Bit of a nervous wreck this week, and it's only Tuesday.

Recap.

My two Pint's are fine. They went to Mrs. Freud (counselor lady) after a hiatus of one month due to the fact that I had forgotten to schedule more appointments after the last batch had come and gone. If it doesn't go into my Palm Treo, it doesn't happen in our life.

I actually set the ALARM to remind me that the kids have to go out the door at the right time to catch the bus. Sad, isn't it?

So anyway, we had a condensed version of a counseling session, both girls and I split into a one hour session which was, quick. LOL.

Normally the girls each get an hour.

I explained to Mrs. Freud that Pint had already achieved (or so it seems) the situation that we both hoped she would someday arrive at.

She has come to simply accept her mother the way she is and not...

  1. make excuses for her

  2. look for promises from Mom to be fulfilled

  3. relegate Mom to the status of a slightly weirded out close family friend.

This makes me glad, and a little sad.

Yesterday, in the car, Calamity calls. Wants to talk to the kids. I explain that the kids are in the back seat, and we are heading down Wellsville hill and will not have a signal for approximately 15 minutes. She asks if they can call once we are down the hill. I say yes.

Hit the Calamity button, hand over phone to back seat. Each girl has a conversation with their mother, very brief and one worded. Hi. Yes. no. okay. I miss you too. Bye.

Much more of an, um.....necessary phone call than one in which the child actually wants to participate.


My brother, who is one year younger than am I, and whom I have not seen in 23 years will be here Monday next. The last time I saw him my mother died. We lost touch. We are not a close family. (that would be an understatment).

My niece/daughterinlaw found my nephew (one year younger than Calamity is, last time I saw this child he was turning ONE year old !!) on MySpace. We started corresponding with each other whilst he was in Iraq. He is a (now) civilian who is an IED expert and was working for a contractor in Iraq.

He gave me his Dad's phone and address. We started corresponding.

It's a little weird. So, next week, I will pick him up in Akron at his hotel, and go to the Football and Rock and Roll Halls of Fame...and he will meet his other niece and nephew whom he has never seen (that would be Baby and Son who is married to Niece/Daughterinlaw), meet Baby's boyfriend IF they are together that day and not broke up, meet his three great niece's, meet my other foster daughter and her four children......and reconnect with the two niece's that he DID meet when they were seven and five ish, and has not seen since. I am sure it will be a shock for him, since they are now 30 and 28..and that is a lot of years inbetween.

I have warned DH that my brothers are, well, as not normal as am I, only in much different ways.

This brother is the one I was closest to growing up. I think he is the one most approaching normal human condition.

The other two, the oldest (niece/daughterinlaw's dad) is an anti social, libertarian genius who is condescending to the point of being unable to function well in society at all, and the youngest is a, well, Moonie. (Disciple, follower of the so called reverend sun yung moon). I don't capitalize his title or name on purpose.

The youngest has visited twice. The first time he acted like an ass. The second he taught my son to shoplift. He was asked to never return.

We were all considered genius. The parents had our I.Q.'s tested. Yuck. And, we were expected, actually forced to perform up to the parent's expectations. Not the parents. The Father.

My oldest brother, a year older than me, received a beating in Kindergarten because he brought home a B.

I started Kindergarten and never brought home more than a B occasionally, mostly a C. So did my next brother down. We learned early to NOT show success, because once shown, you could never go back in our family. Never.

I left home at age 13, tired of the beatings. The brother who is visiting next week left not too much longer I think.

We did stay in touch, and I moved back after my Dad left some four years later. At that point, we were all just people, sort of living in the same house. Not a family, if you know what I mean. It was easy to fall apart.

Probably one of the reasons I try so hard to hold my family together now.

Nursey and Cop are irreconcilable so to speak.

¾ Pint is NOT doing well at all. I cannot even go into it, it stresses me out so much. She is on the verge of a nervous breakdown and she isn't even 7 years old for two weeks yet.

My heart is broken to what she is going through. It is very stressful. But, really, what can you expect when you take a small child completely away from everything she knows and feels stable with, and stick her in a large city, a new school, with no friends, no karate, different doctors, different rules, different caretakers, different clothes (no small Catholic school anymore, LARGE public school), have to ride a school bus with street smart city kids....no cousins, no familiar coffee shop where she is treated as a favored customer when she goes in to get her sugar free, dairy free, decaf latte? No familiar parks, no familiar routine. And, no Dad anymore. And Mom is working too many hours to pay the bills, and the only other caretaker is your 19 year old Aunt Baby who does not have the skills yet (but tries very hard) to deal with an emotionally wrecked 6 year old!!

Then, when she has a meltdown and runs amok at school, to the point where they put the school on lockdown, where she bites and kicks the Vice Principal....and then refuses consistently to go to school...

Yes, stress is running rampant in my body right now. Nursey is ready to have a nervous breakdown, Baby is ready to have a nervous breakdown, and ¾ Pint IS HAVING a nervous breakdown.

And, in absentia, so is MeeMaw.

My idea is to bring her out here, live here till school is out for the summer, go to school with cousins, see Mommy when Mommy has days off. Attend twice weekly counseling sessions with counselor here. See same pediatrician she has always seen.

Then, when summer starts, go back to the apartment with Mommy on the four days a week Mommy is not working..and have Mommy take her to the playground and pool everyday where she can make friends and integrate herself slowly into the big city apartment complex society. The theory is, by the time school starts up again, she will have friendships established that will help her out with riding the bus and going to school there. Also, start integrating her into the new doctor regimes, and the new counselor, so that she sees both the old and new concurrently, and makes the transition.

Nursey has not decided yet what to do. New pediatrician is saying (he has seen her exactly twice) that to do that might be giving the message to ¾ Pint that she can control the situation. Okay, I can sort of see that.

My theory is “who gives a flying fuck?” There is a Baby in meltdown. We fix it. We do whatever is going to be best for the baby. That's all that matters to me.

I'm very glad I don't have to go anywhere today. I need a long, soaky bath with about ½ bottle of good Cabernet (not as fruity as Shiraz), and need to sit and watch old re-runs on TV. Brain Veg.

Thursday is Children's Museum day with my best friend, her daughter and Pint.

Saturday is Destination Imagination State Competition day (9:30 and 10:30 am) then drive two hours home, then Black Belt test at 4 pm, with lots of family coming in for the test.

Busy week.

Pray for ¾ Pint please. She really is hurting badly.