It's been a while crocodile

It seems that it has been a year since I have been on this blog, and it is true that it has been a year since I posted anything but it has not been a full year since I wrote something.

The truth of it is? There is a lot of pressure when you have a blog to be posting the right things, to get the right followers, to get the amount of followers, to be listed as "one of the top 10" something-or-other. So, I lost sight of it all and I would write something then delete it, write something else and delete that too.

Truthfully? I don't even have anyone pressuring me, truthfully I don't have any followers to even think about. It has been me feeling (yet again) not good enough. Not good enough to have a blog...whatever that means. And now as I sit and write this I feel a HUGE amount of guilt for not seeing it through and therefor not blogging and journaling all of the things that have happened in a year! Truly its a viscous circle of phychosis; I didn't blog because I felt that I would be judged and now I am judging myself for not blogging. Ugh, its exhausting really.

With much coaching from my therapist I am learning to not-give-a-shit as to what people think and to think things myself in a normal, logical fashion; So I have decided to try this again. And this time without deleting any of my posts.

Stay tuned for the update from this year.

I love my husband...I love my husband...I love my husband....

Don't get me wrong I do love Paul, very much however I am not sure that I like him all of the time! He is extremely busy. Paul owns his own business (he is a computer guy) and has for fifteen years, that in itself is a lot. Paul also coaches football and throws heavy things with the Alberta Scottish Athletic Association. He is just plain busy. So, my venting is this...

We have been building a bathroom in our basement for five years. That's right FIVE YEARS!

We live in an older home that was built in the 50's and whereas we have renovated some of it we have been unable to renovate our bathroom upstairs because it needs to be gutted and we cant do that unless we have a pot-to-piss-in, so to speak. Our upstairs bathroom was renovated in the 80's and it would have been a perfect location to shoot a porn truthfully. On one of the walls there is floor to ceiling mirror (whatever you do, don't look to your left while sitting on the toilet), the other walls are floor to ceiling tile, the floor is honeycomb tile, the sink is the shape of a sea shell, the ceiling is cedar wood paneling and the shower is missing the door so we have to use a shower curtain.

If the bathroom was just ugly then I could deal with that but its not. The bathroom is falling apart by the day. Shortly after we moved into the house (eight years ago) we lost some of the tile from the wall beside the door. The honeycomb floor is coming apart and our sweet Brandy likes to pick off the pieces daily, we now have a huge hole in the middle of the floor. Our tub, although I have cleaned it with bleach and a scrub brush many times will spew putrid black flakes if you turn the jets on. The shower? Don't get me started. It is so old that the plastic is breaking down and can no longer be cleaned. The doors on the vanity don't close properly and the door to the bathroom itself will not stay closed unless there is a towel on the top of it to wedge into the door frame. Although if you lock the door you cant open it....hm?

My dear friend Helen suggested that I just glue the floor tile on and truthfully I'm not interested, and for a couple of reasons. I am hoping that the worse that it gets the faster my husband will move to get the basement bathroom done. And also, if I glue tiles down I will never be able to get them off when it comes time to actually do it.

Having one bathroom for a family of five just logistically does not work anymore either. There have been many times when one of us is banging on the door to go while someone else is rushing to get off. And forget privacy when taking a bath, quite often I am interrupted with a child using the toilet while I'm in there. Ugh.

I love Paul, I really do but he has no follow through and even less free time. And he is not very handy so things take him longer to complete. I try to do what I can to help out. We are not the type of family that has extra cash laying around and so we do home repairs ourselves to keep the costs down. So right now the downstairs bathroom is waiting to be drywalled. Then there is the floor, ceiling, installing the fixtures and paint. I will do the mudding and taping of the drywall (a job that I detest) as well as the tiling of the floor and the painting but I am not strong enough to drywall or install the fixtures by myself.

So I gave my hubby an ultimatum, finish the bathroom or you can not go play with your friends on the 14th (he has a highland games). I hated doing it, we just don't have that kind of marriage, and truthfully I would never stop him from going. But I need him. I need him to physically do somethings around our house. As a family we need him to choose us. See, he always makes throwing a priority and he never misses a game. our home needs to be the priority. Also, football starts in August and so I can kiss him goodbye from August to October.

The other issue is that today we are supposed to be leaving to go to the lake. Paul's parents own a cabin and today we are supposed to be out there getting the cabin ready for the summer. It is not helping at that cabin that I mind it is just that our home needs help. It is a long weekend and wouldn't it be lovely to spend those three days renovating?

So, right now I am sitting here with steam coming out of my ears and Paul is nowhere to be found. Where is he you ask? Working. He had a server go down and he is at a clients. Again (for the third trip in a row) I am left to pack and get ready to go. I have done all of the grocery shopping, laundry and packing without any of his help at all. Granted, he is working. I am just enormously frustrated with his lack of presence at home. I need more of him, I need him to choose us BEFORE he chooses football and heavy events.

Our 14th wedding anniversary is on Wednesday and I am just not sure what it will hold. My love for him is unwavering, I cannot imagine life without him, although right now I am not too happy either. I guess I don't feel much like celebrating.

Changes

I have come to realize in my absence from blogging, that our family is about so much more than Brandy's adoption. We are a family that loves football for example and that too deserves to be written about. We have two kids with special needs and all of the complexities of that deserves time. Our home is crazy, loud and always in a state of renovation. Our life is no more hectic than anyone elses and our family is just as special and important as yours; I just think that we have stories to tell that others might relate to.

I have changed the name of the blog to Notes from a Family in Progress because the old title really only represented the changes brought to our life because of Brandy's adoption. Our family is forever changing, growing and progressing, thus the change of the blog name.

So, I promise to myself to write more often, this is after all a place for me to keep record of the insanity and love of our family

Not such a good day...

I don't know if it is just that I am tired or perhaps it is PMS but today is not such a good day. I cannot seem to gel with Brandy today, her and I are no where near on the same page. Thursday is music day and like the last few Thursday's Brandy and I went excited for our music class. It was mostly good until about half way through when Brandy decided that she wanted to sit with anyone but me, in fact she was giving me a nasty look and then going to sit with other people, so much so that my friend Heather asked what I had done to piss Brandy off this morning! I know that she is two and I am thirty-something but really it is hard to not take it personally. It leaves me feeling rather disheartened. Then we went to Sobeys and there she whined most of the time and for what I have no idea, then again to take out her frustration she hit me. By the time we got home it was all I could do to get her lunch and get her down for a nap....although she is not napping.

So far with this adoption, things have been great, really very easy but today...today is a bad day. Right now she is screaming 'no' in her crib. I knew at the beginning that there would be bad days and good days, I guess that I was just hoping that the bad days wouldn't be because I was feeling frustrated with her. I know that when the boys were two there were days that I didn't really like them all too much either but I don't really feel like I have the right to feel this way about her. After all isn't this what I asked for? I asked to have another child, for the good and the bad. When there are still people waiting for kids do I really have the right to be frustrated?

So, when I am ready and more calm, I will go into her room, pick her up, give her a snuggle and hopefully be able to turn it all around. Maybe she is feeling pretty crappy about the adoption today too.  

Then and Now

Our dear Brandy has peed on the potty before her bath two nights in a row!

I know that this is dorky and I never wanted to be that kind of mom that made the whole world aware of my child's bathroom habits but oh well! We are thrilled!

Going through this toddler stuff for the third time is so much fun. I know that I am in a different place at a different time of my life but I don't remember enjoying it so much with the boys...perhaps it is because it was something that I took for granted with them and then was not able to have again until now. Perhaps it was also that I was tired and depressed.

I remember telling Paul that he had to eat supper beside the boys, had to bath them nightly and put them to bed. OH THE GUILT! If I could do it over I would, I would love every second and not let it feel like a chore. (In my head right now I can hear my best friend telling me to shut-up, give myself a break and remember that I am only human). Don't get me wrong, I did bath the boys, eat with them, read to them and tuck them into bed, but if given the chance I would avoid having to. I was totally hands-on, until Paul came home from work.

When the boys were little, there were two of them. I was lost, not sure what my life meant and if being a stay-at-home mom was enough. When the boys were young I was depressed, still battling post-partum from Noah's birth. There is nothing that I can do to change the past and letting myself enjoy Brandy being a toddler isn't wrong, it doesn't make the past any worse. I need to let myself enjoy this time and not let the guilt of the past cloud the present. 

I know that I have always been a loving and caring mom but these past few years I really feel like I am truly a very good mom. I am good at what I do, just like an electrician, lawyer or doctor. I feel as though I have come into my own, grown up and not just accepted but enjoy the decisions that I have made. Which is another reason why I was so ready to adopt, because I know that not only can I handle it but that I want it.

I love bathing Brandy, she totally cracks me up! I love the smell of the soap and washing her hair. I love rubbing her with lotion and helping her brush her teeth. As for eating with her, Paul eats dinner beside her because I usually eat breakfast and lunch with her. I love to snuggle with her before bed, Paul and I almost fight over it!
So, this time around... I will delight in the trips to the potty. I will savour the bath times and her snuggles afterwards when she is shivering cold. I will laugh inwardly at the temper tantrums. I will enjoy reading the same book over and over (if it means that I get to be with her). During diaper changes I will take the opportunity to talk to her and teach her things. And for my boys? I will remind them everyday that I love them. I will take them to football, fencing, horseback, lacrosse and birthday parties. I will enjoy the after school homework sessions and be grateful that I get to be with them. I will gladly take them to movies that I have no desire to see, just so that they will hold my hand in the dark. I will play board games and read books to them. I will continue to be the mom that I have become and I will forgive myself for being the mom that I was.  

My Boys...

Well my Marcus and my Noah have been through alot lately. First it was Christmas and the business that goes with that, then it was a death of someone close to us, then it was the trip to get Brandy, then it was getting sick and missing school and now for poor Noah it is a new orthodontic appliance that has been put in his mouth. OY!

I have talked to both of their teachers and they have all seen an increase in anxiety of BOTH boys, not just our Marcus with the diagnosed anxiety disorder. So today I made appointments for both of them to see our psychologist. We knew that the process of adopting and then bringing a new child home would be hard on the boys but I guess I was not really prepared.

We have seen a return of many of Marcus's ticks (from his Tourettes Syndrome), obsessions / compulsions (from his Obsessive Compulsive Disorder) and general anxiety behaviour. His poor hands are red and cracked from the return of his hand washing. Being afraid and disgusted by germs is a constant for Marcus although he usually manages the need to compulsively wash quite well. We try to ensure that he eats well, sleeps enough and has a manageable amount of stress; doing so (along with medications) allow him function really, very well. Lately, obviously we haven't been able to keep it balanced enough for him. He was so upset the other day when he accidentally touched an apple core in the van garbage that he was begging me to pull over the car so that he could wash his hands. Obviously rational thought was not an option because it didn't occur to him that pulling over didn't magically make a sink and soap appear. As for the ticking, well he is back to saying 'excuse me' over and over again. Yes I know that as far a Tourettes is concerned, a vocal tick such as saying excuse me is really rather pleasant. However, when you count your child saying 'excuse me' forty-seven times in one minute it is distressing none-the-less. Knowing that his stress level is so high that he cannot control his own brain is so sad. He has also started picking his skin on his foot again and it is starting to crack, which obviously hurts him. My sweet boy.

As for our Noah, he puts a tremendous amount of pressure on himself and we have always tried to help him work through it, doing things like reassuring him that he is perfectly perfect the way he is. Lately however the pressure is too much. We actually have seen an increase since football this summer. He is always so worried about disappointing a coach or a teacher, failing a test or not making a tackle. He doesn't want to let himself cry and gets embarrassed when showing emotion. It seems that since we have brought Brandy home he is even more worried about these things, even more concerned about being right, perfect, responsible and the 'model citizen'.

So, we have booked them both some appointments with our child psychologist and are giving them all of the love and snuggles that we can. We will keep a close eye on them and work with their teachers to keep them safe and loved. I am sure that it will all calm down with time, right?

I married Prince Charming!

My dear sweet Paul knocked my socks off! Last Friday he came home with not just flowers for me but a bouquet of flowers for Brandy as well. Paul brings me flowers once every couple of months so I already know that I am spoiled but I was blown away that he brought home flowers for our little girl too. When I asked him why he said it was because he wanted to be the first man to ever give her flowers! Be still my heart.

Paul and his little princess!