Thursday, June 26, 2008

Miss You!

When we lived in Knoxville, Jon and I were blessed to become close to the Blair family. Their daughter Harper was the same age as our daughter Karis, and the two girls were tight from the age of 2 until, well, I guess they are still close at heart. We saw each other through job changes, moving, adoption, births and deaths, and finally a life change for the Blairs. I miss our friends, especially my sister in Christ Tracy, who moved to Las Vegas last November. I miss that Harper and Karis won't get to grow up together, although as Tracy likes to remind me, we moved away first when we moved to South Carolina. The Blairs became the kind of "couple friends" that fit into our lives so easily they felt like family. We ate with each other, vacationed with each other, stayed in each other's homes, cared for each other's children and so much more. Although I'm so sad at the way things ended for them, I will always cherish the time we had to be part of each other's lives. We haven't yet found a good set of "couple friends" here in Duncan but we're working on it. Meanwhile, I put together a video of the Blair children and our children and set it to Miley Cyrus singing "Miss You." Karis actually chose the song and I think it's very appropriate. We miss our friends and it makes me sad that they are all the way on the other side of the country but at the same time I understand Tracy wanting to be where she feels God is calling her to be. I just wish God was calling her to South Carolina. Here's the video:

Saturday, June 7, 2008

R.I.P.

We are gathered here today to mourn the passing of our dear friend, Personal Responsibility. After years of faithfully walking with us, she was bludgeoned to death by Righteous Entitlement and Delusions of Victimization. We will miss you, P.R. You taught us how to examine our consciences. You made us look at ourselves realistically and taught us that many times something WE did led to what we sometimes tried to think of as "bad luck." What will become of us without your guidance?

What, indeed? I read an article a couple of days ago about a 3 year old girl whose foot got caught in an airport escalator. It turns out she was wearing Crocs, and her shoe got stuck in between steps, trapping her foot and nearly severing a toe. She'll make a full recovery, by the way. I've heard of this sort of thing happening before on escalators with Crocs, and while I love Crocs I know they can be clumsy and unwieldy sometimes. Escalators and children don't mix well anyway, in my opinion, and anytime I am on an escalator with my kids I'm as nervous as a cat. It probably doesn't help that one of my childhood nightmares was getting my shoe or shoestring (yes, back in the day we wore shoes with actual shoestrings that you had to tie, BY YOURSELF) caught in the escalator. My girls like to jump at the end of the escalator ride and that's fine by me. I'm usually holding their hand right up until the moment that they jump so they don't jump too soon. At least if they're jumping their toes/shoes won't get caught. Anyway, the punch line to this story is that the mother of the 3 year old girl is thinking of suing the airport. For what? Because her daughter was wearing Crocs? I don't get it. I'm sorry the little girl got hurt, but sometimes an accident is just an accident and no one is at fault. And sometimes things that happen to you are your own fault.

Years ago a lady (questionable term) made headlines for suing McDonald's. She went through the drive-thru and bought a cup of coffee. The coffee spilled and burned her, so she sued McDonald's. Um..... Why? Because McDonald's told her to put the coffee between her legs and drive? I don't remember what happened with the case but I thought it was ridiculous. Common sense should tell you that the coffee will be hot and you should handle it carefully. If it wasn't hot, she probably would have complained about that, too. Sadly, common sense seems to be in short supply these days. We shouldn't need warning labels on appliances telling us not to use them in the bathtub. I've known since elementary school that water conducts electricity, haven't you?

I'm all about choices. Life is a series of choices that we make, thanks to God's gift of free will. Like right now: I'm choosing to write in my blog rather than do other things, like clean the kitchen, fold laundry, take a shower, etc. When I'm feeling lazy and I stay in bed instead of getting up for quiet time with God, I'm making a choice. (In fact, I'm revealing my priorities with choices like that one - my sleep is more important than my relationship with God, at least at that moment. But my speech on priorities can be saved for another blog post.) Much of the time I choose the easy way out. :-) I'm not a big fan of excuses. That doesn't mean I think people should beat themselves up all the time, but at least be honest with yourself. You'll never do any better if you can't acknowledge what you're doing now. One of my favorite sayings is, "Self-awareness is the first step." If you can't look at yourself objectively and realistically, change (as in becoming more Christ-like) is much harder. It's like trying to follow a map without knowing your starting point. I KNOW my tongue needs to be tamed, so I'm working on that. I KNOW I need more quiet time and I'm working on that, too. I KNOW that I let my anger rule me sometimes and with God's help, that's getting better all the time.

I try to teach my girls to make good choices in life. If your sister hits you, you have a choice: walk away or hit back. Make the right choice, and don't come to me with the excuse that she hit you first. The lesson doesn't always "take" and so, like me, they will need to hear it over and over again - Make good choices.

Monday, June 2, 2008

Letting Go

Something new is happening tomorrow. For the first time in her seven-plus years of life, Karis will be sleeping away from home without me. Dana is taking her to the beach for an overnight trip and it scares me to death! Not because I think Dana is irresponsible, but because I'm just so convinced that Karis needs me.

Karis has always been a little bit sensitive and needy, even as a newborn. She didn't seem to fit into this world exactly right, like a puzzle piece with a corner cut off. It wasn't until she was five years old that we discovered she has Sensory Processing Disorder. Most people have never heard of this problem, but basically it means that the information she takes in through her senses (including hearing, sight, taste, touch and smell, but there are others) doesn't always get understood correctly by her brain. If you've ever been irritated by a tag inside your chirt or the seams on your socks, you might have some idea of what SPD is like. But imagine that the irritation is so bad that you can't concentrate on anything else - it's all you can think about, and it actually HURTS. Sometimes lights are too bright and sounds are too loud, but other times the lights aren't bright enough and the sounds are too low. As a baby she had a hard time eating and sleeping. Even now she eats a very limited number of things. I'm sure people think we baby her or spoil her (or both!) but the fact is that she would literally starve herself before she would eat what we think of as "normal" meals. Certain smells will make her gag and vomit. She also struggles with some kinds of movement and she seems distracted a lot, almost like she's got ADD, which she does not. Sometimes her senses are on high alert and sometimes they seem dulled. It's hard to say what's coming next. SPD is so sneaky that it even affected the way Karis held a pencil, or cut with scissors. It affects the way she looks at words on a page, because she doesn't naturally read left to right and top to bottom. That's called "visual tracking," by the way. And SPD, especially mild SPD, is nearly undetectable unless you know what you're looking for. There are sensory seekers, who want more and more and more stimulation. They are the kids who seem to be risk takers, who want to jump off the couch again and again or can't hug you without knocking you down. There are sensory avoiders, who want you to turn the TV down or cut out all the tags in their clothes. For the most part, kids with SPD swing from one extreme to the other, depending on the day and what else is going on in their lives.

I'm of the belief that there is no one who is 100% normal. What's normal, anyway? But when it comes to our senses I think we all have SPD of one degree or another. The thing is, our differences are minor enough that we can adjust to them without major trauma. Kids like Karis can't make that adjustment and their SPD affects their quality of life. She can't always regulate herself because she can't process the sensory information her body is taking in, and sometimes she resorts to making sounds instead of using her words. There are kids out there with more severe SPD than Karis who literally cannot stop themselves from playing with their food or crashing into the couch. She does have some ability to self-regulate. I suppose I should count my blessings but it's hard on those days when Karis is so overwhelmed with life and all the stimulation out there that she just wants to curl up on my lap for hours and hide her head.

As with most mothers, I *know* that no one understands my children the way that I do, but it's particularly true of Karis. I can relate to her in so many ways and I feel her pain and confusion when the world gives her mixed (in her mind) signals. I want so much to protect her from the world and keep her close to me but I know I can't do that forever. So when Dana said she'd like to take Karis to the beach overnight, I said yes, even though I may not sleep at all tomorrow night. Seven years old and she's never slept the entire night without me at least in the same building. This is a big day.