The Po Show

Once Again

I hate to sound like a broken record (actually I am thrilled to be sounding like a broken record in *this* instance), but this year beats the hell out of last year. Today is my birthday (thank you, thank you very much). On my birthday *last* year, we had to go to an interview at the first day treatment program we visited. I was all stressed out, trying to find the place, worrying about how to deal with the timing of picking up Ross at a train station near the campus. I was stressed out in general, with the whole "we have to find a placement for Matthew and it's SUMMER and we're leaving for CA next week" situation.

So we had both kids in tow, and no one was expecting us. We waited for the director, who was in another meeting, for almost an hour. When we finally did see him, he had no idea who we were, had not seen Matthew's file, could only tell us that there were no spaces available for next year. He tried his best to give us an introduction to the place, and when Matthew heard that it was a year-round program, with a summer session, he flipped out and started banging his head. We got him together enough to go on a brief tour of the campus, which was quite nice, but it was all a bizarre and upsetting experience. Afterwards, Ross asked me where I wanted to go for my birthday dinner (woohoo, let's party now!) and we ended up going to Cheesecake Factory and it was very nice, but I was so emotionally drained.

My birthday this year was much nicer. Tessa went to art and music camp, which she is loving (it's just too adorable to see her playing "Hot Cross Buns" and "Mary Had a Little Lamb" on her half-size violin), so Matthew and I were alone for most of the day. We went to the library and to the mall, had lunch and frozen yogurt, and went grocery shopping. I received a TON of lovely birthday wishes via Facebook and email, including an ecard from my sister that featured a dog that was shocked when the question "How old ARE you?" came up on the screen :D. Tessa came home and disappeared into her room, where she proceeded to make me THREE sets of cards and gifts (each in a shoe box, and I was supposed to choose one :)). Ross came home early, bearing flowers, and I had a brownie with a candle in it so they could sing Happy Birthday to me. I received a beautiful black dress and three pairs of wool socks (I had been saying that most of my wool socks were shot, so he found some SmartWool socks on sale at Nordstrom Rack :)). My sister called and I had a nice long talk with her. Now I'm having birthday cocktails (acai juice and vodka, because you know that as you get older, you need a lot more antioxidants :D). So all in all, a lovely birthday indeed.

Oh, and we found out that we totally dodged a bullet with that other day treatment program. We were talking to the parents of a girl who had gone there for a year (till they pulled her out and managed to get her placed in Matthew's school) and it would have been completely, disastrously wrong for him. Apparently the staff there is great, but the student population is very tough, to put it mildly, and Matthew would have gotten eaten alive there.

So there, more this year goodness.

Happy Birthday Bunny Girl

Yesterday my baby girl turned eight years old. She is lovely and magical and larger than life.

As her years on earth accumulate, a sense of panic builds in me. She is growing up, stepping away from me and farther out into the world. She still clings to me now, enclosing me in waves of love and need and connectivity. But the time when that diminishes is right around the corner; I can almost see it in my peripheral vision. The intensity of emotion she feels for me will never completely fade, but it will never again be what it is now. I will bear this, but not lightly.

She drives me insane on a daily basis, but she is the brightest spot in my universe. I feel like she was my most profound gift, the one sent to show me the limitlessness of the sky. And now she is eight. A figure eight, a circle that turns round upon itself. Place it on its side and it's a symbol, meaning infinity.

Lasts that Last

Today was Matthew's last day of school for the "regular" year (as opposed to the summer session, which begins in two and a half weeks). What a difference a year makes, as last year's last day of school was horrific. He didn't have a placement for the next school year (he'd been given one earlier in the week, when I was told that they'd placed him in the BOCES autism program, then unceremoniously had it taken away the following day when I was informed that that program was full). What should have been a day of closure was instead a day of rushed uncertainty. I had to hustle him out of school with quick goodbyes to the school psychologist who loved him so dearly, feed both kids a hasty lunch, drop Tessa off at a friend's birthday party, and then take Matthew for an interview at the school with the autism program, the one that did not have space for him. I still don't know why they made us go through that, but the psychologist attached to the program set up a meeting with the program teacher, who was very nice, but reiterated that they did not any spots available and actually had several kids on the waiting list.

Today was much better, to cap off a sensationally better year. Matthew enjoyed the pizza lunch, said they had free time all day (he chronicled the great Yu Gi Oh battle he'd won), and he brought home a treasure. It's a photo album the teachers put together and sent home, with pictures of him throughout the year (with cute captions and scrapbook embellishments). The best ones are the one that has the caption "Friends" and shows Matthew laughing with several of his classmates, and a two picture set, the first of which is captioned "All," while the second reads "Smiles," with Matthew smiling broadly in both. The child, for whom school was formerly the site of tragedy, smiling. It's all there, the story of the year.

Today was a little bittersweet for me, because I got to see some of the kids from Matthew's cohort at the "old" school (which of course is still Tessa's school). Today was 5th grade graduation, and they were all dressed up, these kids that Matthew has known since 1st grade, and if things had been different he would have been there with them, moving on.

Instead he's moved on without them, and that's fine, better than fine, because he didn't belong with them. He is where he belongs, a transformation that's built to last.

Happy Father's Day

The weather did not cooperate yesterday (it's rained 19 of 22 days in the month of June so far! ICK!), so we didn't go to the city as planned. I made tons of hash browns for breakfast and Ross got his presents (from all of us: a much needed new UCLA cap, a tee shirt with quotes from The Big Lebowski, and the new Elvis Costello CD). He got a sweet school-made card from Tessa, and a card and picture frame made by Matthew.

Here's a picture of the picture frame:



Look at that lovely smile on that boy. For the last few years, they couldn't even get him to take a picture at school for class projects. The ones we have from first grade and kindergarten show him grimacing like someone stepped on his foot. But this, this sums up the year for him.

Social Butterfly

For people who don't have much of a social life, we are pretty busy these days. Next Friday is Tessa's last day of school (a half day) and she had invitations to two different parties. Curiously enough, she chose the pizza and waterslide party of her friend Rory, who was in her pre-K class but hasn't really been a close friend since then. I would have thought she'd have chosen the "tea party playdate" of her classmate Sofia, the one in which all the girls are going to wear fancy dresses. Tessa is such a mixture of girly girl and non-girly girl, who loves her world "cute" and pink, but loves Pokemon and YuGiOh too.

The following day, next Saturday, will be her own birthday party at Build-A-Bear Workshop. We have 12 kids coming (eeep), with pizza and ice cream to follow. Then at 3:00, we will be going to Matthew's classmate's pool party, which both of my kids are really looking forward to as well.

Today we were supposed to go to a party at another of Matthew's classmates. It was FAR (like 45 miles away), but Matthew was very excited about going. I asked if he knew if a lot of the other kids from class were coming, but the only one he could remember was (of course) Lydia. He thought several other kids had said they were coming, but he knew she was :). We left around 11:00 (the party was to start at 1:00), drove in the rain up to the outlet center that was just a couple of miles from the friend's house, and stopped for lunch. We found our way to the house and Ross remarked (since there were no cars parked in front), "Are we the first ones here?" We got out of the car, Matthew commented a few times that he was nervous (he still has such a hard time dealing with out of the ordinary events), and we walked up the drive.

The dad met us outside with a hesitant look on his face and asked, "Did you not get our message?" Oops, not what you want to hear! It turns out Chris has been sick on and off for awhile, and late this morning he started throwing up, so they decided to call off the party. They had called everyone at about 11:30, but we had already left. The parents felt terrible that we had driven all the way up there, but of course we understood. Ross wanted to go back to the outlet center, since we were up there anyway, so we upset the children further by making them walk in the rain and shop. It was really raining too! Things just worsened from there, as we were stuck in abysmal traffic on the way back, as there had been an accident earlier on the bridge across the Hudson (it took us 40 minutes to go about half a mile at one point). Matthew got very very upset that the traffic was so bad, and that it was "all for nothing" since the party had been cancelled. Strangely enough, this didn't happen till the traffic had actually picked up and we were moving pretty well.

I sure hope the social engagements to come all go better!

In Sickness and In Health

Matthew has been sick, with what seemed very flu-like yesterday (including a 102.8 fever). He's better today.

Yesterday Tessa just could not keep her voice down while Matthew was trying to rest. At one point he fell asleep for a couple of hours, and stumbled out to the living room at about 6:45 in the evening. Tessa was drawing something on the floor, and she yelled really loudly when she saw him. He got very upset, since his head was pounding already, and I got mad at her for being so loud. "I'm sorry," she sniffled, "I was just so excited to see Matthew."

Later he dazedly went to bed again, and he ended up sleeping most of the night. Tessa left a card, which she had apparently been making for him when she yelled so loudly, in his doorway. I pointed it out to him this morning after she left for school. It had a big happy face on the cover, with a cheery "GET WELL SOON!"

Inside it read:

Dear Matthew,

I hope you get well soon.
Your (sic) a great brother.

Love,
Tessa (written in cursive)


She's loud, but she's sweet as pie :).

And the Winner Is...

Last Tuesday was Awards Day at Matthew's school, a yearly event. The students each receive two awards, chosen and written for them by their teachers, to reflect both academic and social achievement. They are printed on a lovely certificate, each in an individual envelope. Matthew's awards were:

"Outstanding Excellence in Social Studies: For his insightful conversations regarding social studies topics; for his participation activities and for adding comments based on previous readings."

This one he expected, because Social Studies is his favorite subject. Apparently he was quite thrilled when they announced it, and he went up to one of his teachers and enthused, "I got my Social Studies award!"

He also received:

"Award for Improvement in Communication: For his increasing ability to explain his feelings, both positive and negative, to his teachers without worrying about expressing those feelings."

The progress he's made this year has been so amazing. He actually will say how he feels about things, even things that are upsetting. One development that I've found astounding is that on a couple of occasions, he's told his therapist about something he was too hesitant to broach with me, and asked her if she would call me to tell me about it.

It all reminds me of The Wizard of Oz, when each of Dorothy's companions receives an award for accomplishing the things that were the hardest things in the world for them to do. They found the means within themselves, and stretched farther than any of them would have thought possible.

Just like Matthew.