing okay. My kids are good people who are growing up to be great. They take in strays and donate to charity and are kind to people they meet. Sure, we have our blips along the way, but for the most part they’re growing up to be pretty awesome adults.

So enough with the mom guilt.

Seriously? Being a mom these days is ridiculous. Attachment parenting. Helicopter parenting. 

Corporal punishment. People calling CPS for your kids playing outside in the lawn.

Don’t tell your kids no. I would seriously love to know who came up with that one.

If you’re a stay at home mom (or a homeschooling one), your kids don’t socialize enough. If you’re a working mom and your kids go to school/daycare, you’re letting someone else raise your kids. Tell them to wash their hands, you’re turning them into germophobes. Let them run around dirty, you’re not teaching them to be healthy. Breastfeeding mom? Bottlefeeding mom? Oh, the vultures on the Internet can chase after that one for days. #fedisbest

Healthy dinners. Hand packed lunches. Make crafts for kids’ birthday parties. The list of what we as moms are expected to do for our kids goes on, and on, and on, and…

And that’s before you start talking about keeping the house clean, getting back to your pre-baby body in six weeks or less, or any number of other things that we as women are expected to achieve.

My point is, as parents, we are never going to be good enough. It’s time to stop. Stop staying up late and getting up early. Time to stop running our kids around all day without having two seconds to ourselves. Stop planning our days down to the last minute without any cushion for when things blow up. (Like, say, when the dog has vertigo and you have to jump up every three seconds and carry him outside!)

And for pete’s sake, stop holding yourselves, and each other, to unrealistic standards. Put away the judgement sticks. Stop trolling the Internet. We’re all in this thing called Parenthood together.

POTS Stinks

Let me start by saying I tip my hat to all the parents out there who have children with chronic illnesses, disabilities and special needs. It’s exhausting, and you guys are rockstars!

If you’re new to the blog (and let’s be honest, I update so infrequently it’s a miracle anyone is here at all!) let me catch you up.

About two years ago, Princess C was diagnosed with dysautonomia and borderline POTS (Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome). For those of you not familiar with the medical jargon, it means the part of her nervous system that controls her body’s automatic functions, like her heart rate, the ability of her veins to constrict, how her GI system processes food, and her breathing, doesn’t quite work right. She’s considered borderline POTS because she has all the symptoms, but they aren’t quite severe enough to meet diagnostic criteria.

It took us about a year to really get her symptoms under control, during which we homeschooled, and physically she was doing well. So well, in fact, that we decided to send her back to public school.

Since then, it’s basically been a nightmare. Her symptoms have been relentless, and I think she’s missed almost as much school as she’s gone to. Although her last report card said she only missed six days of school. I think someone fudged the paperwork somewhere :P

We have an appointment with her specialist next week to see if we can get some accommodations for school. Some days, she’s just too down to go to school. Fainting, vomiting, that sort of thing. But then she has those in-between days-what we’ve dubbed her “dizzy days”-where she’s lightheaded and unsteady on her feet, but fully capable of sitting in a chair and following along in class. Which I know because we’re still doing her at-home Spanish classes through the Spanish Homeschool Academy, and I’ve only had to cancel a few of them.

Until we get those accommodations, however, we’re still playing the absenteeism game. Which means long stretches of days where she needs someone to make sure she gets liquids and foods and safely to and from the bathroom, while we’re both agonizing over the amount of school she’s missed and wondering if this is going to be the day we get the call from CPS.

I don’t think it will happen-she’s got a GREAT principal this year (she’s in Jr High now) who has worked closely with her physicians to get her back in school. She was actually Mr. A’s third grade teacher, and we LOVED her. But the year she was sick and in and out of the hospital without a diagnosis, she missed so much class it was “mentioned” more than once. Right along with holding her back, despite her grades being high enough that she was still on the honor roll.

We were all stressed out and on edge until one of the nurse practitioners at her pediatrician’s office said enough was enough, pulled her out and got her a tutor. When she did go back, it was half days only for the rest of the year.

Know who told us a tutor was an option? Her doctor’s office. Know who told us half days was an option? Her doctor’s office. Know who didn’t tell us diddly, and made it sound like we were going to get a visit from CPS, and told us that having a tutor for an extended length of time wasn’t an option and if that was the case, we needed to homeschool?  

The elementary school.

To be fair, homeschooling for a year did turn out to be an excellent option while we got a treatment plan in place. She was able to take days off as needed, and work at her own pace around doctor’s visits and PT. We all appreciated the huge breath of relief it gave us not to be agonizing over whether or not she was going to make it to school that day. It would have been nice, however, had we not been made to feel like that was our ONLY option.

Oh! You’re probably sitting there wondering why we re-enrolled her in the first place in homeschool was such a good choice. The problem was, Princess C is a social creature. She loves being active, and really needs to be around people and get involved in extracurricular activities. With her dad working full time, and me working two jobs and going to nursing school, she wasn’t getting that. Once she started feeling better, it wasn’t doing great things for her coping skills.

She’s been MUCH happier since going back to public school. They set up her schedule so her best friend is in almost all her classes (not sure if that was a great idea or an awful one, but the girls are happy with it!). She was chosen for select chorus, and has a part in the school play. It’s exactly the sort of school experience she needed.

After having her home sick for the better part of the last two weeks, however, we’re all exhausted. Thank goodness it’s the weekend. I have to take G-money for a placement test for the STEM program tomorrow morning, but after that we have the rest of the weekend to rest and recharge.

POTS stinks.