Monthly Archives: January 2011

01/31/11

Some Jobs Not For Me II

From my previous post Jobs Not For Me I, it was clear that I should not be in workplaces that involve a lot of social contact especially with those who I see need help but that I am unable to help. However, it has been only recently after writing about these things, that  I understand how I was affected in so many ways. During these places of employment I was also going through serious personal struggles, such as divorce, financial problems, health problems and ethical problems. I seriously struggled with my understanding of what being a Christian meant and applying that to my work life. I had fully transitioned into what I thought a Christian lifestyle was  by the time I was working in this other place of employment. I had a lot of guilt and misunderstandings about all of it. I have intertwined my faith and work here somewhat to give a little clarity of what I was thinking during that time because I had a lot of inner struggle with the next job that I will talk about.

I was a human resource specialist for a temporary agency.

My job consisted of interviewing, hiring and trying to locate new positions for labor and clerical work. Once again in this position I felt something was wrong but I did not know what it was. I thought that it would be a good thing to help try to get people placed into positions who were unable to get work. The problem was, the owner of the company was doing things that did not seem right and during that time many of the the people who were looking for work were in similar life situations as those who use check cashing/payday loan stores. They have had hard lives, many of them want to do well but have a hard time doing it. There were many illegals that came through and were quickly pushed through with fake social security cards. I was unaware until I started noticing how blatantly bad some of them were. I brought them to my supervisors attention and she said if they don’t look too bad take them. I did not do that.

We filled factories with many people who could not speak English.

They lived in one and two bedroom apartments with 10 sometimes more people. They felt privileged to be working in dangerous atmospheres for $5.25 an hour. I got to know these people, some of them took advantage of me and some did not. I wanted so much to help everyone. I felt that having to work there was a short-term thing and that soon I would be led into my true calling, church ministry. I looked at work as a ministry opportunity also but it was not a long-term thing. My heart was set on ministry and I was heavily involved with my church. It was one of the good churches I have been in. With the ethical issues, the constant people coming in and out, interviewing, talking, having to make phone calls, the different types of people, I began to get sick. I regularly had sinus issues but I ended up getting a virus that lasted for over two months. I was also going through a separation waiting on my ex-husband to file the papers that he said he was going to do. I was also in serious financial trouble because he left me with mounds of debt, I will write about another time.

Both this job and the payday loan job were similar in many ways.

There was an aspect of being in danger that I felt but did not understand until later. One day however, I realized just how dangerous it was with this job sometimes. We had another office in a little town about 30 miles away, one day a week I was to go there and do interviews. The office was in a building that had other offices but no one got there until later in the afternoon. I was there by 7am ready to open the doors at 8am. There were times that I was in the office alone and would have several guys in the office as well, filling out paperwork and waiting for interviews. Many of them, in that area, had been in prison or had problems with drugs or alcohol at one point, possibly still but they were all required to have drug testing so we could know if they were eligible for hire. Many of them tested positive for drugs, which meant that they were possibly under the influence while in the office with me. This would explain some of the strange behaviors I noticed. Also things I felt or saw but could not explain.

This particular day, the office was empty and there was a guy standing outside the door, waiting.

I had a bad feeling the moment I saw him but I had to let him in. I gave him the paper work and asked him to fill it out. I was very uncomfortable and saw a swirly blackness around him, I also had a sick feeling in my stomach. I shut my office door and locked it and prayed for another person to come in for an interview. They never did and I had to proceed with the interview. I was also struggling, like I have so many times before, with feeling like I was wrongly judging the man. What if he was a nice guy and I was just being evil in my thoughts? I understand now that I had misinterpreted Christian teachings, though some people use them to manipulate like that, this was my own wrong interpretation.  The whole interview was very uncomfortable and I just knew I had to get him out as quickly as possible. I did not follow procedure and after the interview part I just said we would call him if he was eligible. He then started to get a bit aggressive and insisted that we had to give him a job. I told him that I would look through his paperwork and we would call him for drug testing if it were to work out. He would not leave and continued to go into a rant about how we had to give him a job but that we would probably not since he had a felony.

I then said that I could call my supervisor and see what she said while he was still there.

As I tried to explain to her what was going on, she could hear him in the background being loud. She finally told me to tell him that we could not hire anyone who had a felony due to our insurance policy. This was actually not true but I didn’t know that at the time. I told him, he was very upset, I stayed on the phone with her until he finally left. When he left the office she told me to look and see if he wrote down what he had done. He had and it was for rape, he had been in for 10 years. She told me to quickly pack up and get out of there and come back to the office.

Again, things began to connect for me about the job just like with the other one.

I started to understand the kind of potential dangers I was in. I started to understand about the people who were suffering and working hard to make ends meet. I was starting to understand that there were people who were taking advantage of people like me, though I could not differentiate between them. It made it even harder because my employer was taking advantage of me, my supervisor and the temps and the temps were also taking advantage of me and the employer. It was too much for me to understand.

By this time, with this job I had lost so much weight I was down to 100 pounds again.

Unlike before in my life, this was not self-induced weight loss. I am 5’4 and that is just not a healthy weight for me to be at. I became very sickly and I was mentally, emotionally and physically exhausted. The only thing I found comfort in was my church. To this day it is the best church I have ever been in. They supported me during my divorce. They encouraged me to get into leadership. They developed me in my prayer life and challenged me in my faith by reading books from people of different faiths and beliefs. They encouraged loving people right where they were at and most of all they did a lot of hands on ministries. We would work with the many different ministries throughout the city and offer help. They were very unity focused and did not see any reason to start a ministry if there was one already in progress no matter the faith or no faith, we would help them help others and be actively involved in our community.

I was at church and serving as much as possible.

I found that this too was too much for me emotionally. I wanted to serve and help anywhere and everywhere. I spread myself thin and was basically working two full-time jobs with my regular job and with serving at the church. Both involved a lot of social activities and both caused me to stay very sick. I was overwhelmed and slept or had meltdowns all the time at home. I will be writing about my church experience in the next few months because I feel that I am able to without any anger or hurt now, this church that I talk about now, was the hope that helped me not give up on all churches. I know from their example that there are good churches out there and good people.

But back to the jobs.

What I discovered from both of these jobs was that I am not capable of working in places like that. Someone like myself cannot handle the stress and pain of watching people suffer, go in cycles and not change, the unknowing of who is taking advantage of me and who is not and the inability to do anything about the injustice of it all. Talking to people who are unable to buy diapers, food or have heat in the winter is devastating for me. Especially when I too was in such financial burdens that I could barely help myself. I wanted to help I tried to help and on many occasions I got burned for it. There were a few who were able to receive help and be able to get in better places in life. I hope that they are still doing well. I am thankful about that but I cannot work in environments that use so many different social situations. Too many for me to understand. I would sometimes be overwhelmed with emotion and didn’t understand what I was feeling.

I then had to protect myself.

I started to get a hard heart because I couldn’t take it. I shut down emotionally and the people became objects and I began to trust no one. There was a major problem with this because even though I shut down, I still felt it since I was engulfed in it. Since I was going to church I was constantly reminded that my faith revolves around loving and caring for those in need. It was very hard but I have now come to understand that I was not bad for trying to protect myself. I was taken advantage of so I should protect myself. I also understand that my longing to help others can be better used in different ways. Healthier ways for me. We each have gifting and they should be used in their proper place. I am not gifted to work in these environments because they will eventually kill me. Suck me dry and leave me empty.

I am thankful for all of the good things that came from those work places.

I learned a lot about people, unfortunately I still get sucked in by certain types of people sometimes. I have to stay on guard but I have grown in that area. My church experience has opened my eyes in a lot of ways also. All of these experiences that I have gone through have actually helped me to understand that the world is a lot different from what I thought it was. Now that I have been gaining an understanding about how my brain works and that I am not at fault for how other people behave, I see all of these situations in my life as learning tools. This information can help my kids when they get older or help someone else right now. I felt stupid and ridiculous when I realized that I had been taken advantage of. I felt confused because I didn’t understand how to incorporate my faith into my life without sacrificing my sanity and health. I would bypass my gut feelings because I felt that I had to be wrong, Jesus would never think that way about a person, so I shouldn’t.  I couldn’t understand why everyone else could get it and I couldn’t. I see now that I was not wrong for wanting to protect myself and I wasn’t wrong with my “gut” feelings.

I am just not capable of working in those kinds of environments and I am not a bad person for that. FREEDOM! :-)

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01/30/11

Ok, Ok, Truthfully “I’m Memetastic”

I was so graciously given this award by Diane at Don’t Panic. I admit that when I first saw this award, I had a moment of panic. I am not good at coming up with lies on the fly, if I do make things up they are never believable so I guess I will have some pretty good ones. I also had a moment of “What is the point of making up lies?” and “What is the point of this whole award anyway?”. That is what my brain does I can’t help it. When I finally processed through all of it and researched the the purpose, I finally got it and said to myself “Oh, I can do this.”

Did I just take all of the fun out of it? Oh, well that is me. :-)

From what I can tell the originator of this lovely award is jillsmo at Yeah. Good Times. I have modified a few words but this is pretty much what she said.

Here are the rules:

1. You must proudly display the absolutely disgusting graphic that I have created for these purposes (put it in your post, you don’t have to put it in your sidebar, I think that would seriously be asking too much). It’s so bad that not only did I use COMIC SANS, but there’s even a little jumping, celebrating kitten down there at the bottom. It’s horrifying! But its presence in your award celebration is crucial to the memetastic process we’re creating here. If you need a higher resolution version… I totally have one!!

2. You must list 5 things about yourself, and 4 of them must be bold-faced lies. Just make some things up, we’ll never know; one of them has to be true, though. Of course, nobody will ever know the difference, so we’re just on the honor system here. I trust you. Except for the 4 that you lied about, you lying turkeys! But don’t go crazy trying to think of stuff, you’ll see by the example I’ve set below that we’re not really interested in quality here.

3. You must pass this award on to 5 bloggers that you either like or don’t like or don’t really have much of an opinion about. I don’t care who you pick, and nobody needs to know why. I mean, you can give a reason if you want, but I don’t really care.

4. If you fail to follow any of the above rules, I will hunt you down and harass you incessantly until you either block me on Twitter or ban my IP address from visiting your blog. I don’t know if you can actually do that last thing, but I will become so annoying to you that you will actually go out and hire an IT professional to train you on how to ban IP addresses just so that I’ll leave you alone. I’m serious. I’m going to do these things.

5. This one isn’t actually a rule, but once you do the above, please come back here and link up to the Memetastic Hop so that I can keep track of where this thing goes.

It is me talking again, I also liked so much what Aspergirl Maybe said at the end of hers that I made my own version, I hope she is ok with that!

If you do not want to participate in this fabulous Memetastic Award, I fully understand and you are hereby absolved of any harassment or fear that you may need to get an IT professional, from me anyway, I cannot speak for other bloggers who may become obsessive and stalk you.

Here it goes my wretched lies, remember one of them is true.

1. I think the moon is made out of cheese.

2. I was told by a city official in Sweden that I could stay but my boyfriend had to leave the city because of illegal dealings.

3. My favorite food is octopus.

4. I think I was a rooster in a past life.

5. My cat can speak Spanish.

Here are the 4 bloggers who I have bestowed this wonderful award! That’s right I could only do 4, I have spent far too long on this and now I am getting too crazy trying to find one more blog that has not already received this award.

1. In the Kiln

2. Puzzle Piece Princess

3. The Other Side

4.The Art of Being an Asperger Woman

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01/28/11

Selective Mutism, Oh That’s What I Do

Today I read the chapter entitled Puberty and Mutism from the book Aspergirls by Rudy Simone. I find it rather interesting that I read this chapter today after I just posted about some of my similar behaviors in my previous post Some Jobs Not For Me I . I had no idea that there was an actual name to my behavior or that other people did this besides my mom. In my mind I thought maybe I had learned the behavior from her. I am not talking about the puberty section because that is a whole can of worms that I am just not ready to crack open at this time so I will only focus on the mutism part.

Rudy stated that “Virtually every Aspergirl I interviewed experienced selective mutism at some point in her life, and some still experience it.”

Yes, I have and do experience selective mutism. In my post earlier I mentioned this “Then there were others that I couldn’t even look at, I have spoken about this a little bit, I had encountered many people who  had like a blackness around them. They scared me and several I refused to help. I couldn’t their presence made me ill. My stomach would get in a knot and I couldn’t speak.” I was trying to describe to the best of my ability what I felt but in the book she describes it much better.

She states “Mutism not only hijacks our words but also our ability to think. To use the “needle on the record” analogy, the needle gets stuck on the same unpleasant lyric, and we can’t shake it free to move on to the next line.”

Here are a couple of quotes from others in her book:

“There are plenty of times when my brain freezes and I don’t figure out what to say for a few days or so afterwards–my ability to continue the conversation just shuts down, and I’m restricted to rehearsed statements that add nothing.” (Anemone)

“The mutism lasted until my mid-20′s. Unfamiliar or judgmental people would trigger it and it would last long as I was with those people. When I have selective mutism, I cannot form a novel thought and it is like blackness.” (Widders)

“Mutism is actually my biggest problem. It always has been. I have a difficult time speaking fluently as it is, because my brain doesn’t work in words. It works in images,sounds, patterns. When I’m upset or nervous my translation system breaks down. I can think and think, but I can’t turn any of it into words–and I can’t exactly project my thoughts out through my forehead. It hurts, and it hurts others when I can’t respond to them. (Andi)

All of these describe me somewhat. I have a very hard time speaking to people because when I am talking my mind is a moving picture show. I try to describe what I am saying instead of having a conversation. When people speak immediately my mind goes into everything I have ever experienced that is similar to what they are saying, I am feeling, hearing and seeing what they are saying and categorizing it in the file folders in my mind. I am also at the same time pulling my own experiences which can be through sight, sound, smell and picture that play out as a movie in my mind. I am trying to connect with them and relate while reliving my experience and applying their experience to mine. It is no wonder I cannot speak, look at how much am I going through just to have a conversation.

This is only a small amount of what is going on.

Add to this my social anxiety which can trigger mutism, making the whole experience worse and not being able to read social cues to the mix. Yikes! I wish I could put up the whole chapter and go through it but I can’t. There are parts where she said that we have the ability to sense “negative” vibes and this can shut us down. I shut down when I hear people yell, tell jokes that I find hurtful to others, someone bullying me, if there is a person bullying someone else, for some reason my passion to stop injustice steps in and my “fight” mode takes over, when I am in a crowd or if I am around someone where I see or feel a blackness. There are other things that cause me to shut down and have a brain freeze but I can’t think of them now.

I am just elated that I am not the only one and it has a name!

I had not connected that I do this in regular social situations as well because I do not get such intense feelings like I do with people who have the blackness around them. They cause me to feel physically sick and dizzy. I have had experiences where I black out around a person, not long but long enough to feel dizzy and see dots. Other situations cause me to have a pain in my throat and sometimes the chills. They have not been the same exact symptoms so I didn’t connect them until after reading this chapter. What I find interesting also is that I have trumped these “gut feelings” about people and forced myself to continue to try to have relationships, with people who are bullies. As a child I didn’t get it, even if I felt that uneasy feeling but they would pretend to be my friend, I would still try to be friends, always to my disadvantage. However, I did go into selective mutism without realizing it. I have called it shock but it is more fitting to call it selective mutism. There is a lot more in this chapter but I will stop there, I found it very insightful.

Has anyone else had these same experience? Rudy stated that this happens in both females and males on the autism spectrum.

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01/28/11

Some Jobs Not For Me I

After I left my seven years at Target, I really had no idea what I wanted to do but I had to find a job. I didn’t feel that schooling was an option for me. Reluctantly, I went back into a retail environment as a supervisor, it was all I knew really, it had become my identity. It was not good, I said it once and I will say it again, if they would just let me do the work and leave out all the social aspects I would thrive but it is basically impossible in a supervisory role for that to happen. After several months I had to quit. I found a job working in a check cashing/payday loan outlet. I had never heard of a place like that, I never even knew that they existed. As I interviewed for the position I was very much sold at working there because of the hours and the flexibility. It would be me and another woman working the shifts, which meant I would be alone most of the hours. The manager worked out-of-town so basically we had a lot of freedom.

Even after I started working there I didn’t fully understand what a payday loan was.

A payday loan was explained to me as being beneficial to people who were in a jam or needed some cash until their check came. It sounded like a good idea for those who could afford it. I quickly realized that most of the people who came in for them could not afford them. I still hadn’t come to full terms of how I felt about the whole business. I was too happy with having the perfect hours for me, the freedom in not having a manager hanging over me, being able to do my job and enjoy it with the accounting part of the paperwork, and number one being alone most of the time. I did not like the collections part, the calling people on the phone and the lingering feeling that something was not quite right with the business.

I quickly rose in ranks and was sent to various other stores in other states to help out.

The more I traveled the more clear it was that these places were strategically placed in lower-income areas. The check cashing part of the business became very disturbing for me. I began to notice what others had been telling me about the social security check days, the disability check days, the churches or non-profits that went through there to get their checks cashed. Other people seemed to “know” that something was wrong. There were a lot of great people that I met but it was also emotionally draining because they shared their lives. I ended up moving to another city and becoming a manager at one of the stores in a pretty happening downtown area. The store was located next to a liquor store and a convenient store.

As I worked in these places I understood that it was dangerous because we were behind bullet proof glass.

However, I did not comprehend the real dangers, like the fact that I had to wear a panic alarm necklace in case someone tried rob me. It didn’t occur to me that the people that came in could possibly be dangerous or be taking advantage of my sympathy to try to figure out how to rob the place. My manager and co-workers constantly told me to be aware, alert, do not trust anyone. Some of the people though, just had hard lives. Things they would share broke my heart and I prayed for them all the time. I thought possibly God had placed me there to pray for people who I encountered. Then there were others that I couldn’t even look at, I have spoken about this a little bit, I had encountered many people who  had like a blackness around them. They scared me and several I refused to help. I couldn’t their presence made me ill. My stomach would get in a knot and I couldn’t speak.

Thankfully there was only a couple of times that I was alone in the store when someone like that came in.

The other good thing was that since that particular store was such high volume, I was never alone for long. I still didn’t talk to them I would just cash their check or get their payday loan as quickly as possible and get them out. I was called rude and some not nice names on occasion. I had one guy threaten to kill me because I wouldn’t cash his fraudulent check. It was scary at times. There were many regulars that I grew to love, then there were regulars that made me so upset. The few drug addicted mothers who would come in high, their babies in the stroller, they would cash their social security checks, renew their payday loan and then go next door to buy lottery tickets, alcohol and cigarettes. There were times when I would just cry as I watched them walk out the door.

I tried to find help for them through ministries or churches but it wouldn’t last long and many of them had already used up those resources for help.

It was too much, I began getting sick. I got extremely ill and didn’t know why. This was the time that I started having severe cramping and at times would be unable to walk. I couldn’t eat, sleep and I was highly emotional. It became clear that I had to change something, my first husband was actually the district manager of the stores, that was how we met through the company. He helped me to finally find a doctor who was able to diagnose me with Endometriosis. I had a laparoscopy and they lasered off all the scar tissue they could, it was all over my right ovary and had covered my lower back. That is another story. We decided to move to his hometown and I took on the role of being a manager at one of the stores that was very low-key and I was the only employee. It was in a safer neighborhood and I got to spend the day reading, listening to the radio and studying whatever I felt.

It was working out perfect except, as I began studying scripture I started to feel that the work we were doing was not moral.

I remember one day I was auditing another stores payday loans, there was one that had been there for years. It was from an elderly lady, she was late on her payment so I had to call her. I found out that she passed away. She had a $100 loan that she had paid $1500 on in renewals. I felt sick. That one moment connected all of the other things that I had not really realized before and I could no longer work there. I had to quit, my father-in-law hired me in one of his insurance offices as an assistant. This short-lived position helped catapult me into a deep depression. I was told that my job was 80% nothing and 20% work. I cannot do that, I considered going into insurance but I had a problem with the ethics as well. I began to not be able to get out of bed.

I was diagnosed with depression and put on Zoloft.

I didn’t want eat, I didn’t want to talk to anyone, I made my husband call in for me, I couldn’t get out of bed. I started having pains again and feared that the endometriosis had come back. While diagnosed with depression, the doctor called it symptomatic and she felt that I was causing myself to feel these pains. She felt that all of it was mental and that I had no real problems physically. She could have been right, I really do not know. I decided that I had to move and I told my husband that we had to move to where my father lived. We moved there and then I went through another round of jobs.

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01/26/11

Dancing Free Singing Loud

All of my family will agree that I am an uncontrollable dancer. I will dance and sing anywhere without thinking. I make up songs about anything, but I do not have the greatest voice so I try not to be too obnoxious. As a kid I danced everywhere we went. I was always moving and driving my mom batty. Anywhere we went that had music, I was dancing. If there was no music, I made up my own. I have passed this trait on to my kids. We sing and dance around here a lot. Sometimes they are not into it as much as I am. I really enjoy all of their children song cd’s we have.

Ariel and Joshua can be heard across town singing as loud as possible while in our car.

Daniel likes to listen, rock back and forth and smile. He will sing sometimes. I find it interesting that he doesn’t sing as much as he used to, his singing is how we knew that he could talk. He wouldn’t say words but he wanted me to play music 24/7 in his bedroom and every cd I played he had memorized. He memorized the words and tune to every song, in the order on each cd. One set was this 365 song, 8 cd set. He would play in his room, with his spinning gears and sing. I knew that he hummed but I had not actually heard him sing until one day. I heard singing coming from his room, peaked around the corner and he was singing the words.

I didn’t want to disturb him but I paid more attention to his singing.

Since I have always made up songs anyway, I started making up songs about everything and singing them to Daniel. I would sing about eating, taking a bath, changing a diaper, brushing teeth, whatever we were doing I sang a song about it. I still do this and we still sing certain songs that were crafted during that time, my favorite is the chant I would sing when Daniel got upset with me “Mommy is annoy–ING”. This chant was accompanied with some sort of silly dance that made him laugh, it still works. I am not sure why he has stopped singing like he used to but you can tell that he still knows the words to all of the songs that were played for a year in his room. He will ask for them to be put on in the car and if I start it on the wrong song he will say “That’s not right”. As he listens he just rocks back and forth and smiles.

All three of the kids love music and it is a big part of our life.

Though I play no instruments, well I can do a little guitar but not much, I still love all kinds of music. Music has been a huge part of my life. My mom has always played many different types of music and my dad is a self-taught musician, since I can remember he has been teaching himself to play various instruments. He plays the keyboards, piano, guitar, drums, any percussions really, he sings. I would watch him practice in his basement when I was little, teaching himself entire Rock Operas. He always had a dream of creating a Rock Opera. He and my mom saw the premier of Tommy in Britain and he was in love. He rarely plays any secular music anymore, he now leads worship at his church. I think he could probably come up with a pretty great Rock Opera though.

Both sides of my family love music.

I feel that is probably why me dancing and singing was encouraged or at least it was my label. Family members labeled me as the “dancer” since it was my special interest. Every family member I can think of has a special interest and then it became their label. There are many stories about me dancing but one of the family favorites is when I had to be dropped off at my dad’s work, I was about 6 or 7 yrs old, my dad was very busy. He was the manager of a fast food restaurant at the time and the drive thru was out of control. It was pretty normal for me to have to entertain myself or work, while I waited for my parents to finish work. On this day for some reason I decided that the people in the drive thru area needed to be entertained while they waited.

My dad was extremely stressed and he was short an employee so he was running the drive thru.

My dad was pleased that people were not getting angry because they had to wait, he also kept hearing people laughing and saying things like “that is so cute”.  Finally, he decided to look outside to see what was going on. When he opened the back door he saw me dancing and singing next to the menu. I had been entertaining all of the customers while they waited. I have a vague memory of this but I do remember being out there feeling so happy that people were happy. I still do this, not to this existent….most of the time.

I had this same freedom when I first started going to church. 

I was so excited when I first started going to church, being surrounded by music that was full of joy and so peaceful to me. I had not been brought up in church, so I did what came natural. I remember the first time I was in a worship service, I had my eyes closed, my hands raised and danced to the swirl like visions that were in my mind. I seemed to just know the songs and had no need to read the words, my body flowed to the music and I just sang to God. I just did it. It was only after this that I felt wrong. I discovered that people say “worship God freely” but  they actually mean do it in a way that does not make them feel uncomfortable. I couldn’t really stop, it is very hard for me not to just flow with music. Just to be clear, I wasn’t dancing down isles, hitting people or being seriously out of control. :-)

I have been in churches where freedom of worship styles is encouraged.

I have also become aware that I can be distracting so I learned to find a happy medium at most churches. It has been a bit confusing for me to understand the rules for church, every church is different even if they are the same denomination. The church we are going to now is a lot more conservative than what I have been in, in the past, so I find myself feeling anxious and clasping my arms together so I will not move my arms or hands and also leaning on the seats in front of me so I will not move as much. When we get out of church though I am running and jumping with the kids the second we get out the doors. I can worship at home, I am fine with that. However, I still dance and sing like a fool in stores or in my car. In stores this is how I stim, it is the only way I can survive in the store. It helps me stay focused and ignore all of the sensory stuff.

Throughout my life people have thought that I was seeking attention or just being obnoxious because of this.

I do not like having attention. It makes me feel very uncomfortable and I do like being unseen. It’s a catch 22, I dance and sing without thinking about it and that causes me to receive attention. :-/ These things are just natural to me though. When I was a child my dad would take me to the grocery at wee hours of the night, we would sing and dance the whole time together. My mom and I spent a large amount of time at home dancing and singing, even though I drove her nuts sometimes out in public, she never told me to stop. Unless I was way out of control.

I do the same things with our kids.

David thinks its awesome. He doesn’t have that freedom and wishes that he had. Things in his life as a child just made him self-conscious about singing or dancing. He loves it too and sometimes we get him going with us but not always. I have never meant to be a distraction and wish church leaders had not used that word to me because it made me feel awful about worshiping freely in church. I don’t let it affect me like it used to though and in past churches I have had people thank me for being so free because it helped them to be free as well. If anything that is what I would want for people, if they feel like dancing or singing, to just have that freedom to do it whether at home, at church, in a store, or where ever as long as it is not harmful to others or to the point of being so distracting its irritating.

I am aware enough of my surrounding to not do that….most of the time. :-)

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01/25/11

Strange Tastes-Full Moon

We have been slowly adding some cheese into Daniel’s diet trying to see if he does actually have a problem with cheese. I talked about that in The Cheese Experiment. I have stayed with one brand that is shredded and in small amounts. We just started a few days ago which led to this conversation with him yesterday. I thought it was too funny and wondered if anyone else has ever wanted bananas and cheese together. It does not sound tasty to me at all. Then again I really dislike bananas so that could be my main issue. In the conversation you can see that Daniel already knows that I will not give him banana and cheese.

We have had this discussion for days now but he asks anyway.

Me: Daniel are you hungry?

Daniel: Yes, how about banana and cheese. Why can’t I eat banana and cheese?

Me: It will be gross Daniel, how about orange noodles? (orange noodles are GF mac-n-cheese)

Daniel: How about these noodles and cheese? (plain GF shells)

Me: Ok, you can have those noodles and cheese.

Daniel: Why can’t I have Scooby Doo noodles? (I have no idea where he got this, I haven’t gotten those for kids and we haven’t been to the store for a while.)

Me: Because they have gluten in them and gluten makes you sick.

Daniel: It will make me puke, Mom?

Me: No, it makes your head hurt.

Daniel: And it makes my head spin and I can’t talk?

Me: That’s right Daniel, it hurts your belly too.

Daniel: I have to eat gluten-free?

Me: Yes, Daniel you should eat gluten-free.

Daniel: Ok, I can eat noodles and cheese. I can, Mom?

Me: Yes, Daniel you can.

Daniel: They are gluten-free?

Me: Yes, Daniel.

Daniel: Ok, I can eat them, Mom?

Me: Yes, Daniel.

He has been doing that a lot lately.

He has been asking me three sometimes four times if he can do something that I have already said yes to. I am not sure what that is about but if I don’t answer him he will keep asking me the same question over and over again or he will say “Why aren’t you talking?’. I think that is pretty funny because I have asked him that on several occasions recently, when he wasn’t answering me. I am not sure if other kids do this too but I thought I would share and see if there were any thoughts.

I am very happy about this full moon cycle.

He has been very calm this time around, that has not been the case for at least five moon cycles in a row. I am not completely sure how many it has been but at least five. He has had a very hard time when the full moon comes. He seems to have a harder time with his vestibular system, it is more off than usual.  During these cycles, he will be off-balance and fall more often, he has been unable to hold a writing instrument as well, he gets cranky, will only eat one type of food, has a hard time sleeping and has also had times where he is unable to talk clearly. All of these can play off of each other, it is like a downward spiral once one starts. So far he is not having as many of these problems. He is still off-balance, we are doing exercises to help him and he is needing a lot of deep pressure input but his mood is much better and he is talking just fine. He is also open to eating more than one food. He has been able to focus on school work too so that is a good thing. Who knows, I have tried to track this stuff but sometimes it’s just too much to keep track of. :-)

It is possible that Daniel requests odd food combination’s during the new moon cycle, I haven’t really paid attention. Hmm…

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01/24/11

Feeling Loopy

I am going on my fourth day of taking over the counter medicine. It seems that the little cold I had was the flu with cough. :-) Thanks coughing cat lady. Ha ha ha I was actually feeling something start last Tuesday but continued to ignore it thinking I was just feeling a little off. By Weds. I knew something wasn’t right but it did not stop me and I wasn’t about to take anything. By Friday I was barely able to function and had to get medicine. I did good getting a blog post out. Why did I wait so long and not rest? Because I thought I was fine. I didn’t feel that bad really and there was no reason to stop my regular schedule just to rest when I felt fine, REALLY. Just a little annoyed by my body not doing what it normally does and coughing was a nuisance, and the head congestion I thought was just a little sinus problem.

It wasn’t until my whole body was having serious chills, I couldn’t get warm and every piece of clothing that I put on burned my skin, made me think I may be a little sick.

There are several reasons why it takes something big to make me acknowledge that I am sick, first of all I do not tell anyone around me so I end up being in pain or not feeling well in silence for a long period of time before anyone notices that something is wrong. Second, I really do not like taking any medication. ANY! I am extremely sensitive to medications, supplements and vitamins so I have to be very careful what I take. Third, I don’t like being sick, it is an annoyance and gets in my way. I have plans, I’ve got stuff to do, something like a my body shutting down on me is frankly bothersome. I don’t have time for it. I know I sound ridiculous, but for some reason this is how I think about it. I do not get sick often anymore, so when I do it just doesn’t compute. I did respond the same way in the past when I was sick. It would take a lot for me to comprehend that I really needed to see a doctor or rest. In my mind I feel like if I can open my eyes, walk, talk, then I am fully capable of doing everything I have my mind set on doing.

I did lose my voice for a day, though.

I am feeling better but I am still taking stuff and I am LOOPY! My brain is all fuzzy, swirly, streamy, seeing all kinds of  colors. What medicine am I taking you ask? Well I have had to take NyQuil at night, DayQuil during the day and I was taking some Alka-Seltzer cold/cough at one point. Not all at the same time and the right doses. Believe me I dislike taking anything so much that I am a freak about reading the directions and making sure I take them correctly. I know from past experiences that these make me feel funny but at this point I would rather feel funny than feel what I was feeling. At least I can breathe now and have been able to get some sleep. :-) When it comes to the kids or David though I am the first to say “Let’s go to the doctor!”, David has to talk me down. I think that they need to go but I don’t or I will say “Maybe we should get medicine” for them not for me.

I have always had strange reactions to medication.

Throughout my life when I have had surgeries or needed some sort of antibiotics or something my body reacted in not pleasant ways. I have not found a prescription pain medication that has worked for me, it seems my body is numb to any I have been given. Though, I can use Advil and it seems to work. My body goes into a complete cleanse mode with any kind of antibiotic. I just can’t take them without being extremely sick, even in very low doses. When they found cysts on my ovaries they put me on birth control pills, they tried three different kinds that all made me bedridden. A few years later when I had a laparoscopy for endometriosis, the doctors said that I should try again and we tried four different prescriptions, one the lowest dose possible, still bedridden. I was very sick and could barely move. This was intensified by the different anti-inflammatory prescriptions they had me try as well.

When I was taking over the counter diet pills and sinus meds, I couldn’t understand why I felt sick all the time. Um Hello??

First off, that wasn’t smart anyway but they were also messing up my body. When I stopped doing that and tried taking herbal supplements I started having very strange effects. I remember one day I tried ginseng and I went into a full-blown rage. I didn’t think it was the ginseng, so I kept taking it and I got progressively worse. I tried St. Johns Wort and got very emotional. I tried Echinacea and was a roller coaster of emotions. I never took them at the same time, my thought process was “Well since that one didn’t work, let me try this one.”. I cannot remember what else I tried over the years but bottom line is I cannot take any herbal supplements without serious side effects. This has made me super sensitive to what I give the kids, if I have such adverse reactions what will happen to them?

I know that some supplements are not bad and we have used fish oil with no problems.

The vitamins we give the kids are fine we do supplement with vitamin D, Calcium and Omega’s but I know that they do ok on those. By accident David purchased some with Echinacea in it, within days of them taking it they all started to have meltdowns and emotional outbursts. The only thing different was the vitamin so I checked it out and saw that it was an ingredient. I stopped giving it to them and within a few days they were back to normal. It led me to believe that they have the same sensitivity as I do with those kinds of things. I have to be very careful with what vitamins I take, they have to be all organic, kosher, (shellfish coating that makes me very sick), and I have to take half the dosage suggested. Normally I have to take children’s medicine or half the adult dosage because I get sick or loopy.

Hence my loopiness now.

I have been taking the adult dosages and I am feeling it. I cannot run any large machinery here! I haven’t been sick like this in so long I couldn’t even remember what to take. I also forgot how much this stuff messes me up. In the back of my mind I think I was holding out so I wouldn’t have to take anything. I was hoping my natural immune system would just fight it off and I wouldn’t have to think about it. Well the good news is that I am reminded that medicines and supplements mess me up and maybe that will help someone else out there. Anyone else have these kinds of issue with supplements, medications, herbal remedy products and prescriptions? That reminds me, I had to get off of Zoloft because of the side effects I was having. By that time I had moved to another town and had a better support system so I really didn’t feel that I needed an anti-depressant any longer. But while I was on them I had relief from anxiety for a while then started having darker thoughts than before I was put on them. In the long run it was better for me to be off of them. When it comes to the kids or David though I am the first to say “Let’s go to the doctor!”. I think that they need to go but I don’t and I will ‘”Maybe we should get medicine” for them not for me.

Well there is my loopy talk for the day. :-)

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01/21/11

She Coughed On Me!

The other day, my mom, the kids and myself all went out. We needed to just get out of the house because all of us have been cooped up and we needed some air. We decided to go to a thrift store that we like around here. It is a little thrift store but they have “buy two get one free” books and an entire room full of them. You need to search through to get the good finds but usually they have something. I have gotten a ton of children’s books there, they run about .25-.50 each and then they also run sales so I can get books for about .10 cents each sometimes.They also have a small section with toys that can have a great find but it is usually rare. We did find a huge bag of Lego’s for $2.50 that was awesome!

Alright, so we go and make our rounds.

Now the smell in this place is horrible. It’s not even the cats that smell, they have a ton of different room deodorizers going on or the bathroom pipes are doing something, I don’t know, it can be too much sometimes. The people that come in can be quite rude and are not fans of children even though my guys always stay close to us and do not terrorize anyone. They still give us looks like “How dare you bring children in here”, not the volunteers just the customers. They especially don’t like it when we go into the electronics area but we HAVE to because that is where Daniel finds his old camera’s and other items like 1980 VCR’s that he wants me to buy so he can dissect it.

On this day it was actually quiet and all things were going pretty well.

The smells had not made us sick, there were very few people and there were a lot of cats for us to check out. I couldn’t find any books and took the kids to watch the cats, while mom shopped for books. I can watch cats all day. From what I could see there were 15, they allow them to roam around and they have huge condo’s, beds and cages set up for them. It is a cool little kitty community. Very clean where the cats are, I like that. Daniel decided he wanted to see if there were any cameras so we went over there and looked. I am completely sidetracked from my point, I am just letting you know because I think what Ariel said next was too funny. We were looking at the camera’s and Ariel noticed some people going in with the cats, hopefully to adopt one.

She then said quite loudly “Mom, why are there human’s going in with the cats?”.

I laughed and told her that they were looking to adopt a cat and hopefully they would. Of course that started the request for us to get another one but we cannot, if it was up to me we would have at least 3 cats. But we are very happy with Nathaniel. Ok, ok anyway, we go to the counter to check out, as I was placing the items the kids picked out on the counter the woman waiting on us coughed all over our stuff, on my hands and on me! I looked at her in complete disbelief. I stared at her for a moment, the entire scene playing back in my mind. I saw her just start coughing over and over again, germs flying all over the place, she didn’t bother to cover her mouth. Full blown wide open mouth hacking all over me.

I couldn’t think and just needed to get out of there.

She didn’t say sorry, she didn’t think anything of it.I quickly paid, got our stuff and left mom in the store as the kids and I high tailed it to the car. When we got to the car, I pulled out my mega pump of anti bacterial sanitizer and doused the toys, the kids and me down with it. Yes, I am kind of germaphobe but this was the first time we had been out since the kids recovered from their virus. I was praying “Oh, Lord please, PLEASE, do not let the kids get sick”. Well the kids are not sick, but I am.

I have been coughy, achy, runny nose, sore throat, NyQuil kind of sick.

No fever! Yea! Needless to say I was not happy at all. I was also exposed to some sick kids on Sunday so it could have been them too. They coughed on me but I am more forgiving of 2-5 yr olds coughing all over me, it is pretty much expected but not a grown woman. If my post is all over the place it because I am not thinking clearly. I am waiting on David to get back with some medicine for me and I had to get my mind off of what I am feeling. Not to mention I am fighting the voice going on in my head saying that I am “lazy and unproductive and should be able to be fine it is just a little cold, get up and do what you have planned today”.

David said I need to rest, I wish my brain would let me. :-)

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01/20/11

Where’s My Green SORRY Peg!!

Now that this is all over it is quite amusing and I was thankful to be able to handle it much better than in the past. Yesterday was going quite well. We finished school, played some games and everyone was getting along. The only thing that was getting a bit frustrating was Daniel wanting something different every few minutes. He would ask me for things that were at the top of the closet that he has not had any interest in for a long time. I would have him clean up the previous whatever and then get him the next toy or game or paper or string or box or whatever. Around the end of my patience David comes down and hands me the phone, it is my aunt.

I was not prepared for a phone call so I was a little off guard.

I am not a fan of the phone and it gives me a lot of anxiety but I will talk to my aunt no matter how I am feeling. We talk about every two or three months but it feels like we just talked to each other the day before. Needless to say I am pretty comfortable talking to her but I still need after phone downtime. David had to go back up to work, I had started dinner, Ariel and Joshua were beginning to wrestle and Daniel was asking for something at the top of the closet. All of this while I am having a conversation on the phone with my aunt who I have not talked to since before all of the holidays and she needed to give all the low down on how she almost had a million meltdowns because she had a ton of people, including family in and out of her house.

Deep breath!

I get the box for Daniel and it is full of SORRY game peg pieces. He has been playing with one green peg piece for days. It has shown up in random places all over the house. While my aunt and I were talking, I was trying to make dinner and Ariel and Joshua started arguing over how to lay out stuffed animals, Daniel began asking me for his green SORRY peg. I told him that I did not know where it was and that he needed to look for it. In the mean time I was walking all around the house looking for it because he was getting very upset. Finally, I told him that l I looked everywhere and I had no idea where it could be.

He began to play with a water bottle half full of water.

He dropped it on the floor, kicked it around and said “Where’s my green SORRY peg?” He asked this over and over again and I had to take the water bottle away because it was going to burst from him throwing it around. Oh, boy did he get upset. He started yelling at me, really loud. I was still on the phone and trying to cook dinner. I should have just gotten off the phone but I wasn’t sure when we would have been able to talk again so I stayed on. David came down and tried to take care of the situation but in the mean time Joshua’s 46 lb body landed on Ariel’s little foot. Not good. David took care of that situation while I continued with the food on the stove.

Daniel decided that his tactics were not working.

He then proceeded, after David goes back upstairs, to shake all of the pegs in a plastic box with a lid on it. VERY LOUD! Oh, my goodness it was so loud it hurt my ears so bad. I was cooking something on the stove that required my full attention so I couldn’t leave it. He sat at the kitchen table shaking the pegs, asking “Where’s my Green SORRY peg?”. Every time I turned to look at him he would stop, the moment I turned my back he would start-up again. When I was finished with the food I told my aunt that I just couldn’t take it anymore he was seriously hurting my ears and head, so I decided to put him on the phone.

My aunt, The Daniel Whisperer.

He started talking to her and laughing, she asked him what was wrong and he said “I don’t know”. After a few minutes I took the phone back and he was laughing and went to sit back at the table. I walked in our bedroom and happened to see the green peg on the floor next to our bathroom door. David and I walked past it at least a hundred times. (Maybe an exaggeration) Daniel walked past it a ton of times too. My brain felt so disconnected by that time. I brought the peg to him and he was so happy. I had to show him where I found it, of course. After all of that I got off the phone and was able to be with everyone. I actually didn’t need any down time.

I was surprised by me, normally all of that would have just taken everything out of me.

I was quite tired in the evening though and I did go to bed early. It was really a surprise that I didn’t get upset or have a headache. I didn’t get completely overloaded, well I did but I just responded differently. During the situation my brain was a mess, but after all of it was over I was able to put each thing into a compartment in my head and section off the sounds and chaos. It was like my brain processed each one individually and then I could cope with the situation. I have never been able to do that before, normally my brain will just get dizzy, fuzzy, swirly and I get sick to my stomach. I usually have to stim for the rest of the evening and I get cranky. I don’t know if this will happen ever again but it happened once and that was good. Although, next time I will just get off the phone. :-)

Now my aunt and I have a joke when we are upset about something “Where’s my green SORRY peg!!!”

Said pieces and said box displayed here:

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01/17/11

Oh, Happy Days!

Yesterday, I was in class with the kids at church, I was not sure how Daniel was going to do since we haven’t been there in a few weeks. I was both surprised and amazed at what he did socially. He has been more visibly aware with the other kids, he has always been aware but for him to acknowledge them is something recent. He will laugh at them or smile but the initiating any contact has not happened. Until yesterday! I was so excited to have been there with him as he stepped out a bit to talk and play with some of the other kids.

He actually sat down with me and the group of boys that I was sitting with and said, “Hi Zach”.

He remembered one of the boy’s name! I asked Zach if he could say “Hi Daniel” back to give Daniel the confidence that his words worked. Then I told Daniel all of the other boys names, that he may know, but be like me and feel uncertain that they are the correct names so not say anything. I do that all the time or I cannot remember names at all no matter how many times I am told. After every boys name he said hi to them and they said “Hi Daniel” back. He was so happy! He tried to play a bit but then wasn’t sure how to keep playing so he left.

He did not do his normal walk the perimeter, yet.

He went and sat next to the other teacher who was doing a puzzle with one of the little girls. He just started talking to her. He continued a conversation with her about her watch. She handled it pretty well because he REALLY wanted her watch and wanted to keep talking about it. He participated with singing and dancing, which he usually does but he was doing more of the hand motions than usual and interacting with the other kids. A lot of the times he will stare at the screen and rock back and forth. There were some moments when he was distracted with the DVD player and managed to mess the TV up a bit but we got that fixed for our 5 minute video. When the story was read, at first he looked like he was not paying any attention but there were times that something was said and he turned and looked.

So it was clear that he was actively listening.

After the story and video we went to go make our craft and he was fixated on the remote controls. I had brought one from home just in case, I figured he would not be able to focus unless he had one. At the tables he was refusing to sit and started to get a little agitated. I told him that it was craft time and that he needed to sit, he asked me why, I explained it to him, he wasn’t sitting and I took his remote control. He then said “Why did you take my remote?” and I told him “Because you are not listening to me”. He sat down and said “Can I have my remote?” I gave it to him and then he did his project.

WOW!

When he was finished he asked if it was time to go home so I told him that I would take him to daddy, but it wasn’t time to go home. Class was almost over but he had done such a great job and he was getting to his limit, I knew it was best to let him go with David. David was sitting out anyway with Ariel because she was having “anxiety” about her stomach problem. That is another whole story that I will have to write about but the short version is she was worried about people asking why her stomach hurt and she didn’t have an answer for it. She told us that she was “nervous and anxious about not being able to tell people why if they asked”.

Daniel did have a few moments of walking the perimeter and banging on the walls a little.

He did not do it for long though and he kept coming back to the floor or tables to try to play with the other kids. He tried to talk to them but then I could see went blank then didn’t know what to do. I tried to help him by initiating questions between him and the other kids but at some point Daniel just had to go. It could have been sensory, anxiety or just not knowing what to do next but he was a happy guy after we left and said he had fun. He has even been telling me what he did in class this morning. I am guessing he really did have fun.

The other amazing thing is that he did not have any problems all day after we came home.

He kept focused on a Wall-e game he has and then he wanted to play on this website Jacob’s Lessons but he learned how to play Othello game with David last night. Games can be hard for him. He also had been talking to me and hanging out with us off and on the whole day. He had some alone time but it wasn’t all day.  Today has been pretty good too. Right now all three of them are “making music”, Daniel on guitar, Joshua on keyboard and Ariel guitar and vocals. It’s pretty funny. I am so excited that the social skills curriculum and books have been working. Between that and Ariel and Joshua, Daniel is making some huge progress in stepping out in social situations. I am dreading the full moon though, he seems to make huge changes then the full moon comes and he has such a hard time.

Hopefully this will be a good full moon cycle!

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