I'm gonna have a very happy boy very soon

I can't say too much in case he reads this but come Christmas morning my little man is going to be so overwhelmed he might just explode!

At least that's what I hope happens cause we got him some pretty amazing gifts this year!

I am looking forward to laughter, smiles, and yes I will probably shed a few tears of joy too. This year is the first time in a very long time that Hubby and I have actually bought something for each other and didn't spend ALL our cash on the Wild Child. It's gonna be an awesome Christmas this year!

It's begining to look a lot like Christmas

Christmas has arrived in our house and my little boy is now a young man. He is growing like a weed, so fast in fact that even the pediatrician said ....

"HOLY GROWTH SPURT!!!"

the last time she saw him.  The Wild Child goes in every 4 months for a check up to make sure the ADHD medicine isn't messing with his growth or hurting his heart at all. This last visit, he had grown 2 1/2 inches and gained 10 pounds...in 4 months time! The pediatrician says that's not supposed to happen yet, he's supposed to wait until he's 13 or so. Of course this boy is one who has always taken his own path in life, he does not follow the curve of the norm. Never has and probably never will either. As I look at my boy, my young man, my heart skips a beat and pauses. This young man is my creation...yes my husband has helped to raise him and without his genes he wouldn't be here....but he is still my creation. I carried him for 41 weeks, I made sure I did everything possible to bring a healthy baby boy into this world. I held him in my arms, I provided his food for 19 months after he arrived. I showed him right from wrong. I have watched the tiny changes from tiny little baby to the young man that sits before me now. He is my creation and I feel proud.

When I am completely honest with myself, I never thought I could really pull this parenting thing off. I had such a strong desire to be a mother and to do a better job than my egg donor, but deep down inside I worried that I was going to screw it up. I was worried that somewhere hidden in the genetic makeup was a bad glitch that would rear its ugly head and make me mess up. I have watched other abused children grow up to repeat the cycle, I have seen the statistics, I knew I was swimming against the tide. I didn't know if I was strong enough to be a good parent but I had such a desire that I had to try. Looking at my young man sitting next to the Christmas tree, watching him help me hang ornaments and hope for Christmas presents. Listening to him sing and laugh and just talk about stuff that I don't even fully understand....it all warms my heart. I did good with this one, he was worth all the effort.

Don't get me wrong, I know my job is far from over and now that he is getting close to the teen years my job has multiplied and grown drastically. Much like his growth spurt, my job has expanded and now is even bigger. Now I face new challenges, new territory, places that I know nothing about because I have never been a teenage boy and have no clue what kind of stuff he is going through. I have had my hormonal changes, but it is not the same for a girl as it is for a boy. He goes through these anger phases where I went through crying phases. As a typical kid he is trying to stretch his wings and put distance between himself and his parents and it breaks my heart to watch it happen. I am not ready to let go, I am not ready to let him spread his wings and fly, yet again I am not sure I am truly ready for what life is dishing out.

I know I will overcome, I know in another 11 years I will look upon my son and smile with pride. I have faith in this fact. I believe that we will struggle along this path, that we will make a few mistakes, but in the end I feel deep down inside that I have built a solid foundation and that this young man I see now will be a great adult, someone I can look at and be proud of. I am certain that someday others will look at my son and say "His mother must be so proud of him." I believe in these facts, I believe them to be true even though they have not happened yet....and in my opinion, that is half the battle right there. Knowing, and believing in, your success before it has actually happened.....that is the key to success. If I can see the big picture, even if it's a little fuzzy, I know it will become clear in due time. The day that happens, the day where I can look back at this post and say "yep, I was right" that day will be a wonderful day. Until that day, I will look at the here and now...and right now this is what I see.....

I see a young man beside a Christmas tree dreaming of good things. Hoping he has been good enough to get all that he is dreaming of and truly desires. As I wrap presents and put them under the tree I know he is looking and analyzing the size of the packages and trying to figure out what they might be. Every kid does that right? I know he's waiting and hoping for a really big box to show up, hoping he'll get that one special present, the one that will just make his Christmas complete. I can't wait to watch his face as he opens these gifts that we have bought for him, I hope he likes them as much as I believe he will. I love this time of year because it brings out the kid in my kid and the kid in me. I never got to fully enjoy Christmas as a kid, my day to day existence was filled with fear and torture, not laughter and hopes and dreams. I enjoy watching my son have the Christmas' that I always dreamed of having....and that is my Christmas gift to myself.

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Not sure how much I will be updating in the coming weeks. As Christmas arrives life gets busier and I don't always get the chance to get on my blog. I hope everyone reading this blog has a wonderful holiday...whatever holiday you celebrate. In my house, we celebrate Christmas and so to you and yours...Merry Christmas ans Happy New Year!

Just some random thoughts

Recently I have had some titles come across my desk at work that have made me think.  These are religious based questions, and anyone who has read my blog knows that I often question the christian beliefs....well here are a few thoughts along those lines.

First there's the story of Christmas, I see and hear these people daily asking why people want to take Christ out of Christmas...well my question would be, "Why do you have to butt your Christ into our Christmas?" The traditional Christmas holiday had nothing to do with the birth of Christ. As a matter of fact, if you read the story in the bible and then compare it to the known weather patterns in that part of the world, it is impossible that Christ was born in the month of December! The flocks of sheep would not be out in the fields in the dead of night in the middle of December and the shepherds would not be sitting out there guarding them. But let's look at this story a little more. Christians want you to believe that this virgin girl was "touched" by God and became pregnant with his son...ok people we all know how babies are made so that narrows down to God raped an innocent 13 year old virgin to impregnate her with his child. A girl that was already vowed to marry another. Now Joseph, the poor sap, had no choice but to go ahead and marry the girl and make her an honorable woman so that she wasn't having a child out of wedlock. So Christians put all their beliefs and hopes into a child molester! But, he's not just a child molester, he's also a supporter of incest as well.

Now you might ask how I came to the conclusion that God supports incest? It's simple really....God created Adam and Eve right? They got together and had a bunch of children...well where do you think the rest of the population came from? Now it's entirely possible that Adam and Eve, much like the Duggar family had 3 football teams worth of kids, but eventually Eve's body would have said enough of this and stopped producing kids. The only logical way for the population of this planet to continue is for those children to get busy and make some of their own...that's called incest. Brothers and sisters are not supposed to get it on, it's just wrong and nasty....yet God supports it because he only created one man and one woman to procreate and populate the earth. If he didn't support it he would have created two men and two women so that they could have children and the genes wouldn't have to mix because there would be two separate families with different genetics.

Personally I think Christians are just looking for some hope, grasping for something to make life meaningful. So they created these stories and passed them down from generation to generation without thinking about how these stories actually sound when you look at them from the outside. They were so desperate to not let pagans have a holiday that they created this story of Christ being born on Christmas day, so sad, why single yourself out? Why not join in with society and go along with the festivities? If you don't want to party with the pagans then celebrate your god but don't go changing the story to say what you want it to be, just celebrate in your own circle of friends like the rest of us. Celebrate your god but don't change his birthday just to attempt to take away the original reason for the holiday...you're so selfish to do that and isn't selfishness wrong in your book?  When Christians hear stories about rape they pray, they say God will get you through this and they pray for justice. They pray that the rapist finds Christ and asks for forgiveness for his sins and that the victim be healed...why? Because God is a rapist himself, Jesus Christ is a child of rape and so they will understand. Of course God will forgive the rapist, he's one himself, he can totally relate. And Christ will of course heal the heart of the victim because he knows his mother was a victim too.  When these Christians hear about incest they are disgusted and call it an abomination, yet they don't see their own story of creation to be an abomination...why? I do not know!

These are just a couple of reasons why I struggle with this Christian belief system. I have been a victim and I don't think they are great stories to teach children. Why should a child worship a child molester? If God were to pull that crap today he would go to jail and once he got out he would be labeled a sex offender for the rest of his life. Maybe Christians need to rethink and keep their Christ out of my Christmas, I much prefer to celebrate the real reason for the season....love, family and our life together.

The joys of fall....

We live where there are lots and lots of trees and that means lots and lots of leaves. Today was week three of cleaning up leaves off the yard and moving them back into the woods so that our grass can grow nice come springtime. Lucky for me, I have this terrific little wild child who just so happens is at the perfect age to do yardwork. BUT he's also still at that perfectly playful age too so after all the leaves are piled up, and before he helps me lug them off into the woods, he gets to do things like this......

That was just one of the smaller piles of leaves, we had a few that were at least three times as big on the side yard and a couple other that were about the same as that one as well. But he got to run through the leaves, he got to have fun and laugh, and he totally enjoyed jumping off that swing into that pile over and over again. At one point he did ask me why I didn't join in, why I no longer jump in leaves and play too. Kinda got me to thinking that maybe I shouldn't worry about what the neighbors think and I too should just have some childish leaf fun....but then again I don't want the neighbors to think I've gone a bit loopy since turning 40. I did have fun watching him have fun and I laughed with him and enjoyed capturing the moment in my minds eye and on the camera. I'll look back on those with fondness in the future and I can only hope that someday, when he's all grown up, he'll come back and help with those leaves and maybe make some memories of his own as he watches his children play and laugh in the leaves. Then we'll share a whole different perspective of these memories and maybe then he'll understand that a parent doesn't have to actually play in the leaves to have fun, they just have to watch their children do it.

Grounded

This past week has been a very long one for the wild child and for myself....because he was grounded.  Long story short, he got caught texting some pretty bad language and a lesson needed to be learned. So he spent the entire week with no electronics except for the 30 minutes a day that was allowed to him. He had no cell phone time, no tv, no video games, nothing electronic at all for entertainment. For 30 minutes each day he could watch tv or play on his iPod, but no internet and no computer except for school work. Also no friends and he missed out on going to spend the weekend with his grandparents. He was pretty bored at first and then he started to use his imagination and found that life isn't so bad without electronic devices to entertain. He discovered old toys that he had stopped playing with and the joy of shooting hoops in the driveway. He learned to enjoy reading again to pass the time and learned just how much he enjoys his electronic toys. He learned a new appreciation for what he has and learned that mom isn't a pushover.

Today he got back his electronic devices, he is still without a phone for another week. I feel I still need to drive to home just how severe of an offense it was that he was texting with that kind of language. Regardless of what other children say in their texts, it is not, and never will be, ok for my child to speak or text in that way.  Mom is playing tough and the wild child is learning a valuable lesson.

Let me tell ya though, this week I have faced my biggest challenge ever....sticking to a punishment that I handed out! Quite often, because of his ADHD, I will give in early and let him have back what was taken away. I think that has actually taught him that mom is a softy and will give in quickly if he puts on his pouty face and apologizes nicely. I tend to go easier on him because I know he struggles with his impulse control with the ADHD and I don't think that has been a good lesson to teach. So now, now that he is older, I must be strong and hold out so that he can learn to control the impulses and be a good man. Now I must be strong and be a mom.....it really isn't easy!

Halloween, the happiest and scariest time of year. A time to be scared for the fun of it, a time for haunted scary houses and thoughts of dead people coming to suck your blood or eat your brains. Halloween is the one time of year where it's ok to be scared of everything.

When I was a kid, I was scared of everything every single day of my life. I was scared of getting the beating that I knew I would get. I was scared of the boogie man who was actually the sperm donor. I was scared of the dark, I was scared of the light. I spent every waking moment scared of something. On Halloween night we would dress up as scary things like ghosts or pretty things like fairy princess'. Then  we would grab a pillow case and our little orange box from school, the UNICEF box that we received every year at school. People would have bowls of candy and another of pennies to put into the UNICEF box. It was a tradition that we did every single year, we would take the box of pennies to school the next day and hand it in. The teachers would send the money off to help poor children who had no food to eat or the opportunity to get an education. Anyway, we would head out trick or treating....the egg donor often driving the car and letting us out here and there to run around through the streets pretending to be something we weren't begging for candy and pennies. 

Before walking out the door we were always warned "No funny rhymes like "Trick or treat, smell my feet, give me something good to eat" and no eating the candy! We were warned not to touch a single piece, never open a wrapper, never eat anything given to us because someone might have put a razor blade in it and it would cut off our tongues and we would bleed to death and die! 

OH THE TEMPTATION!

As we rode in the back seat we would try to sneak candy into our pockets so that she wouldn't know. We knew what was going to happen once we got home, we knew that once we entered that house with that candy we would never see that candy again. See the egg donor had to "test" the candy to make sure it wasn't poisoned or that it didn't have razor blades in it. If it looked tampered with (aka it was a piece of candy she didn't like) then it was thrown into the trash. If it looked like it might be ok, she would take a bite to be sure and then she would have to be 100% so she would eat the rest. She would sit there and eat the candy in front of us, torturing us by eating our candy and not letting us have a single piece. Sometimes I would sneak to the trash barrel after she went to bed and steal pieces of candy out of it. I had a spot in the back of my bureau where I stashed my candy, in my underwear where she wouldn't look or find it.....and I knew my siblings wouldn't go there either. The candy was safe from all. 

Perhaps she meant well, trying to protect us from harm. Perhaps she really did, in some sick weird way, think she was doing the right thing. Perhaps she thought it was good to keep us feeling helpless and under her control...I really don't know. All I do know is that my son will never experience that kind of Halloween night! Oh he'll get to go out trick or treating with his pillowcase and zombie costume, but he won't carry that UNICEF box (because the schools don't do that here) and he will not have his mother eating all his candy in front of him. I do go through the candy looking for anything that might be tampered with, I am smart enough to know  that there are people out there who would find it funny to drug kids or whatever. So I check, anything that looks iffy I toss. I take one candy bar for myself and all the dark chocolate goes to Hubby because he's the only one in the house who will eat it. I put all the rest in a bucket and it gets given out one or two pieces at a time when earned. I do have to limit him, I just don't have to take it away. 

This year, as in years past, I look forward to carving pumpkins into jack-o-lanterns, I look forward to going out with the boy as he trick or treats around the neighborhood, watching him be a child and gather candy from his neighbors. I look forward to hanging out with him afterward handing out candy to the stragglers and pumping up on sugar bombs. I don't really look forward to the sugar bomb battle (since it will be a school night he is going to need to go to bed at a descent hour regardless) and I don't look forward to the battle of the bulge as the candy sits in the house calling my name and teasing me lol. 

Personally, I think the egg donor, in her own way, thought she was doing right by us. I think she thought she was making good decisions regardless of how we felt about it. She could often be heard saying "Spare the rod, spoil the child". I guess she didn't want us to be spoiled, she just took it too far. I can now see these things because I have let the anger go, I have decided to not live in fear and to move forward in my life. For me, this is like the day after Halloween. I don't have to be scared anymore because the monster has been revealed as the sad and pathetic person she was. She's not so scary anymore, the sperm donor isn't even scary anymore, I now fully realize that the only way they can hurt me now is if I choose to allow them to haunt me. I am choosing to know in my heart that it's all just a memory.

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Happy Halloween Folks and please.....be safe out there. Have some fun trick or treating, going to parties, whatever you do to celebrate this fun holiday. Just be sure not to eat the candy in front of your kids.....cause that's just plain mean!

Life is what you make of it

I don't know who originally came up with that saying, but I used to hear it from my foster parents a lot and I never fully understood why they would say such a thing to me. First of all, how did I make that life? My life was not what I made of it because I had no choices that I could make on my own. I was just a kid. Even though I had been placed in foster care, I still felt helpless and like I was nothing but a victim of circumstance. I couldn't make anything of my life because the beginning was so horrible, so unimaginable, there was just no way for me to make any kind of decent life. Afterall, you can't make something from nothing....or can you?

As I grew older I began to realize that we all live an average of 75 to 80 years, that means we get to spend 3/4 of our lives trying to make something of ourselves, we get to make our lives. Once we become old enough to go out there in the world on our own we get to begin to make the choices that will determine who we are and what kind of life we will lead. We get to choose our destiny. We take what we have learned and we make our choices based on that, good or bad we make our lives from that point on. Our past, our upbringing will definitely influence our decisions but we get the final say and we make our own choices in the end. So what happens to those, who like myself, have grown up with nothing (or worse than nothing)? How do we make decisions that are good and wholesome and make for a good life? How do we take nothing and turn it into something?

My personal answer to that is I take that nothing and I do everything I can to make opposite decisions. Am I perfect? NO! I am far from perfect and sometimes I make a wrong decision in the heat of the moment. I will yell, I will lose my cool and say something mean and hurtful, I will copy what I learned out of instinct because I still have trouble controlling my emotions. I never hit, never physically follow the path that was taught to me. I do not lock my child in his room, I do not strike him except occasionally with my words. I know it's wrong, I know I need to control that urge to yell and call names, but it's not always easy. I struggle with this part every single day. My son has ADHD and ODD and he is a HUGE challenge most days of the week. I can't remember the last time we had an entire 24 hours where he didn't push my buttons to their limits. He's active, he's loud, he's defiant and challenges everything you say out of instinct. The ODD (Opposition Defiance Disorder) makes him want to challenge authority. The ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) give him impulse control issues along with the attention and hyperactivity issues. The impulse control makes it hard for him to control the defiance urges and therefore we battle a lot. It's not even the big things, it's the little things like taking  out the trash or recycling. It's things like taking a shower or doing his homework. Lots of times he will do all his homework except for one problem and he'll leave that one because it gives him that little bit of defiance. Of course then I have to fight him, I have to win and make him finish that homework or take out the trash because he needs to learn. It's hard to not become my egg donor with my words and lose my cool. I start yelling, I start raising my voice in frustration and then I lose my emotional control. In my frustration, I too lose my impulse control to a certain degree. So what's the difference between me and my egg donor? How am I so very different from her?

There are really two major differences between me and her....The obvious is I never strike my child. I maintain my control enough to know when to walk away and not allow that evil to grow inside me. If I have to I will tell my son to go to his room for a few minutes or to sit on the couch while I walk away and take a few deep breaths. I know when I am so frustrated that I have to separate myself from the situation. I can feel the darkness boiling up inside me, I know how easy it would be to strike the child down and make him comply, but I also know the cost of that compliance and I refuse to allow myself or my son to go down that road. I make the choice to do the right thing, to know my limits. Second, I feel majorly sorry for yelling and I immediately apologize for my poor choices. I show my son that I know I am not perfect, but I know how to make the right choice in the end. I know my faults and I am willing to admit to them. I show him that the stronger person admits their faults and does their best to fix them. I know I will never be perfect, I know I will forever make mistakes, but I will do my best to show my son that life is what we make of it, life is about the choices we make once we have the power to make those choices.

I know, I know, children can choose between right and wrong. Children can choose to be good people with their friends and family, and as parents it is our job to teach them which choices are the right ones to make. But in all reality, children do not have a ton of power over their choices and for many kids like my son, they're simply wired differently and it's even harder for them to make the right choices even when they are taught right from wrong. Their brains tell them one thing but their gut tells them to defy, to fight against authority, to stand up and be acknowledged  regardless of what may come. They do not comply, they do not simply do as they are told.  They need to be approached differently to get what you want and I am slowly learning how to get what I want without him realizing it. I still give direct orders here and there, he needs to learn to deal with life and fight that urge to defy authority, but he will not learn by constantly fighting. So I work hard to change my tactics, to explain his situation to him and help him understand why the battle is worth it in the end. It's hard for him to look into his future and see a good man that people want to have working for them and with them. It is hard for him to imagine what life could be like if he learns to control those urges to fight back. It was just as hard for me to look forward and see a life without abuse and I need to remember that when dealing with my boy. I need to remember that he is young and he doesn't understand the saying of life is what you make of it. I just need to work every day to help him make the choices in his future that will help him understand it when he's 40 like me.

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I wanted to take a moment to explain something about Thoughtful Thursdays. Lately I haven't been writing stories about specific events, I have been more about my thoughts in general. This is because I feel the events of my life have been just one horrible tale after another and it does no good to hash them over one by one. I feel that in doing so I am only prolonging my pain and I do not wish to do that any longer. I have come to the point in my life where I am ready to just have thoughts and not have to remember specific events in full detail. Life sucks and then you die....that's what I used to say. It's true to an extent but at the same time it's not. It can be that way if you let it, if you hold onto that pain and relive those memories over and over again. OR you can chose to make a change for yourself, for those you love, make a change for the better. My old saying needs a rewrite...Life sucks and then you heal!


Let the healing begin!

New look

I decided I needed a new look in here for the fall so I sat here at the computer with my Paint Shop Pro and created a new banner that would match this fallish background that I like. I love the fall, it's a beautiful time of year. Even though it is technically the beginning of an end, it's also a time of color and beauty. I feel that it shows that endings can be beautiful things that lead to new beginnings.

As I watch the leaves die and fall off the branches I am finding myself looking at it from a different perspective. As I heal from my past I am finding that a lot of things are taking on a new view and I kinda like it. This year fall resembles me....or maybe I resemble fall...I'm not sure but either way, this is how I see things.

In the fall we spend hours and hours looking at the beautiful colors amazed in their beauty even though they are dying. Then those leaves fall off the trees and we spend many more hours cleaning up the debris. We pile up those leaves and carrying them away to the edge of the woods where they can decay in a compost pile and return to the earth. By the end of fall everything is cold and frozen but the debris is cleared out of our lives.  We know that it's still there but we also know that now that we have cleared up those leaves the grass will be able to grow back in come springtime with a vibrancy and beauty that will bring us much happiness. There will be new growth of young leaves and the sun will shine once again.

As for me, I have watched my own life in amazement and awe. I survived a lot of crap, a lot of which I have put here in this blog. I have watched myself, like those leaves, change and turn into something beautiful. I shook my branches and knocked all the dead leaves off and then spent time piling them up and removing them from my life. Much like the old oak tree in the back yard, I still have some leaves that are hanging on trying not to fall but the majority have fallen to the ground. I have spent a lot of time piling those up and putting them away where they can decay and become the fertilizer of my future. I know they are there, sitting in the dark edges of my life, but they are no longer attached to me like they used to be. Occasionally I may go back to those edges and  scoop something up, but it will just be to fertilize and feed something beautiful. I will never be able to forget, these things in my life will never fully biodegrade, but they will remain and be the soil to live my life by. I will use them to make something beautiful, I will use them for something good. As the remaining leaves fall, as I am positive they will, I will put them in the pile with the others and let my new leaves grow in their place. I will someday be the mighty oak that stands tall and strong, surrounded by green grass and sunshine.

Good things come in small packages

This past week I made plans with the Wild Child, we were going to get up bright and early on Saturday morning, drive for 3 1/2 hours to my old hometown and go apple picking. Then  we were going to drive 3 1/2 hours back home. The car was all ready, we were excited and talking about it every day.

Then Friday arrived!

Friday afternoon the Wild Child walked home from school, I met him at the door with a tiny kitten in his hands. Apparently he had found it on the way home and wanted to save it.

**Flashback to my childhood "Mom, I found it in the woods. It was all alone and sad. Can we keep it PLEASE!!!!**

He was all scruffy looking and had matted fur. He was dirty and tiny and full of fleas. It's a holiday weekend and the no kill shelter is closed until Tuesday. We brought it in, gave it a bath, gave it a dose of flea stuff that we had from when the other cats were kittens and placed him in the basement to keep him away from the other animals until we could figure out what to do with him. I told the Wild Child we could probably keep him here in the basement until Tuesday and then we could take him to the no kill shelter. We already had 2 cats and I didn't think Hubby was going to want a third in the house.

Hubby came home from work and the Wild Child worked his charms. He used every trick in the book and maybe even invented a few as well. He even went to the extent of reminding his father that my cat, Rex, had passed away over the winter and so now I didn't have one. Martin is the Wild Childs kitty, Merlin was a gift to Hubby when his kitty was killed by coyotes. My kitty had been Rex and he was gone. In the end Hubby gave the Wild Child a choice, spend money on gas driving to Vermont and going apple picking OR keep the kitten and use that money for shots. He chose the kitten and I received the task of figuring out a name.

At first I thought about naming him Scruffy, since that's how he looked when the boy carried him in. Then I thought of naming him Zorro because of his little mustache. Isn't it the cutest thing you have ever seen?

The Wild Child didn't like Zorro so I kept thinking. We have had a few cats named after mythological gods (Loki and Minerva) so I started looking at greek god names. First I found Boreas, God of the north wind and winter. That's pretty fitting for our family since we sure do love winter. The Wild Child didn't like the pronunciation and thought it might be difficult to say all the time and even harder to find a short name or nick name for.

Then I found Apollo: God of sun, music, archery, poetry, healing and prophecy. I love the sun and how it feels on my face, the sun alone can bring me happiness. Musical talent runs in my family and I find nothing more relaxing than cranking up my favorite tunes and singing along. When in high school I loved archery and was pretty good at it too. I enjoy writing poetry, especially when I am having emotional moments and need to get stuff out of my head. I work all the time to heal and move on from my past. Prophecy, well when I had gone to the bank to take out a little money for the trip my bank account was $666 and then this guy showed up keeping me from going back to my hometown. (In case you don't know, many believe 666 to be the number of the devil) I wonder if it was a sign...makes ya think huh?

I named him Apollo, it seemed to fit.

Of course Saturday I take him in and am informed that he can't be more than 6 weeks old and can't get any shots for 2 weeks. He is adorable, plays well and eats a ton. He has trouble with dry food so we are giving him canned kitten food for now. He's doing pretty good with the litter box so long as I put him in it shortly after he eats. He will learn in due time to go to it on his own, until then I will continue to carry him to the box. He won't go for anyone but me so that's my job, but then again he is my kitten so I guess that's the way it should be.


Good things come in small packages, in this case the package has been named Apollo.

Last week I had something pointed out to me and it came from my cousin. After reading my post she sent me a text that she could tell I was healing because my posts weren't as angry as they used to be. I hadn't really thought about it, but I guess she's right.

After receiving her text I began to think about myself and how I have been viewing my past as of late. I then realized that she is right, I am truly beginning to heal. I still feel bitterness when I think of the egg donor, still call her the egg donor, she will never be my mother since really she wasn't a mother at all. But when I think back I find that I am finding myself feeling more pity than anger and bitterness.....that's a good thing right? I mean really it's probably better for me to not be so angry and pissed off at her forever, it's not good for your health to be angry all the time. I know that I do it more for my son than for myself, I don't want him to grow up with an angry pissed off mother and I certainly wouldn't want him to look back on his childhood and refer to me as his egg donor. No, I have to heal whether or not I want to because it hurts him if I don't.

Again, that's a good thing right?

Perhaps I am healing for the wrong reasons, I think some would say that. Personally I think any reason to heal is a good enough reason simply because the end justifies the means. Does it really matter what I use as my tool to heal? Does it matter the reason I do it so long as I actually do it? I don't think so. Some would say that if I don't do it for myself then I am doing it for all the wrong reasons and that in the end, once he is no longer here, once he is grown up and has moved out, I will find myself bitter and angry once again. I really don't think that's the case at all. I think if I can heal and be a good mother to my child then when he grows up and moves out on his own I will feel such a sense of accomplishment that I will have no choice but to feel good about myself. I will be healed and I will continue to feel good about my life and what I made of it. I took a giant basket of lemons and am slowly turning them into lemonade for my son....I feel that makes me a good mother and when I feel like a good mother I feel good about myself. Thus he is a perfect reason to move on, to live, to love and to heal.

This week I will not be posting any angry bitter thoughts, I will not be posting anything negative at all. This week I will relish in the fact that I have taken a step forward, I have a healthy scab over my wounds of my childhood and I will not pick at that scab this week. I will leave it be and enjoy the fact that this week there is a little less pain in my heart when I think about my wounds.

Have a great weekend and remember to enjoy the healing process when you can.

11 Years Ago Today

It was a beautiful day, the day my whole world changed forever. 

A beautiful 8 pound 12 ounce bouncing baby boy came into this world and turned it upside down. Suddenly my heart was no longer inside my body, it was instead in my arms. As I beheld that wonderful miracle my husband and I created, I knew that from that moment on I would give anything, do anything, to make his world everything mine was not. He would know love, he would know kindness, he would know all those things I should have known but didn't. I also knew that he was going to teach me, he was going to heal me and he was going to be the beginning of my greatest adventure ever. 

As I held that small piece of perfection I understood, this was my destiny, my reason for being.

 

This is why I survived!

Happy Birthday Orion, I love you more than life itself!

When I was a little girl I had a few places that I loved to go to....School, Grammy's house, and the grocery store.

School was always fun because it was my Monday through Friday escape. I hated weekends and I hated vacations. I even hated summer. During those times I would have to be home 24/7 and that meant so many more hours of risking getting a beating or screamed at or both. We were not allowed to visit friends houses, not even allowed to play with the kid across the street because heaven forbid we tell anyone anything about what was going on in our house, or worse we see that normal people didn't beat their kids for even the littlest infraction of the rules. While at home we had to learn new songs to sing at whatever concert the egg donor had us scheduled to sing at or just learn them because she wanted to record us. She had big dreams of us making her rich off our singing. We were her get rich scheme and if we yelled too loud and hurt our voices, we got a beating. If we didn't learn a song fast enough, we got a beating. If we didn't like the song she wanted us to sing and we fussed or complained, we got a beating. So school was good because she wasn't there and I could play with my friends, I could run around and laugh. I could make a mistake on a song in chorus, I could play with other kids and no matter what I never got a beating. It was a relief to not get a beating even though I knew that once I got home and into the clutches of the egg donor she would surely find a reason to beat me. I tried not to think about that while at school because at school I just wanted to be one of the kids, I just wanted to be free.

My second favorite place to be was Grammy's house. She died when I was 7 or 8 years old so I didn't get to have her for very long but she was very special. She had 10 acres of apple trees and every fall we would go pick apples and then bake apple pies with her. She taught me her special recipe that I still use to this day. She also had these little shoe boxes with kids names on them and in each box she kept some of our favorite playthings. no one was allowed to play with another child's box unless they were given permission from that child. My box was filled with paper dolls and paper clothes for those dolls. I could spend hours upon hours playing with those paper dolls and my whole world of worries would go right out the window. Grammy also had this big grass hill behind her house and we would lay down at the top and roll all the way to the bottom. Sometimes we would get grass stains on our clothes that we knew would earn us a good beating but it was worth it to just let loose and have some fun rolling around in the grass.

Finally I enjoyed the grocery store because I was a very good sneak. I very quickly learned how to snag grapes and other pieces of small fruit to nibble on. I would stuff my pockets with those grapes and happily follow the egg donor through the store eating them. Once my sister dared me to steal a pack of gum....I got busted and not only did I have to take the gum back but I got the beating of a lifetime for stealing. My sister didn't get anything even though it was her idea.I never dared to steal gum again.

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Yesterday I mentioned my friend that I found on facebook, I thought today would be a good day to reflect on how my experience with her helped me help my son. This past summer the Wild Child got to experience having a friend move away. This boy has been friends with him since they were in kindergarten together and they both have ADHD. The fact that they have something like that in common has really helped the Wild Child out and gave him someone to talk to about it...someone other than me or his doctor that is. It's nice to have someone your own age to relate to and this is what it was for the boys. They both have struggled in the same areas and so they could talk things through about what works and what doesn't and they could just vent to each other about having a condition that makes things harder for them. Anyway this boy moved away and it was hard for The Wild Child to accept. I told him about my friend Adrienne and how saddened I was that she had moved away, how angry I felt at her parents for taking my friend away from me, and how dearly I missed my friend even now. This showed him that I could understand and I could relate. This opened a door of communication for us so that he could talk about his feelings instead of bottling them up inside. Of course I also pointed out how lucky he is because when I was a kid we didn't have cell phones to text each other and my friend didn't have grandparents to come back and visit with every other weekend. My friend also moved a lot further away than just a 2 hour drive! He got to see that it could be worse, he could have to go 35 years before finding his friend on facebook  and having to catch up then. My friend and I have started messaging on facebook and have exchanged phone numbers so we can text. 35 years later, it's kinda crazy and amazing all at the same time! I am glad to an extent though, because if I had not lost my very first and best friend back then I would not have been able to relate so well to the Wild Childs situation now. I guess everything does happen for a reason, even when they suck!

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Have a great weekend everyone and hug your loved ones tight. think how you would feel if you didn't get to see them or speak with them for 35 years and then say all the things that are important to say and none of the unimportant stuff. Be thankful we live in a world of technology where anything is possible and people from your past can be found in the most unexpected of times. Find your happy places and build happy memories to hold onto for those bad days and remember good things come eventually, it just might take what feels like forever.

Another happy moment brought to you by...

Facebook!

I know, I know, you're probably sick of hearing me sing the praises of facebook but this one is pretty cool...honest I swear it is!

See I was looking over my home page at all the newest news when I saw that one of my friends that I went to elementary school with had become friends with a name that was exceptionally familiar, it was one of my very first friends EVER! 

See when I was in first grade there was this girl named Adrienne, she was cool, she was pretty, and she and I got along great! I would consider her my best friend back then. Then one day her parents packed her up and moved. I was devastated for awhile, I really missed my friend but we never saw one another again. Through the years I have often thought of her, remembered her fondly and always wondered where she ended up. She is one of those people that you remember perfectly, if I close my eyes I can still picture her perfectly as that skinny little first grader with the long dark hair. 

So when I saw her name sitting there I began to feel an excitement  like nothing else. I was a little apprehensive thinking that maybe this was a coincidence and that she might not be the very same Adrienne, but I had to try. I clicked her link and looked, it looked like her just older. I sent a message....sure enough it's my old friend! 

Gotta love facebook, yet again it brings me in touch with someone I have held close to my heart for many many years, someone I thought I would never see again or speak to again. Yet again it brings back to me a tiny piece of my youth that held happy and pleasant memories.

Thank You Facebook!

10 Years

Sure seems like a long time, an entire decade, 1/10 of a century

10 years is a long time but ask pretty much anyone alive today where they were and  what they were doing 10 years ago today and unless they were just too little to remember, they will know the answer with amazing depth. 10 years ago today feels like yesterday for most Americans and probably for many who live in other countries as well because 10 years ago today our entire world changed.

I was sitting on the couch watching Orion playing. He was almost a year old, just a week from his first birthday, he was walking and running and playing like any normal one year old. He was laughing and having fun. I turned on the tv because one of Orion's favorite shows was about to come on. What I saw was a burning tower and people running and screaming. Then a second plane flew into the second tower right next to the first one. The reporters were in shock, I was in shock. Hubby was just getting out of the shower when I told him and at first he thought I was talking about the building in Oklahoma that had already been blown up by terrorists previously. Then I explained, no it's in New York and the twin towers are gone! We watched tv in awe, unable to tear our eyes away from what was on the screen.

Meanwhile Orion continued to laugh and play and be completely oblivious to what was going on in his world. I watched him thinking to myself "My son is going to grow up in a time of war!" and asking myself "What kind of world have I brought this child into?" I tried to spend more time watching him and less watching the TV where the world was falling apart. Here in my living room we were happy and safe, out there in the big world, it was a very scary place. I wanted to stay safe inside with  my sons laughter but kept getting pulled out into the terror. It was on every channel of the TV, it was all over the radio, it was in the voices of every person around except that small boy who laughed and played.....I so wanted to be that little boy or at least be like him. I didn't want to know what was going on, I didn't want to see and comprehend what was on every channel of the tv. I just wanted to play and not have to face the big scary world that was invading our happy world.

I turned off the tv knowing that I was not going to see anything different and played with my son. I cherished his laughter, I held onto that moment because I knew that from now on, everything was going to be different outside our living room bubble. I needed to hold myself together for my boy, I needed to be strong and not be sad for all those people out there who had died or been injured or loved someone who had died or been injured. I knew I could be sad later, when he was asleep, but for that moment I needed to be a good strong mom.

September 11, 2001 will forever be embedded in my memory as I am sure it will be in your too.

A new beginning

Here we go, the beginning of 6th Grade!

On Tuesday the Wild Child began his new adventure as a 6th grader. Even though technically he is still in the elementary school, they treat the 6th graders more like middle school students. He has to change classrooms for every subject, he has to do more work and he has a shorter recess. The homework began on the very first day and it wasn't easy stuff either. On the plus side, he has informed me that he likes his teachers, is learning new things and having fun. Doesn't seem that long ago when my little man was starting his first day of preschool, my how time flies when you're having fun!

Of course my little man starting 6th grade takes me back to my own youth, things were pretty crazy for me back then. I was starting in a new school that was at least 4 times the size of the school I had previously gone to. I knew no one there and had no idea where I was going or what I was going to face. I had just been placed in foster care 3 months prior and I was still terrified of my own shadow, say nothing about the looming shadows at that big school with people I didn't know and who didn't know about the life I had just come out of. I didn't know if the teacher knew my story and I was scared to tell them for fear they would treat me differently and think I was just looking for sympathy.  When I met Angel that first day, my world became a little nicer and I found a life long friend. We would spend the years that followed at each others houses, hanging out together, laughing together and leaning on each other for family and emotional support. I don't think I would have made it through 6th grade without my friend, I hope my Wild Child can find such a friend too. If nothing else, I am betting his 6th grade year will be much better than my own and I will enjoy watching him grow this coming year.

What a crappy couple of weeks I have had!

It all started two Sunday's ago when a filling came out of one of my teeth. Monday I went into the dentist and they told me I was going to need a root canal, post and crown. The office person told me it was going to cost me in the range of $700 to get this done after my insurance paid their portion.  So we scheduled the appointment for the root canal for Thursday (last week). I arranged for my mother in law to come down and take care of Orion for me, which required her to reschedule meetings and such. So Thursday I go in for the root canal and sure enough first thing they are telling me that I actually need something called a crown lengthening and that it's going to cost me another $600! They even tried to convince me that my dental insurance company was going to pay a total amount that was twice what my benefit is. I ended up walking out with a copy of my x-rays and a really bad mood.

I called the insurance company when I got home and they laughed at the concept that they would make special accommodations and pay double my benefit so I would have been stuck with that extra amount as well. I called a different dentist who was also covered under my insurance and asked to come in for a second opinion, they could get me in the very next day. Friday morning I have Orion pack up some video games and head on into the dentist thinking they are just going to look at this tooth and give me their opinion. They look at it and agree that indeed I do need a root canal, post and crown on the tooth but the crown lengthening was not needed. Then they ask if I want to go ahead and get that done with right then and there. I was scheduled for a full visit so why not take advantage of the time and get it over with. They pulled in an extra chair for Orion to sit in while they worked and he got to watch me get a root canal done. Then they ask if I want to go ahead and put the post in since there is no sign of infection in the tooth. What the heck, why not right? So he puts in the post and does a temporary filling over it. I now have a tooth again. The dentist recommended that I just wait until January to do the crown since the vast majority of my insurance benefits will have been used up on the root canal and post just so I can save myself a little money. Orion was well behaved through the entire thing and I was very pleased, he truly made me one proud mama!

A couple days later, on Sunday, hurricane Irene came through and knocked out our power. We waited and waited for it to come on, nothing all day. Then my husband went to work on Monday and hear rumors that it might take 5 days to get our power back because there were so many lines down everywhere. I had to throw out all the food in my refridgerator except for a couple things that we managed to get into coolers and on ice, things like some chicken, milk and butter. Most of the fridge stuff was lost and all the frozens as well. On the up side of things...my fridge is so clean now it looks like it just came home from the store. Yesterday morning the power came back on, I was thrilled! I went out food shopping so I could restock my house.......only to come home to no power! I had to run out very quickly and get some ice at the store down the road so that I could pack another cooler with it and ice all the food I had just bought. I was afraid I was going to lose all that food as well and I was not pleased. The power didn't come back until early evening. This morning I woke up half expecting to see no power, but it is still on so I am hoping it's all over with for us and that we will not lose it again.

On the down side, I could not work the entire time the power was out so I lost out on a fair amount of money. Luckily I have a wonderful husband who makes a lot more than me so that we can still pay the bills and survive!

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Of course these events have taken me back to my youth and I have to share with you...because that's what I do on Thursday :)

The tooth thing took me back to when I was maybe 4 or 5 years old. I don't really remember how old I was, but I do remember the event and I can actually still see bits and pieces of it perfectly. It was the day my egg donor became a toothless old fool. I can perfectly picture her coming home from the dentists office, her mouth full of bloody cotton balls, looking like someone had beaten her to a pulp. She looked utterly miserable.....maybe that's why I can picture it so well, because it was a moment that I saw her feeling the way she always made me feel. She had gone to the dentist and had every single tooth in her mouth pulled out. I don't remember the why, I just remember that part of it. She never got dentures because she couldn't afford them, so from that moment on she was a toothless old fool......literally!

When my tooth broke last year I got a crown on it, this year I lost a filling and needed my first root canal. But I will make sure that no matter what, I will never become her! If I didn't have my husband and his help, I would be. I would have needed to have that tooth pulled out and never replaced. I would have left last years tooth until it rotted away and had to be pulled too. I am so very thankful that I will never be like her, I will find a way to make sure that even if I do end up needing to have my teeth pulled, I will find a way to afford dentures because I will never, I simply refuse to become a toothless old fool.

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The power outage also took me back. I can recall so many times when we would come home to find no heat, no electricity, and no running water. Generally that would be the middle of winter and the pipes would be frozen because the oil had run out and the electricity was off because she hadn't paid her bill. I remember how horrible I felt in those times, having to go find some wood to burn in the pot belly stove and then melt snow on top of it so that we could take a bath or make something resembling food or even flush the toilet. I remember having to leave the toilet unflushed because the snow hadn't melted yet or worse, having to go in a pot and then carry it outside to dump in the swamp. It was always so humiliating having to carry the pot of smelly mess out to the swampy area behind the house to dump. If you slipped and spilled it you not only got to smell like that for the rest of the week but you got a beating for it too. I often tried very hard to hold it until I got to school just so I could use a real bathroom. At those times, when it was cold and we had no heat, we would melt the snow on the stove and then put it into jars and curl up with them in bed to stay warm through the night. Sometimes we would fight over the jars because the bigger the jar the longer your heat lasted. I often ended up with the smallest jar because I was the youngest and smallest. Occasionally Sissy would crawl into bed with me and share her jar and warmth with me, but most of the time she would sleep with Big Sis #2. It was during these times of no power where I learned to survive on very little, very little food, very little warmth, and very little love.

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One final note...because of the power issues the schools will not open for an extra week so my son is enjoying his last week of summer once again....lucky kid! Of course this just means they will go longer into the summer but hey, it's nice to find out on the last day of summer vacation that you get an extension.

This past week we went on a family camping and biking trip to the beach. It was good to get away from the real world and relax with my two favorite people. Of course, as always happens, I found myself looking back on my youth and realizing how much I truly missed out on.

When I was my sons age, there is no way we would have gone camping in a tent and made campfires. We didn't roast marshmallows and make S'mores . We didn't get to ride bikes for miles on end until we hit the beach and then spend hours at the water running and playing and riding the waves. No, my egg donor was not that cool! She was actually afraid of the water and we weren't even allowed to go into the local brook when it was 6 inches deep. I had so much fun watching my son have fun and a very small part of me began to actually feel sorry for my egg donor...can you believe that? I truly felt pity for that woman. She totally missed out on so much by making me miss out!  She didn't get to hear the laughter of her child, she didn't get to see a smile cross my lips, she didn't get to watch her children have total relaxed fun. No, she spent every single day beating us down, keeping us unhappy and sorrowful. She reveled in our misery because misery loves company. She totally missed out on seeing stuff like:

A loving smile from her happy child

Her child roasting marshmallows by the fire looking so tired because of all the fun that was had through the day

Smiles from a loving husband and child at the same time

Relaxing beside a roaring fire

 the list goes on and on

 But most of all, I can guarantee you that she never got to see this

A genuinely happy smile on my face!

All I can say is "It's her loss!" She didn't care to put that smile there and she did everything in her power to make sure it was never there. She didn't allow me to feel happiness and love and in turn she missed out on something amazing. I get to see it and feel it every single day from my son and I really do feel sorry for her for never getting to enjoy that sensation. I guess I must be growing up because instead of feeling only hatred and anger I'm starting to feel pitty and sorrow for her.  

I guess it had to happen sometime!