Camp ended. School started. New classroom, which isn't bad. Old classroom much missed.
It's been literally psychotic around the house the past few days. Aggressive episode that I talked about in my last post on Friday. A nice reprieve spending time with his cousins on Sunday. Otherwise, it's been pretty bad.
He's been scared in our house, in the yard, by himself. He continues covering his ears, and I'm not sure why. Is he hearing things? He screamed the other night that his eyes were "playing tricks" on him because he could see the carpet sparkling and moving. He has screamed while sitting on the couch for what looked like no reason. When I asked, he said he was just having "a nightmare," though he was awake in the middle of the day. He says his ears have been "playing tricks" on him, but he never tells me what he hears, if anything. He stomped around the bathroom with a furled brow and angry growl, and when I questioned him what was going on his demeanor changed immediately: "Nothing," he said.
He is beginning to become obsessed that the movies are trying to tell him something, that they are telling him what to do in his life. I guess, if you really, really think of it, every movie -- especially the kids ones -- have some kind of message or theme. So he isn't exactly wrong, but he's not even close to right, either.
Fingers crossed he will come out of this quickly. Not a fan of psychosis.
Monday, August 15, 2011
Saturday, August 13, 2011
sober-up.
Peer and I enjoyed dinner outside last night. Great Italian meal, lots of good conversation, lots of wine. We arrived home assuming Ace would be asleep as he usually is when we come home from dinner on Friday nights. Not last night.
Last night as soon as my foot crossed the threshold he aggressively demanded that I strangle him. I refused several times letting him know that I love him and would never do that. He turned to Peer and demanded that Peer strangle him. After Peer refused, Ace lunged at me screaming that if I don't strangle him, he'd claw out my eyes.
It was a horrible hour and a half of this. I video-taped the last 30 minutes. I got a new iPhone the other day and wanted to test it. I'm not sure what it is about these really intense situations that I think, and in this case act on, some totally mundane thought. Dissociation, I guess. I know too much about psychology. I never was interested in the subject in the past, and really, I could teach a class.
Anyway, it was a rough night for Ace. I'm still trying to figure out what caused his psychotic break. I think the stress of his first week at school, realizing camp is over, missing his class from last year, nearly having to say goodbye to his psychologist (crisis averted as we have decided to follow her to the new clinic). All these losses drive him back to the fact that he was adopted. Regardless of how Peer and I try to spin it, Ace focuses on the fact that his own mother and father gave me away, left him with total strangers. He doesn't understand why anyone would do that. It's beyond his comprehension -- he's only seven, and it's a grown-up action.
Long story short before my computer battery dies, coming home to an aggressively psychotic child sobered me up lickity-split.
Last night as soon as my foot crossed the threshold he aggressively demanded that I strangle him. I refused several times letting him know that I love him and would never do that. He turned to Peer and demanded that Peer strangle him. After Peer refused, Ace lunged at me screaming that if I don't strangle him, he'd claw out my eyes.
It was a horrible hour and a half of this. I video-taped the last 30 minutes. I got a new iPhone the other day and wanted to test it. I'm not sure what it is about these really intense situations that I think, and in this case act on, some totally mundane thought. Dissociation, I guess. I know too much about psychology. I never was interested in the subject in the past, and really, I could teach a class.
Anyway, it was a rough night for Ace. I'm still trying to figure out what caused his psychotic break. I think the stress of his first week at school, realizing camp is over, missing his class from last year, nearly having to say goodbye to his psychologist (crisis averted as we have decided to follow her to the new clinic). All these losses drive him back to the fact that he was adopted. Regardless of how Peer and I try to spin it, Ace focuses on the fact that his own mother and father gave me away, left him with total strangers. He doesn't understand why anyone would do that. It's beyond his comprehension -- he's only seven, and it's a grown-up action.
Long story short before my computer battery dies, coming home to an aggressively psychotic child sobered me up lickity-split.
Sunday, August 7, 2011
the government.
The city launched a website called ChicagoBudget.org for people to chime-in on how to balance the budget. I have no idea if any of the ideas are going to get off the ground and even if they don't, it's been beneficial to me.
I've really never thought that I've had a voice in how things go in my city, my state, my nation. So, to be honest, I haven't put much thought to things. I vote for candidates based on whether or not they seem smart, a good orator, a people-person. I rarely if ever vote on issues, mostly because I figure everybody on the campaign trail is disingenuous about that. They're trying to get elected. I guess I'm jaded.
So this website has given me a little bit of a glimmer of hope that our mayor actually does want to hear from us. And putting down my ideas in writing has made me think. I have a better idea of my philosophy toward government:
I've really never thought that I've had a voice in how things go in my city, my state, my nation. So, to be honest, I haven't put much thought to things. I vote for candidates based on whether or not they seem smart, a good orator, a people-person. I rarely if ever vote on issues, mostly because I figure everybody on the campaign trail is disingenuous about that. They're trying to get elected. I guess I'm jaded.
So this website has given me a little bit of a glimmer of hope that our mayor actually does want to hear from us. And putting down my ideas in writing has made me think. I have a better idea of my philosophy toward government:
- Governments should keep programs that produce revenue and dump or privatize the ones that don't
- Education is supremely important -- a well-educated, well-informed society allows us to progress
- Governments must provide infrastructure
- Governments must provide rules
Monday, August 1, 2011
yesterday.
To be truthful, I've been holding back heaving sobs and wiping my nose nearly all day. Held by a hazy sunset, weighed down by heat, humidity and a hot breeze, yesterday I saw Paul McCartney perform live... and his words continue sounding in my ears, consuming my thoughts, and sloshing back and forth within my heart.
I can't tell you the last time I heard a tune by the Beatles or Paul McCartney: years ago, a decade, maybe more. But there was a time in my young life, those first few years of development, when I listened to them non-stop. It was that time in life before anything ever went wrong, when I was nothing but absolutely adorable, when the world lay furled before me. Back then there were my parents and there were the Beatles, and both provided me nourishment, guidance, and set my course.
The vision is so clear to me: my mother doing sit-ups on the living room floor in our house on Abbey Court (not to be confused by Abbey Road) while the Sargent Pepper album spins, spins, spins. There's the story of a girl in the sky with diamonds, a girl leaving home, a lovely maid named Rita. I imagined life filled with psychedelic sounds, groovy swirly colors, and needing only love to get by.
The possibility of becoming a mother to a child with special needs, a mother consumed by anxiety, stress, grief, and undying hope that grasps always at straws never was mentioned to me by either my own parents or the Beatles.
Then yesterday the words of my youth, of my formation came tumbling back at me like a rain storm. They weren't just catchy tunes or sounds that sucked me in. It was as though the road-map I was given as a child found its way back to me:
What amazed me last night as tens of thousands of us gathered to hear Sir Paul, was that those songs weren't just my songs, my road map. Those songs were everybody else's road maps, too. Every one of us poured ourselves into the choruses, cheered at the intros, and simply couldn't get enough of what this one guy on stage had to say.
I looked around and thought that every person here is hearing this and clamoring onto a vivid memory in their history. These songs are life forces that drive us deeper within ourselves, our past, and ultimately bring perspective to our present. What must that be like to so deeply touch the lives of millions of people? For me, I wasn't listening to a musician, a former Beatle, a knight. I was listening to a true Saint who, with each note, dripped sustenance within each of us to continue our journeys.
As his voice traveled back with me to my living room 33 years ago, it dawned on me that room lives even today -- in my heart, in my core, hardwired to my soul. My parents and the Beatles are still providing signposts along my long and winding road...if I choose to listen.
I can't tell you the last time I heard a tune by the Beatles or Paul McCartney: years ago, a decade, maybe more. But there was a time in my young life, those first few years of development, when I listened to them non-stop. It was that time in life before anything ever went wrong, when I was nothing but absolutely adorable, when the world lay furled before me. Back then there were my parents and there were the Beatles, and both provided me nourishment, guidance, and set my course.
The vision is so clear to me: my mother doing sit-ups on the living room floor in our house on Abbey Court (not to be confused by Abbey Road) while the Sargent Pepper album spins, spins, spins. There's the story of a girl in the sky with diamonds, a girl leaving home, a lovely maid named Rita. I imagined life filled with psychedelic sounds, groovy swirly colors, and needing only love to get by.
The possibility of becoming a mother to a child with special needs, a mother consumed by anxiety, stress, grief, and undying hope that grasps always at straws never was mentioned to me by either my own parents or the Beatles.
Then yesterday the words of my youth, of my formation came tumbling back at me like a rain storm. They weren't just catchy tunes or sounds that sucked me in. It was as though the road-map I was given as a child found its way back to me:
Hey Jude, don't make it bad
Take a sad song and make it better
---
Blackbird singing in the dead of night
Take these broken wings and learn to fly
All your life
You were only waiting for this moment to arise
Blackbird singing in the dead of night
Take these sunken eyes and learn to see
All your life
You were only waiting for this moment to be free
---
Yesterday
All my troubles seemed so far away
Now it looks as though they're here to stay
Oh, I believe in yesterday
---
Ob-La-Di Ob-La-Da
Life goes on, brah!
La-la-la-la life goes on
---
When I find myself in times of trouble
Mother Mary comes to me
Speaking words of wisdom
Let it be
---
Ob-La-Di Ob-La-Da
Life goes on, brah!
La-la-la-la life goes on
---
When I find myself in times of trouble
Mother Mary comes to me
Speaking words of wisdom
Let it be
---
What amazed me last night as tens of thousands of us gathered to hear Sir Paul, was that those songs weren't just my songs, my road map. Those songs were everybody else's road maps, too. Every one of us poured ourselves into the choruses, cheered at the intros, and simply couldn't get enough of what this one guy on stage had to say.
I looked around and thought that every person here is hearing this and clamoring onto a vivid memory in their history. These songs are life forces that drive us deeper within ourselves, our past, and ultimately bring perspective to our present. What must that be like to so deeply touch the lives of millions of people? For me, I wasn't listening to a musician, a former Beatle, a knight. I was listening to a true Saint who, with each note, dripped sustenance within each of us to continue our journeys.
As his voice traveled back with me to my living room 33 years ago, it dawned on me that room lives even today -- in my heart, in my core, hardwired to my soul. My parents and the Beatles are still providing signposts along my long and winding road...if I choose to listen.
Monday, July 25, 2011
hieroglyphics and fairies.
I can't stay away from this blog for too long. Mostly because I need it to chronicle some of the bizarre things that Ace says.
Hieroglyphics
He was upset the other night. We were at my in-laws. He was having trouble acclimating to a different bed and different room. Earlier in the day, I asked him if he wanted to see King Tut at the science museum. He said he had no idea who King Tut was. Not interested. Back to the evening, he asked me to read what it said on the ceiling. I told him that I didn't see anything on the ceiling. "Fine," he said, "I'll read it. It says, 'The ancient times have come back to destroy Ace.'" And then he said, "I know why you couldn't read it. It's in hieroglyphics. I can read hieroglyphics."
Fairies
A couple of days later, the night we came back from visiting my in-laws, he complained that a girl at camp stopped sitting with him at lunch. He's attending a camp through a public park district and has an aide. Several of the kids in his group have aides; however, this little girl -- we'll call her Sami -- doesn't. Here was his reasoning why Sami no longer sits with him:
"I told Sami that I have fairies. She said she didn't believe me, but I said I would bring the fairies to camp one day. Except I kept forgetting! Actually, no. I didn't forget." He whispers while shifting his gaze down and to the left: "It's just that they're hiding.
"This happened for ten days, and now Sami doesn't want to sit next to me at lunch anymore."
The End?
I hope that Ace's predicting that the "ancient times" of relentless, aggressive psychological breakdowns aren't on the path of materializing. I hope that these are just isolated incidents. I'm bracing myself, though. Today his psychologist called saying that she's leaving the clinic. I'm hoping his abandonment issues don't go through the roof. It's been three years since a therapist has left him. Let's hope he's grown emotionally since then. I'm not in the mood for a crisis.
Hieroglyphics
He was upset the other night. We were at my in-laws. He was having trouble acclimating to a different bed and different room. Earlier in the day, I asked him if he wanted to see King Tut at the science museum. He said he had no idea who King Tut was. Not interested. Back to the evening, he asked me to read what it said on the ceiling. I told him that I didn't see anything on the ceiling. "Fine," he said, "I'll read it. It says, 'The ancient times have come back to destroy Ace.'" And then he said, "I know why you couldn't read it. It's in hieroglyphics. I can read hieroglyphics."
Fairies
A couple of days later, the night we came back from visiting my in-laws, he complained that a girl at camp stopped sitting with him at lunch. He's attending a camp through a public park district and has an aide. Several of the kids in his group have aides; however, this little girl -- we'll call her Sami -- doesn't. Here was his reasoning why Sami no longer sits with him:
"I told Sami that I have fairies. She said she didn't believe me, but I said I would bring the fairies to camp one day. Except I kept forgetting! Actually, no. I didn't forget." He whispers while shifting his gaze down and to the left: "It's just that they're hiding.
"This happened for ten days, and now Sami doesn't want to sit next to me at lunch anymore."
The End?
I hope that Ace's predicting that the "ancient times" of relentless, aggressive psychological breakdowns aren't on the path of materializing. I hope that these are just isolated incidents. I'm bracing myself, though. Today his psychologist called saying that she's leaving the clinic. I'm hoping his abandonment issues don't go through the roof. It's been three years since a therapist has left him. Let's hope he's grown emotionally since then. I'm not in the mood for a crisis.
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