I only have a sugar free Red Bull keeping my eyes open right now, so this post won’t be the most well-written.

Zizi was put on a 5-day run of antibiotics for what the doc thought was a secondary infection in her sinuses; the second time in the child’s whole life she’s ever been on antibiotics, while back in the olden days, I’d say we popped ‘em down like candy, but I think we actually got candy LESS often, to be honest. For the first 3 days, that damned fever never dropped out of the 99-100 range… just a low burn the whole time. Her cough improved noticably, and immediately, on the meds. Finally on Saturday, her temperature came back to normal, she had more energy, and even her appetite picked back up a little. Yay! We still laid low this weekend to not push things, but saw no reason for her not to go to school on Monday.

I was so stir-crazy with cabin fever that Brent watched her Sunday for 3 hours while I was the one who went out to run a couple errands, just to let me get a break and get out of the house. Sweet man. He also folded a mountain of wash and cleaned the kitchen while I was out at Lowes, getting a new Brita water pitcher (we found out the hard way they are not dishwasher safe – DOH!) and laundry baskets. I’d kinda wanted to indulge in some “me” time, and maybe go to the mall to find an appropriate outfit for our upcoming trip to New York with my parents, but felt guilty when Lowes took too long, and so I just made one more stop to buy a new book by one of my favorite authors, and went back home.

Monday was a complicated morning. Brent needed me to follow him to the repair shop to drop off his car for state inspection, and then take him to work. Zizi had an orthodontist appointment, and needed a letter from her pediatrician clearning her to return to school, and then of course she needed to get back to school for her first day back. it  sent our normal routine in the morning into chaos, and we don’t do well with chaos around here.

But wait, there’s more… tell ‘em what I won, Batman….

Zizi was quiet, subdued, and low-energy once again. I thought she was just not thrilled about going back into school after the better part of 2 weeks of Mommy Attention and being at home on beautiful spring days. We picked her up a nice “Back to School” lunch at Wawa (both to try to get her to eat a little more, and because the morning was too crazy to make a proper healthy lunch like I wanted her to have). She seemed fine when I kissed her goodbye after signing her in at the school office,and handing in our Doc’s Note.

I decided it was time for “me time” and went over, finally, to the mall to deal with the wardrobe challenge of the summer: an outfit for me to wear up to New York on the first weekend in May. It could be 90°F up there, it could be raining and in the 50′s. It needs to survive and look New York fabulous after a 2 1/2 hour drive up, so anything involving linen is out. The outfit needs to be equally appropriate for a visit to The American Girl Store, a carriage ride in Central Park and lunch at Park Avenue Spring without looking overdressed, frumpy, or offending my mother’s very exquisite taste and style. It also had to be affordable on my unemployment check, and fit my curvy self in a flattering manner. Oh, and since I am spending what is the whole non-existant budget for my summer clothing on the clothes for one night’s stay in NYC, I need to get a LOT more wearing out of it – it needs to double for job interviews, any graduation parties or family events that come up, and be machine-washable. Not asking much, am I?

It’s a good thing I look good in black, that’s all I’ll say.

It took me two hours, but I managed to find it. And Macy’s is having one of their many sales, that’s a Pre-Sale — I bought the outfit, it’s mine, but now I don’t pick it up until April 25th, and I get 25% off! (And yes, it stays neatly on a hanger the whole time, not balled up in a bag).

I came home and finally, after two weeks, had the house to myself. I got some paperwork done, did wash, and looked for jobs. There’s one I would love, but it would be a huge challenge, and to be honest, I wish I had about 3 years more experience before it popped up as “open” I’m so jazzed about the mission and the work the place does. It’s a soup kitchen/food pantry up in Lansdale, called Manna on Main. I’m sending my resume in, it never hurts to try… but damn, I wish I just had a little more depth in grantsmanship.

So, anyway… the day passed very quickly, and then it was time to go do the morning in reverse: pick up Brent from work, get Zizi from her afterschool program, swing by the car shop, and finally come home and figure out dinner. When Brent went in to sign Zizi out, she came out limping down to the car, and was very whiney and in poor spirits. It ws shocking. Once we got home, she really was upset and I had her cuddle up to me and tell me how her day went – and it hadn’t gone well. She had missed the going away ice cream party for her favorite teacher who was there doing his graduate work in her reading class. Two classmates “bullied her” — which meant they told her to “shush” (this is Quaker school. Real bullying is dealt with severely) She cheered up after we talked a while, but she still seemed.. needy, and tired.

I decided to take her temperature, and my eyes almost popped out of my head – the child’s fever was back, and it was up to 101.8! Higher than it had been the rentire two weeks previously, but a full degree! I dosed her immediately with ibuprophen and called the pediatrician’s night line. Then called her dad to let him know as I waited for the call back.

Got a call back from the nurse practitioner. I mentioned the limping and the general soreness, lack of appetite, fever, and that, given what we’ve been through for 2 weeks, and that we just finished out a round of antibiotics, we need an appointment scheduled… and asked if I should take her to the ER. Don’t want to be a paranoid mom, and an ER trip after 7 pm means we won’t be home until 2 am. If it can wait, it’s better to NOT use our ER, to keep the child comfortable at home. We decided that since the temp wasn’t spiking up very high, we’d wait and see the doc in the office the next day.

But my Spidey-sense ws already on full alert, and I was absolutely twitching. This is like nothing she’s ever had before. I know my kid, this is not normal. I was already thinking that the fever came back after a full course of antibiotics? Infection.

I told Zizi that she was going to sleep in my bed for the night, I wanted to stay close and monitor her temperature. But I was still freaking out, and it was about 8:15…. I finally called Dianne. My go-to Mommy Expert on sick kids. Between the three of them, her kids have had everfuckingthing out there. You know, there’s a point in motherhood, in taking care of sick kids, where you slip into veteran-in-the-trenches mode, and it’s War, and the f-bomb gets issued as a standard prefix before every noun in the sentence. Hence, “Zizi’s fever is back and we’re going back to the doctors’ office obviously the antibiotics didn’t work” becomes “The kid’s fucking fever is fucking back and fuck me with a fucking chainsaw back to the fucking doctor’s fucking office we go. Fucking antibiotics didn’t fucking work. Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuckity fuck-fuck.” at least inside your own head. This is why Di and I are such good friends 3 decades later – we can still talk to each other the same gentle, refined way we did back in all-girls private catholic high school.

I don’t usually call their house at 8:15 at night – that’s past the tire-mommy curfew on phone calls. I hate it when my phone rings after 8. Call me after 10? somebody better already be dead. But I was twitching. I couldn’t NOT call.

Di’s husband Nick answered, and offered to have her call me back, but I guess something in my voice tipped him off and he asked if everything was ok. I spilled it all out – the first fever, the second fever, the antibiotics, the limping, the temperature spike… and he immediately said “Liz, the first thing I can think of is Lyme Disease, with the fever and joint pain – did they test for that? Did you check to see if she has any target-looking red bites on her?”

Oh, Jesus. Because of the hot day, I’d put Zizi in one of her cotton sun dresses, and I never saw her knee. She was wearing a long nightgown for bed, too. I hung up and ran upstairs and the kid was practically already out cold… and I pulled up her nightgown to look, her one knee was the size of a softball – on Zizi, that’s like a snake swallowed a basketball she’s so skinny.

Change of Plans. We all whipped into gear, and Zizi put her dress and sandals back on, we grabbed her Nintendo DS, her blankie and teddy, Brent had to bring me out my book to the car, .. but Zizi and I were at the ER before 9. I called Dave on the way to tell him what was happening, and texted him updates as the night wore on.

WE didn’t get out until 3:15 AM.

And gotta say… never a dull night in the ER. WHOLE Lotta Crazy in the world, just waiting to meet you. Oh, and if the racist douchbag who started yelling at the little black lady just for looking at him reads this – the waiting room was filled with mothers and children. Keep your own F-bombs to yourself in front of our kids. We sure as hell do, and we have a much better reason for using ours. Boo-Hoo, you “were sick and you pay your taxes and you have insurance” (actual quote, from a 260 pound 30-something man who could walk on his own and sit up in a chair) poor widdle you were told to wait, and flipped out after 10 minutes. You scared my kid, who ws sitting there in a wheelchair, and all the other kids and we Moms all moved over across the room, in a big mommy pack and YES, yes we were shooting you evil looks, and yes, every one of us talked to the guards who came to tell you to sit down and STFU that it was all your fault and not the innocent woman whom you were threatening. We’d been there an hour already, you big douchy crybaby. Please know, Jesus may love you, but the rest of us hoped you contracted TB.

But I digress…

The one test we really needed they couldn’t finish in the hours we were there: the Lyme test. The worst part was when the nurse had to draw blood – a lot of blood. And couldn’t find the fucking vein, and my poor baby’s back of her hand was practically stabbed into hamburger. Remember what I said about Ziz undergoing trauma? She can’t break her attention  away, and becomes locked into the pain to the point of not being able to realize it is over or it is going to be ok? 20 minutes of her screaming and terrified, at 1:00 in the morning.

And hour later, when the Orthopedic resident offered to take a fluid sample to test to see if the joint was septic (which would have been very, very bad and mandated that we go immediately to Childrens Hospital for surgery) her difficulty with the needles informed our decision. R-I-C-E and mommy watching like a hawk for 24 hours, instead of draining the fluid with an 18 guage needle. Because of everything else, and how detailed I could remember all of her temps and the history of the past 2 weeks, they called it as “Lyme” even without the lab for that test being back yet. The nice nurse even gave me the first dose of the antibiotic to take home with me – the antibiotic is needed every 12 hours exactly, for 21 days, so giving it to her at 3 am would have been a nightmare. 7:30 is much more sane.

Unfortuantely, I wasn’t thinking too clearly when the alarm clock woke me 3 hours after I laid my head on the pillow this morning. I didn’t  think to give Zizi a slice of bread and a glass of milk, but only wanted to wake her as little as possible so maybe she’d go back to sleep, and I just gave her the pill with water. ADHD is rough on sleep. If she woke up fully the overtiredness would act to keep her awake. Sigh. The kid’s stomach had only had a small bowl of lightly buttered pasta and about 6 oz. of Gatorade since the night before, so it was good an empty when she swallowed that giant honkin’ capsul of . She tried to go back to sleep and ended up with that strong antibiotic making her throw up, 45 minutes later.

Gotta love yellow stomach bile on a hardwood floor as you run down the hall towards the bathroom. Never even saw the puddle, but landed my bare foot dead smack in the middle of it like a Boss, baby. Yeah. That was fun.

And that was the offical start of the “new” day. Zizi was up. Brent had to work at 10,  I begged him to go to the grocery store beforehand, and I was the crazy mother freaking out on the physician’s emergency direct line that my kid threw up her first dose of antibiotic.

And my baby has Lyme Disease. They think we caught it early. They think. I’m still worried sick. This blog post has been my way of procrastinating looking it up online, until I felt calmer. Writing helps me cope. Dianne called this morning when I texted her we were up, what a wonderful best friend. She helped me calm down. I can’t tell anyone else or put anything on Facebook – my mom is supposed to have cataract surgery tomorrow, and there’s no sense in stressing my parents out or telling them anything until we see the doctor, get the drug protocol straightened out, and start moving forward on the solution. I’m getting my therapy by writing about it, not talking about it.

The upside was I managed to get a shower this morning. And man, I needed it. Brent tag teamed me in watching the phone for a call back for an appointment with our pediatrician today, while I enjoyed the decontamination process for a whole self-indulgent 10 minutes. God only knows what was sticking to me from that emergency room. (shudder)

Did you know, if you take a 20 oz bottle of Lemon-Lime gatorade and chug about a third, you can pour in a whole (small) can of Sugar Free Red Bull? And, truly, it’s not that bad a mix, either. I’ll probably glow in the dark after this, but… not half bad.

Our appointment isn’t until 2:30 this afternoon. I really hoped I’d get that call for an earlier squish-us-in time. God, I’m so tired, if I laid down I wouldn’t wake up for 12 hours, and so I can’t even try to catch a nap. Ziz is resting comfortably on the sofa, she has her legs up on a pillow, an ice bag on her knee, and her TV shows on. She even ate a full mug of Chicken & Stars soup, so no complaints.

Sigh. Now I’ve procrastinated enough. Time to go online and do my mommy homework on Lyme Disease.

And back to the doctor’s office we go, in about 45 minutes. I don’t have much time to post.

After being cleared to go bck to school, Zizi developed a little cough. As we plowed through the weekend of family functions, she seemed to get very run down, until finally, yesterday, she was, literally fussy after lunch. Just like when she was a baby and needed a nap! I told her to try to go take one, and to my absolute shock— she did. For hours. Even with Vyvanse in her system. When she woke up, crabby and still tired at 5:30 at night,  I took her temp – 100.4. Oh Jesus.

OH, and I effed up my effing ankle on Thursday. Big time. And am supposed to meet my mother, Di, and her mother for lunch today, but my mom might bag out. Oh, and Brent left with my ATM card still in his wallet this morning so I need to go get it before lunch. Have I left anything out? I’m hobbling around like Quasimodo, dragging a sick kid behind me, with no money

and a Bad Attitude.

I admit it. I’m pissed. I’m at that point where I’m just waiting to chew steel and spit nails if the universe hands me one more EFFing thing to deal with on my plate. One more needly, wheedling, big-eyed obligation looking up at me expectantly and mewling plaintively for me to make its little sads go away.

COPE is a four-letter word.

*****************

Afternoon Update

I’m not going to spit nails anymore. Deep breathing… the best laid plans… sigh.

So, I got my ATM card back. Zizi got put on antibiotics by the doc, who thinks she picked up a secondary sinus infection while her resistance was low, which, in turn necessitated cancelling lunch with Di and our moms because we wouldn’t want to take any chances with Di’s mom being extra susceptible to infections and illness.

Zizi got McD’s for lunch, which made her happy, but she also got tired out being dragged around while I filled her ‘script and grabbed a few over the counter necessities from the pharmacy. Once we got home, she curled up to rest on her own accord, without needing any nagging from me. Talked to her dad to fill him in… Doc’s orders, no school for at least the next 48 hours, possibly till the full antibiotic is done (it is the 5-day kind). The kid is going to miss tomorrow and Thursday from school, and we have to wait and see about Friday.

I’m starving right now. I couldn’t bear the thought of McDonald’s for lunch, so only got myself a medium Diet Coke to keep my energy level up while she ate her evil Happy Meal. Stupid, but … ugh. The further I go in life, the more I hate McDonald’s, and the thought of eating a greasy burger as I drove, and having McStench in my hair and coating the surfaces of my car for the next week just grossed me out. Especially when back here at home I have delicious homemade Vichyssoise and French bread leftover from our dinner last night. Which I am about to go eat in about a minute.

I still need a time out.

I confess, I dream of a week of “solitary” for me: where the man and the kid and the dog are all just… out of the house. Safe. Warm. Happy. But OUT. Where a team of cheerful elves comes in, (preferably the Legolas-from-Lord-of-the-Rings kind, wearing chainmail and leather, since it’s MY fantasy. Santa-type elves would be annoying.) and we get all the closets organized at the same time, the clothes changed over for the season, the garage and attic cleaned out, a garage sale complete, and all my Spring Cleaning done in one shot. And then, I have 6 more days to bask in the splendor of a quiet, orderly home before they – the man, child, and dog – come back. Sigh.

I am taking the certification course for Google Analytics and hopefully will be plugging it in here within the week. Very excited, it’s a really nice set of tools for understanding your web presence. Hopefully I’ll have the shop online soon too. There was somewhat of a delay in that. I kinda had to get back into writing and find my voice again, before I got creative with more than words… but I think I’m ready to expand the Blog more now.

Today, I also got a new P2P person! I’m excited to meet her, but I took the “call me” option since her child is young enough to still be taking naps. I didn’t want to make the phone ring during that precious Nap Time… I remember how golden those hours were to me, back when Zizi was little. She was such a beautiful baby.

Aaaahhh, my baby. She’s not little anymore! Zizi has been toggling around with a low-grade fever for 4 days,  uninterested in food except for soup, and listless, some nausea. Said her throat hurt too so after 4 days of this, I took her into the pediatrician for a strep test, which came back negative. Sigh. Apparently, one of her best friends in school was sick, last week – “for two weekends” - and we can all do the math from there. (Bangs head on desk) But when my kid was running a fever, I kept her germy little self home and have been pouring liquids down her throat, dosing her with Kid’s Tylenol, and making her sleep longer, until the doctor said it was ok to send her back to school.

I can’t imagine what it would be like if I had three or four children, and they were passing bugs around. God bless the bigger families, it’s bad enough around here with the three of us when one of us catches something.

I really like our pediatrician. He is one of those intense, super-smart doctors who really cares, and goes above and beyond when it comes to understanding Zizi’s unique issues. He measured her today, and it turns out, she grew again – she’s just under 5’3″ now. He predicts her adult height will be at least 5’9″. (I bet closer to 6 feet.) My little supermodel. Her weight went down a little from the last time she got weighed anywhere – she’s now 99 lbs, about 4 pounds down.

That’s ok – I had switched her from whole milk down to fat free for a couple of weeks, after we changed her Risperdal dosage, in preparation for an increased appetite. Now I’ll bump up to 1%. Before Zizi wasn’t feeling well, I saw a little perk-up in her eating, but really, not by much. She’s such a healthy snacker, so good about eating baby carrots and grapes and grape tomatoes, and such a vegetable-lover at mealtimes, that I  have an easy job when it comes to keeping her balanced on the meds. The summer she was on only Risperdal, it was much, much harder and she had a rapid gain, so I now watch it pretty carefully when we are going to make any change that affect her metabolism. I can usually cut her calories without her realizing, just by switching milk and cutting back on her “popcorn with butter” – using half a stick instead of a whole stick when I make her a bowl. Of getting ice cream novelties instead of containers of ice cream, so she has a built-in portion control on desserts. Simple little adjustments she never even notices, and if she asks,  I explain them away as “healthy eating”.

My friend Dianne never wants her kids, especially her daughter, to know when she’s (Dianne) dieting, for fear it will give her “food issues”. Zizi HAS asked me if she needs a diet, just recently. I almost couldn’t believe it. Fifth grade, and the kid is gorgeous and perfect in every way. WHAT the hell??? That’s our culture, and if those messages are already seeped into Zizi’s mind… I’d hate to think what would be going through her head if she was in the public school. I pointed out her “bony, skinny-girl ribs” and tickled them, and then had her feel my side – whatever ribs I have in me are succulent and ready for the Alien BBQ sauce, and nobody is gonna call me “thin” this week.

Sigh. That’s another thing, uuuugh the diet. Four days of the weekend, her sick, and his weird scheduled days off, and I’m itching to get both the kid and the man out of the house so I can JUST. BE. ALONE. I love my family, but, … “Feed me!” “Help me!” “Feed me!” ”Wash the dog!” “Feed me!” ”Give me directions!” … I just want a few hours to zone out on the treadmill, eat a salad sitting down, and have a quiet house to myself to center and log my Points and get back on track.

Dear Toys R Us:

I’ve recently become aware that you are being pressured by an extremist hate group called the “Million Mom’s” (even though they don’t actually HAVE anywhere near a million members on Facebook or Twitter) to remove an Archie Comic that features two male characters on their wedding day on the cover. I am writing to ask that you PLEASE don’t cave to this bunch of nasty bigots.

I have been one of your most loyal and happy customers for years. Even before becoming a mother myself, I have plenty of nieces and nephews who I’ve always bought gifts for from your stores. When my daughter was a baby, I bought everything from Babies’R’Us and Toys’R’Us and absolutely LOVE shopping and spending my money in your family of stores. This past year I bought all our Christmas and birthday gifts from you – not Target, not Walmart – Toys’R’Us got all of my business, including some things for the grown ups in the family.  I am the proud mother of an 11-year-old daughter who loves comics, creates her own, and hopes to be a professional artist one day. I can’t wait to buy this issue for my child! As someone (like most of the American population) who knows, is friends with, and respects gay people, I am overjoyed to see a product that portrays that kind of equality that we should all be reaching for.

With all of the recent suicides of young people lately, stemming from the horrible messages of hate and intolerance that they absorb, over and over from toxic, horrible people like this hadful of bigots, I do not know how they dare to call themselves “moms”. I ask you to please think of the message that you can send to these children, that Toys’R’Us is a happy, friendly place of play and joy – not hate and bigotry. My daughter has always delighted in going to your store. I want that for all our kids.

J.C. Penny was pressured by this same group because of their choice of Ellen DeGeneres as a spokesperson. I never really shopped in J.C. Penny before, but the controversy made me take a new look at them, and now I can say, they have a new customer in me. They have received a huge boost in perception for their refusal to bow to the pressures of a group dedicated to the shaming and resisting full equality for all gay citizens.

Just knowing that you stock such items and will continue to do so in the face of pressure will certainly make me much more likely to shop your stores and on-line offerings for my toy purchases.

Please stand strong for equality and do not let the small minded pressure you.

Sincerely,

Liz Tarditi

“Zizi’s Mom”

Proud Customer of Toys’R’Us!

Last night I feel asleep early and slept deeply through the night. That alone is  wonderful. I can’t believe I’m saying this, but today a rare thing happened: I woke up early, in the good way.

Like a lot of women, most times I find myself waking up in the middle of the night and having trouble getting back to sleep. Depending on how “awake” I am, and what time it is, sometimes I quietly go into the office and look at job postings – no sense wasting a sleepless night, right? Other times, I’ll wake up because I need to use the bathroom, and, dammit, I’ll end up trying for an hour and a half to get back to sleep, only for the alarm clock to go off juuust as I’m finally slipping into a dream. Both of those leave me feeling like a truck ran over me the next day.

This morning, though, Brent had to get up early to unload a shipment at work, and, even though I slept through his alarm, I started waking when he got up, gradually and naturally coming into consciousness until I realized that I was listening to the shower run, and I REALLY needed the bathroom IMMEDIATELY. While I was still blinking from the light and shuffling my feet, I was, indeed, fully awake and I knew it. A full hour before I needed to be.

I had the luxury of time. Time to get a full shower (including shaving my legs and the deep conditioner for my hair), get myself dressed in something other than smells-cleanish-covers-everything-GET-IN-THE-DAMNED-CAR-WE’RE-LATE-ALREADY! Time to drink a full mug of coffee, sitting down, while the kid was still sleeping. I think I’ve had about 6 mornings like this in the entire time I’ve been a mom. It was AWESOME!

(((((((((((((((((((((((((((Happy Snoopy Dance of Awesome!))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))

(See? See what happens when I’m properly caffeinated!?! Take heed, World!)

And  the cherry on top was that the chaos of the morning that I’m normally swimming in was totally diffused. HE left early for work, there was a long pause, and then SHE woke up naturally on her own, about 10 minutes early, without about 70% of her normal drama queen crap, and THEY did not need to be refereed for once.  I was already “in place” to have her hot breakfast made and her lunch half-packed, and while I won’t say it was trouble-free…. Zizi put too much conditioner on her hair and it needs to be rewashed tonight, and then the child just HAD to let the dog run out of the front door when it was time to leave for school… and I am glad to have them both out of my hair at the moment, after a wild and woolly roller coaster of preteen hormones and drama last night…. the fact is, I didn’t feel my pulse pounding in my skull even once this morning. There was still Drill Sergent mode, of course, but not the Full Medusa (like last Friday).

I should write a post about The Full Medusa, I’m actually feeling like I can laugh about it, now.Took a full 5 days, and a morning like this, to get my chill back, though. Damn, that sucked.

Sigh. There are things to do and the world still needs saving, of course. School Auction items don’t solicit themselves. The last load I washed last night is gonna stink if I don’t switch it to the dryer this morning. My cellphone is lost in the abyss of time and space probably being worshipped as a god on some primitive planet in another dimension, and I have to dig up the gift card for my hair appointment tomorrow, to make sure it will cover both cut and color before I confirm the appointment. Don’t even get me started on the effing treadmill bait-and-switch drama with Sears.

But I’m an hour ahead of schedule, and that, my friends, is a beautiful thing.

It’s funny the things that stick with you from childhood. One of them, for me, is the act of praying by lighting a candle in front of my Blessed Mother statue. I still light a candle when I have something important to pray about, when I want God to pay particular attention. Right now the candle I’m burning is colored red. It’s cheerful. I’m hoping that a job I just applied for will come through, and hopefully my little red candle will be an amusing little hint-hint to the Almighty that I’m asking for good fortune and prosperity. After all, it never hurts to suck up to the Big Boss.

That being said, I’m also still buying my weekly lottery tickets. As much as I hope and pray for a job that will allow me to support my family and also do good in the world, it wouldn’t exactly suck if, by great good fortune, I was bankrolled as a philanthropist and could literally spend the rest of my life on the Big Mission I think God’s worked pretty hard educating me about and for: special kids and education in the outside world, and being the caregiver to my family on the homefront.

Quakers aren’t supposed to gamble. We also don’t have statues of the Blessed Mother and light candles in front of them. Oops.

I was raised Catholic. Lighting candles for intentions and prayers is a big thing for Catholics. I’m not Catholic anymore. I guess that’s on my mind right now because of all the hullabaloo in the media for the past two weeks. Women’s Rights. Birth Control. Rick Santorum. Priests banning Gril Scouts troops from parishes. Bishops all hopping up and down with their mitres in a twist, in an obvious play for political power (otherwise why didn’t they collectively freak years ago when California’s legislation was passed?).

They don’t miss me. My absence has neither been noted nor wept over.  I mean that literally: even after multiple written requests to have my name removed from the local parish register, I’m still getting solicitation letters from the rectory and a weird magazine from the archdiocese. It’s a bit annoying, really. I wasn’t a particularly good Catholic to begin with, having many questions about faith that frustrated and confused my early religion teachers, and later angered my college professor. In an odd way, the relationship I have with our Creator outgrew the little box it was supposed to be kept in, like the little purple flowers that now spring up in the grass beyond the base of their original terracotta pot on my front steps. God’s love, my soul’s response, and the relationship between Us got so deep, so close, so absolutely essential in my life that I can’t cut it down smaller and stuff it back in the framework my former religion provides anymore. To get back to the flower pot metaphore, imagine a whole neighborhood blanketed in violas. That’s my faith now. I hope before I die that I’ll be describing it as “the whole tri-state area”.

I still have my candle lit in front of the Blessed Mother, though. I think of Her now as the MotherGod, the feminine aspect of the Divine, and the creative energy… in other words, the Immaculate Conception for me is God’s own thought become physical reality, an act of pure creation that could never have the possibility of sin or imperfection. The real Big Bang, and every second since then of sustained reality in this universe, including but not limited to the molecular cohesion of objects, the spark of life itself,… my whole Theory of Everything. When I’m praying, I’m asking for creation, for change, for growth, so it just fits that I should ask the Creator of All Life to help me in creating a good little “world” for my own life and family, and hopefully a better real world for other kids and families.

I have to say, sometimes people can really surprise me. Zizi’s dad has, recently. He didn’t freak out about the latest  Bryn Mawr Child Study’s Neuropsych Eval results. He’s coming in for the school’s Learning Fair this spring, and he’s been fairly “open” in his listening lately  about Zizi’s upswing in behavior issues.

I’m hesitant to trust such a period of positive co-parenting, since every time we’ve had one of these previously it has harbingered a real zinger from his camp. The time he tried to take primary custody, only to then “settle” for having to spend less vists with her, pretty much nuked me fully trusting him, ever again. But, for what it’s worth, it’s actually been very smooth between us over the past few months of visits, scheduling, and dealing with the change of the prescribing doctor within Team Zizi. It makes life a lot less stressful, so I can concentrate my energies raising her and adding quality to her life.

Is it wrong of me to notice that, as much as I need a job again, the months of not having to deal with one have created a much higher quality of life for my child? The big deal stuff, like her Neuropsych Eval, and changing doctors, would have taken a full month of days out of my time. If I’d had an employer during the fall, it would have been a disaster in my professional life. All those appointments and conferences would have come first, as they always have, and any employer would have been extremely displeased. In France they get a mandatory 6 weeks of vacation per annum - how many families would be so much better off if we all had that in America? Not just those of us with special needs issues, but so that we all had the time to breathe, the time to recharge, the time to connect with each other? If I had an extra month of free time every year, what more and better could I do?

The day-by-day quality of our lives is also higher when I’ve got the time to make it better: I cook more, and better, homemade meals; the wash doesn’t pile up quite so high, or so often; I have the time to volunteer at the school and connect in a way that I can tell immediately benefits Zizi; I have more time and attention to give directly to her during non-school hours. Puberty is practically here, and it means the world to have our mother-daughter relationship so close and trusting. I know it can’t last, but I also know that this bond is better than I had with my own mom when I was Zizi’s age, and that gives me extra optimism about the years ahead.

Over the past weeks we’ve had several rough patches, which finally culminated in a solid week of horrible mornings and horrible bedtimes. Every. Single. Day. Each day she would promise to be better, and the next day we’d repeat the same BS as the day before. She was a vicious bullying tyrant to both Brent and I, waking up screeching at the top of her lungs in our faces, taking naps on the bathroom floor instead of brushing her teeth or getting dressed for school, and generally unleashing hell on our lives and normal family routine. I went through the whole textbook of techniques and strategies to change the outcome, and Zizi ran through her whole playbook of responses and drama, and nothing worked. The stress level in the house was pushed to the limits, and, honestly, my own blood pressure had me feeling my pulse in my face and getting lightheaded. Finally, that Friday, it started all over again and I finally abandoned all the “behavioral” techniques for special parenting and just treated her like I would if she was a normal kid acting like a brat. I laid down a real punishment, something with teeth in it: She got GROUNDED. For a solid WEEK.

The TV was disconnected. Her electronics were all taken away, except the online math supplemental work that she is supposed to do for school. Life was flashcards, reading, and no extras – no “treat” from the grocery store, no favorite dinner or desserts to soften things, no movies, no kidding. I also gave her a guilt trip on the way to school that resulted in her having quite an attack of conscience for the rest of the day (and a conversation with the Head of School – who backed me up! YESSS!) We had a 3-day weekend that was basically spent with me doing my Granite Wall impersonation. When it really sunk in that this was happening, Zizi had a series of temper tantrums and screaming/crying fits, and I didn’t give an inch. I told her flat-out, “It’s called being grounded because it’s supposed to be a punishment. Act worse and you will get the grounding extended. Give me a bad attitude and I’ll make it even harder on you and make you do more housework. Thank your lucky starts that you are learning this at age 11, because when you are a teenager and have dances or dates or plans for this weekend, you’d loose them all, and not be allowed out of the house. Learn that and remember it right now: your mother loves you enough to teach you that your actions have consequences, you WILL NOT put our family through this again, and, most importantly, YOUR MOTHER will NEVER back down on a grounding, once it’s handed out. Do your time, learn, and it’s over Friday, after school. Give me any more trouble, and it will only get worse. One week can become two, and two weeks can become a month. Do your time, and then we move forward.”

On the other hand, I wasn’t heartless or cold during the punishment. I thanked her and praised her good behaviors, like helping to empty the dishwasher and cleaning her room. I hugged her when she was behaving nicely. We worked together to choose outfits and put them together on hangers for the next coming school week so that she could  have success in her morning dressing.  I decided to watch a wedding planning show I knew Zizi would be interested in, even though it’s not a children’s program, and let her stay in the room while I was watching it. I told her I loved her frequently, and, as the days went on, reminded her that the grounding was over on Friday, with her good behavior.

After getting over the initial shock of it all, and when she realized her drama wouldn’t work, the lesson sunk in. We had a wonderful week. She was really happy when the grounding got lifted, but, honestly, the week had broken her out of several unfavorable routines she had going that she wasn’t even aware of: the TV watching, the attitude, the family participation. It’s been a very positive change, all around. And, when I “released” the grounding, we talked about it again, and summed up the lessons she learned. It seems like she really got it. Her behavior changed for the better.

We still need to tweak her meds. We still need the behaviorist. But this time, some plain old-fashioned parenting worked wonders. And, just icing on the cake, getting back to my original point about her Dad – he backed me up during this time when they talked in their nightly phone calls. We both reinforced to Zizi that if one of us lays down a major punishment, she won’t wiggle out of it with the other parent. That kind of “one voice” approach made an impression, and cut out a lot of the drama. That’s what I mean when I say, things are going, for right now, better than I expected.