Fleeting thoughts through my fuzzy brain

Think. I used to be able to do it. Eh, the ability comes and goes. I suspect it will return eventually.

We went to visit the boy yesterday evening. Sproing, the one at the residential mental health place. Sproing, the one with a heavy case of Oppositional Defiant Disorder. He's a small boy, small for his almost-12 years who carries a huge burden. It's a burden he's not ready to release.

He resists treatment. He opposes pretty much everything. Right now he seems to be concentrating his opposition on his mother. Last evening's visit was painful. According to him, we still hate him. We have parties here to celebrate his absence. He hates us and never wants to be with us ever again.

This morning I called his therapist. She told me that he has talked about hurting me. Sometimes he wants to hit me (he hasn't), but mostly he just says hurtful things. She asked him if it would hurt me more if he hit me or said something hurtful. She said he couldn't keep the grin from his face, knowing what power he has with his words. And I'm not supposed to let him see that he succeeds in causing me pain. In some ways I felt better after talking to her. She had some helpful and minimally encouraging things to say, but I also felt defeated. I often feel that way when contemplating the boy.

I get to see my therapist tomorrow afternoon, barring any unforeseen eventualities. ("unforeseen eventualities" being another one of Grandmama's phrases) I confirmed the appointment today.

In today's "Dear Abby" column the letters were on the topic of parenting children with special needs, specifically autism. Much of what the parents said rang true. I hadn't considered it from this angle (too busy trying to dig out of the mire, I suppose) but OMG! I'm one of those parents! It wasn't initially obvious. None of my kids has anything visibly debilitating. Their disabilities unfolded bit by bit, sneaking up on me while I was trying to, as Patrick said to me, hold the ocean back with a broom.

Do we want to address the other big thing that's been bothering me recently? Now? On this post? Nah, I think I'll save it for a later post. This one is pretty full.

The news

... isn't all that new anymore, but since I haven't updated in a few days, it's new to you.

When last we saw our heroine she was awaiting the transfer of the Sproing from the mental hospital to the next-step care facility. He was supposed to be transfered Tuesday, but had another -what is it called? - emotional explosion where he was screaming and flailing and throwing himself against the walls. The hospital staff sedated him and that was that for Tuesday.

Wednesday morning Superman called the hospital to check on the boy. He was dressed and in his right mind. So Superman toodled on down there and retrieved the boy. I gotta tell ya', I was uneasy about the whole thing. That child is not stable. (understatement alert) Would he and his dad have a wonderful bonding experience, pleasantly passing the time chatting and laughing? Or would the boy have another emotional breakdown in the back seat, and attempt to throw himself from the speeding vehicle to his gnarly death? Either was a possibility. I was not able to accompany them on this trip, as I had a couple of very important classes to attend.

Thankfully, the fellows had a wonderful trip. Sproing was gleeful about leaving the hospital, and was not terribly upset about having to go to another facility instead of coming home. (He'd been through that upset phase when I told him last week that he would not be coming right home after leaving the hospital.) They got him settled into the new place, and Sproing only expressed anxiety right before they arrived.

On Thursday I talked to the woman in charge of therapy on the children's ward. I asked how he was doing, and she told me he was sleeping. It is NOT like the boy to sleep during the day. Hell, it isn't like the boy to sleep much at all. Then I learned that he was on a couple of heavy-duty medications that he'd been given at the hospital. Ah, that explains it. The therapist (Julie) asked if it was OK to take him off the meds. Sure, honey. Do what you need to. Go ahead and find out what he's really like.

Julie talked to Superman on Thursday. Superman asked about the boy. Julie had a different tale to relate. Superman tells me; "She said he was being very very oppositional." YES!! I am vindicated! Show 'em what you got, boy!

I got the impression that Julie didn't really fully believe me when I told her about his behavior. I discussed this with my wonderful therapist Friday. These people don't know me. To them, I am just another overwhelmed parent the likes of which they see every day. Much of their experience with overwhelmed parents involves people who don't necessarily understand the ins and outs of Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder or Oppositional Defiant Disorder. Whatever. So when Julie talked to Superman, she seemed surprised at Sproing's level of enthusiasm.

It's good, though, that they took him off all his medication. They really need to get a baseline of his behavior so they know what they're dealing with before they can make a good plan to treat him. I'm sure they will add medication again, probably soon. This is necessary, though, because he's had such deficient medication management for the past few years. (maybe ever)

The only visiting days at that place are Wednesday and Sunday. We can't even call to talk to him except Wednesday and Sunday. I do wish we had a chance to at least talk to him more often, though I understand the need for the restriction. In unhealthy family relationships, contact with the family triggers difficult behavior. Though I like to think we are "good parents," the fact remains that with the two younger kidlets we have, things have turned in an unhealthy direction. That's one of the reasons the boy is where he is. (The girl needs some kind of placement, too, though I don't think she necessarily needs an acute care hospital setting like he was in.)

Superman and I will attend a family counseling session there at the place on Monday evening. Since this place is an hour and a half north of here (whereas the hospital was 1.5 hours SE of here), we will only call the boy Sunday, since we'll be seeing him Monday.

That's about it for now. Midterm is next week, and I have three exams; one Monday, one Tuesday, and one Wednesday. Study time!!

Also, my "g" key is acting wonky again. Thank goodness for spell-check.

One step forward and two steps back

The boy. Oy. He had a really great day Sunday. Superman visited him (I stayed home with Diva) and the whole visit was smooth, friendly, not a discouraging word was heard.

But this evening we got a call from the nurse saying that he lost his cool this afternoon. He was being verbally, then physically abusive to the staff. He threatened (or maybe actually tried - I'm not sure) to throw a chair through the window. He was banging his head against the walls again. They put him in the observation room for a while, and when he didn't calm himself down they gave him a sedative pill. He stayed in the observation room for another half hour, but did not sedate. It's like the sedative didn't work at all.

The unit nurse called us, talked to Superman at 6:30-ish. He was still in the observation room, not being calm. I called back about an hour later because I had questions for the nurse. All the nurses were busy, so I talked to one of the aides. He's a big guy named Leonard. Pretty tall, very broad, and very black. It's nice to have that kind of presence on a mental ward. Nice guy, too. Anyway, I got to talk to Sproing. He had calmed down enough to come out of isolation/observation, though Leonard said he was still being disrespectful.

So I talked to him. He sounded great. We had a very nice conversation. I told him that he'll be leaving there tomorrow. He was very excited about that.

The insurance company has approved his stay at the hospital there until tomorrow, so he'll transfer to a longer-term facility. Superman was on the phone for an hour or more this afternoon trying to get that arranged. Of the facilities we know about from info received from that hospital, only the one in North Charleston has an opening for him. North Charleston is really far from here! Superman made some more inquiries (mainly from the insurance company, I think) and he found out about a place that's a few miles north of Greenville. That's much closer to us. By the time he got that information, though, the people he needed to talk to at the current hospital had left for the day. First thing tomorrow he will make more calls. The boy might go to Charleston, or he might go to Greenville. Wherever he goes, he goes tomorrow. Superman is all anxious again.

I will be in school all day tomorrow and won't be able to go with him. I HOPE Sproing keeps his shit together for the trip.

So I talked to the boy this evening. I asked about his rough afternoon. But when I told him that he will leave there tomorrow he started talking about "being good." He says he'll be good so he can leave the hospital. So why was he so disruptive and violent today? Well, he tells me that he can decide to behave. Today he didn't want to. I totally believe him. I've seen him turn that kind of attitude around in 30 seconds when he is adequately motivated. The motivation is inconsistent, though. What works one day doesn't work another day.

I wonder if the good folks at the hospital can give the boy a sedative before he and Superman take off for the next place.

Light and I saw Sproing on Saturday. That's the day I picked up Light, dropped Twitch off at his school, then took Light down to Columbia to see the boy. We had a pretty good visit with Sproing for the first 10 minutes. He was talking about his plans for when he got out of the hospital. He planned to come home, stay home all day and play his P-ess-P and watch TV. Here at home, alone, unsupervised while his dad and I were out doing our daily things. Uh-uh. So I had to disabuse him of that notion. He didn't take it well. The visit deteriorated quickly. He got huffy and left the room.

What does it all mean? Is he making any improvements? Do the professionals even have a definitive diagnosis? Do they know what they're dealing with, exactly? Or even vaguely? The plan was for this hospital to stabilize him, then he'd move to another facility where he can stay for a longer time. How long? I've heard 3-6 months. Frankly, I think he needs a longer stay, but who really knows? Maybe after a few months he will move to yet another place for a more moderate level of management. He needs intensive management right now. Duh. 24/7 supervision for sure.

In other non-Sproing related news, I took my Monday quiz today in Psychotherapies class. I actually studied for this one! I mean like really, for more than just the two hours before class. I actually knew the answers and everything! It was great. I should have started studying a few days earlier than I actually did. Today I felt so good about the whole study-and-know-the-information thing that I started studying for next week's quiz today! I'm thrilled. I made note cards from today's lecture, then went back and made up a bunch of study note cards for the other class I had today. There's a test in that class next week, and I got started on it today. I feel so much like a student today! This is the groove I like to be in, the one that's been eluding me since the start of the semester. I still have a hideous amount of work to do in the other two classes, and I'm afraid to look at those now. But I will.

Last night I finished the play- and character- analyses that were due last Tuesday in my Theater class. I talked to the instructor last week, explained how my life was falling down around me, and asked for an extension on that assignment. She told me to take all the time I needed. Nice, and I appreciate it, but that was a tiny bit too much leeway. I work well with deadlines. (usually) I really could have had the assignment completed by last Thursday, but since the pressure wasn't on to get it done, I dawdled more than I should have. But I did finish it last night and took it to her office this morning. So it's done. Good for me.

We're going to try for a reasonable bedtime tonight. With that in mind, I'll leave you with this.

In the continuing saga...

Superman and I made the trip to Columbia again today, this time to meet with the counselor who works on the adolescent ward. They call this a "family meeting." First we talked with her, then Sproing joined us. His participation in the meeting was a somewhat milder rehash of yesterday's visit. He wasn't very cooperative. Neither of us expected anything different.

When Sproing was in the meeting, the counselor had all of us talk about some specific things we want to focus on. Of course Sproing wants to come home. So what do we need to address for that to happen? I told her that I want the boy to tell me the truth about things, rather than the near-constant lying which is his habit. I also want him to listen to me, to accept that I mean it when I tell him I love him and think he's smart and handsome. He doesn't have to agree with me about it, but he should not accuse me of lying when I say those things.

If he had anything to add to that list, I don't remember. He sat scrunched down in a chair on the other side of the room, hands folded across his chest and his forehead wrinkled in a combination of pout and frown. After a few minutes he turned his back to us and leaned against the door. The counselor invited him to leave when he refused to respond anymore.

The child had another "episode" this morning and had to be sedated. This time, however, he didn't fight the sedation. The episode involved him trying to pick on another child. There was some mutual aggravation, as I understand it. His response was inappropriate.

The counselor said that he is beginning to show his problem behavior. He's been generally nice most of the week, but as the honeymoon wears off, he's displaying the actions and attitudes for which he was put there to begin with. The staff needs to see him in all his confounding glory in order to know how to help him. They recognized the Oppositional Defiant Disorder pretty early.

All in all it was a very good meeting. Superman and I are both encouraged that the boy is acting out there the way he does here. We are vindicated!! We are affirmed! It isn't all in our imaginations. The really great thing is that these folks at the hospital are not shocked or surprised by his behavior. They've seen this kind of thing before. They know how to handle it. They know what to do! Well, I think they do. They're still assessing him. He has already been given some different medications, and I know that is one of the things he needed. He also needs a lot of behavioral and/or talk therapy.

He will only stay in this hospital for a week to ten days. None of us (except Sproing) think he'll be ready to come home after that. The counselor told us about three places in the state that provide the next level of care. It's longer-term, from three to six months, and has the high level of management that he needs. One of the things they mean by "high management" is 24/7 surveillance. He needs this in part because he is suicidal. Did I mention that he's been banging his head against the walls there in an attempt to kill himself? That's one of the behaviors for which they sedate him. He may or may not be over that in the next week. We shall see.

Superman feels much better today. Thank you all for your thoughts/prayers/encouragement. He is more hopeful than he's been in a very long time that our dear young son is now being adequately treated for his mental/emotional problems. And by extension, we receive treatment of sorts. Validation is excellent therapy!

I have a bunch of studying that I should do. There are a couple of assignments that need attention. It's 8:00 on this Friday night, and I'm exhausted. Tomorrow will be a busy day. I'm going to bed now.

And the beat goes on

We had Chinese take-out the other night. The fortune in my fortune cookie says "You are a happy man." You can imagine how thrilled I am to know this. Really, it's very reassuring.

Sproing entered the in-patient mental health facility on Monday evening. This place only allows visits on Thursday, Saturday, and Sunday evening from 6:00 until 7:30, and we can call him between 6:30 and 8:00 on the evenings that aren't open for visitation. So Tuesday I called him. He was asleep, having been sedated after losing his metaphorical shit. I called him Wednesday evening. We spoke for a short while until he got mad at me because I wouldn't take his PSP gaming device to him. He hung up on me.

This evening Superman and I drove the 70 miles to visit him. He gave us each a hug, and sat in his Daddy's lap for a while. The conversation proceeded in a downward spiral.

him: I want to go home.

us: We want you to come home, too, but we need you to get well, to be able to get along with others before you can come home.

him: I will be good. I won't get in fights, I won't vandalize property, and I won't steal things anymore.

us: That's what you always say, and we think you believe it, but we know that you need to get more help here before you are able to really do that.

him: I want to go home and play my game and pet Scheherazade.

us: And we will be glad when you are well enough to come home, but you aren't yet.

him: No you don't. You don't care anything about me. You are happy I'm gone.

us: We love you very much, and you are here to get help. This is not about punishment. You are here to get help controlling your emotions.

him: You don't love me. If you loved me you'd take me home. When can I go home?

us: We will talk to the doctor about when you might be able to go home.

him: No you won't. She will just say no, anyway. I don't care. I don't want to live with you anyway. You hate me. You think I'm ugly and stupid. You wasted your time coming here to see me.

us: We are glad we came. We want to see you, and are glad we get to see you.

him: No you're not. If you loved me you'd take me home.

us: We will take you home when you are well enough to go home.

him: I'm ready to go home now.

us: We will talk to the doctor about when you can leave this place.

him: No you won't. You celebrate because I am gone. You hate me. I'm stupid. You wasted your time coming to see me. I wish you would just go away.

et cetera

This is pretty much what I expected. It really was good to see him, though it was hard seeing the tears running down his cheeks. I know that if he came home now, things would not be better, and they could possibly be worse. We really don't know what to say to him.

Tomorrow afternoon we will be back at the hospital for a family meeting. We meet with someone on his treatment team. I'm not quite sure what she does. Is she one of the therapist/counselors? I don't know, but Superman and I will meet with her, and Sproing might be with us, too. I hope we can get some kind of clue about how to communicate with him. Right now we just argue in circles with him.

Y'all, Superman is having a really hard time with this. He is an engineer; very analytical, likes clear answers. He typically has an upbeat attitude. Right now he's depressed and overwhelmed. Of course that's a normal reaction, but these feelings are so foreign to him, and he's frustrated. I, on the other hand, am quite familiar with overwhelming depression. And right now I feel pretty positive. Sproing is finally getting the kind of medical/psychological attention he needs. We are getting help! So this time I'm the strong(er) one, and he's all kinds of vulnerable. Keep him in your thoughts and prayers, please.

The weekend is shaping up to be quite busy. Twitch goes back to school on Saturday. While Superman is at home with Diva, I'm taking Twitch, and we'll be swinging by Light's college to pick her up on the way. We'll drop off Twitch at his place, then head down to Columbia to see the poor little confined one. When he rejects us and sends us away, Light and I will continue back home. I mapped the route: 300 miles round trip. It's a good thing I like to drive.

I may not post for a few days, but I don't forget about you. I shall return.

So what happened?

Picking up from here...

Superman and I got to where Sproing was on Monday afternoon sometime close to 4:30. He was glad to see us, gave us hugs, etc. I loved on him a bit. He allowed me to! I want him to know that the rejection isn't malicious or personal. He has some problems, needs help, but that doesn't invalidate his existence. He is of the opinion, and has been for a long time, that he is ugly and stupid and doesn't deserve to live and should never have been born.

We put him in the car and I surreptitiously flipped the switch on the back doors to disable the handles from working on the inside. I was afraid he'd try to open the door and bolt. Indeed, he threatened to. While on the way back said he was going to open the car door and throw himself out so he would die. Was he serious? Does it matter? Just saying that indicates a troubled mind.

Let me back up a bit. When Superman and I left Greenwood I started making calls. (He was driving.) I talked to the school social worker, to my counselor, and I can't remember who else. The social worker (my personal hero, btw) was very concerned. She said that he needs serious intervention, and NOT to bring him back to Greenwood. He won't get help here, and frankly he's too dangerous, too shaken up to be let out of sight. She looked up a few places, called me back and gave me phone numbers of mental health hospitals with adolescent wards. I called one but they couldn't take any new patients, they are full with a waiting list.

I was just too freaked out to call any other place. But the social worker had mentioned a place adjacent to one of the hospitals in the Columbia metro area. (We had to go through Columbia to get to Sproing.) I didn't have that phone number, though, and didn't know where that (or any) hospital is. I'm not too familiar with the city.

Well, we were driving along, getting close to Columbia, the traffic was getting heavier, and Superman was stressing. Duh. We made a wrong turn. It was easy to fix; just go up here to this road, take that to over there, then hook up to the road we need. It only took us very slightly out of our way... or did it? Guess what we saw on the "wrong" road? The mental health facility! I said "LOOK! That's where we're stopping on our way back!"

And we did. But back to Sproing. We got him, stopped for gas, then went to Haus du Waffel. I had a hankerin' for pee-can waffles. All three of us were hungry. It was weird, though. We knew Sproing had to be protected from himself. We had to be very careful. We hovered. We sat in a booth with Sproing "locked" in on the other side of his Daddy. The boy couldn't move. Neither of us got farther than three feet from him, both of us ready to spring if he sprung.

Back in the car he talked about being glad to go home to play with Scheherazade and his PSP. No, honey, that isn't going to happen. He alternated that with vitriol, saying he hates us, we hate him, he's ugly and stupid (a common refrain), and he won't live in this house ever again. He'll just kill himself. Or run away. He wants to live in a cardboard box beside the highway. Superman started to "reason" with him, but I told him not to bother. There is no reasoning there. But then Sproing said he was glad to be going home from that stupid boys' home. And he hates us. The pendulum was swinging wide and fast. It was strong evidence that the boy is off his rocker, and reinforced our decision to take him to the hospital.

Which we did. We pulled into the parking lot and tried to get him to come with us. No such luck. So I drove around to the patient-drop-off circle and sent Superman in to retrieve strong-arm assistance. What they did instead was give him a clipboard of forms to fill out. Doesn't that sound just like a hospital? Sproing and I waited in the car (doors and windows locked). He fumed. He bounced off the seat, ceiling, doors of the back seat. He screamed. (It's a small car. The sound was nerve wracking.) He lay on the seat and kicked the door as hard as he could. I'm impressed with the strength of that door.

Superman finally came out and said we could go in. He had to pull Sproing out of the seat by his arms, and I got behind the boy and sort of hugged him while leading him to the door. He was like a caged animal once we got inside. We were in a tiny interview room with an intake social worker. Sproing was pacing, banging the walls, bouncing off the furniture, crawling on the floor. He crawled under my chair and hid for a while. That was as still as he got. Superman and I answered the nice lady's questions. When she had the low-down, she assured us that he would be admitted, but she had to call the doctor-on-call to make it official.

In the meantime (and after speaking to me out in the hall, away from the boy, to ask if she should) she put us into another tiny room behind the locked doors. It's a good thing she did, too, because at one point Sproing ran out of the room and tried to run through the doors to the lobby. It took a really long time. We probably waited an hour or more. The nurses on the adolescent ward weren't ready to process him until nearly 10:00. Sproing was their third intake of the evening. I guess there are lots of crazy young'uns in South Carolina.

During our wait Sproing calmed down a little bit. We had some positive interactions. He and Superman played the license plate word game* with letters Superman made up. He let me hold him and scratch his back. Then he bounced off the walls and kicked things.

We finally went to the ward. Superman and I had to sign a few consent forms for medications. By then Sproing had shut down. He sat slump-shouldered in a chair, no expression. I gave him a hug (he didn't resist) and told him we'd be there to visit on Thursday evening (the next visiting time). And we left. And though I'm exhausted, I feel good about the whole thing.

Addendum: I spoke with one of the nurses earlier this evening. She said he had a rough afternoon. He insisted that I was going to pick him up and take him home this evening. He took all of his clothes to the lounge area, put them in a chair beside the door, and tried to open the door. Of course it's locked. Then he banged on the door. Then banged his head on the door. Then threw his clothes in the garbage can. He was taken to the "observation room" where he continued beating his head against the door (or wall, I'm not sure which) and then threatened to kill himself. The nurse tried to give him a pill (some kind of chill pill thing) but he refused it. So they had to restrain him and give him the medicine by injection. Oooh, consequences! I wonder if he'll accept the pill next time. Anyhow, he was asleep when I called.

She asked me if this was the kind of behavior we've seen at home. Well, not quite, but close. He usually doesn't get quite that violent, but what she described is consistent with the type of things he does. Nothing she described surprises me.

They only allow visits on Thursday, Saturday and Sunday from 6:00 - 7:30, and the patients can receive phone calls on the other days of the week, but only from 6:30 to 8:00. Since he was sleeping when I called at 6:30, I'm going to call again after 7:30 to see if he can talk. I don't know what to expect.

*SC license plates are alpha-numeric, with three letters. The game is to think of a word that contains those three letters in that order. Sproing is surprisingly good at it.

Post Script: To answer Karen's question; fortuitously, Twitch is on quarter break from school, so he was here to take care of Diva while we took care of Sproing.

More about the same old sh!t

Oh my! It's after 9:00 already! I didn't know it was that late.

As I mentioned in my previous post, I'm going through the blog archives searching for stories of Diva's misdoings. I'm actually reading the whole blog backwards. It's an interesting exercise. I haven't found much about Diva yet, but I know it's coming soon. I have found a few damning tales of Sproing, too. I'm going to write a dossier on him, too, so I'm tagging those posts. The whole exercise is dredging up dirt. I don't like it.

However, it is interesting to read about my life. I have read through August of last year. That looked like a good stopping place. I'll tell ya', I'm depressed a lot. So many of my past blog posts relate feelings of depression or stress or being overwhelmed, much like I am right now. Have I always been like this? You didn't know me ten years ago. I think I was more pleasant then. I was a lot more foolish and naive, I'll tell ya' that. Back then I thought that the love of a good family was enough to make an adopted child a healthy and productive member of society. I'm not so naive now. Sometimes love isn't enough. I've learned that nature is more powerful than nurture in some circumstances.

I took Diva to her therapist this afternoon. I hogged the first 45 minutes of the hour. Last week I didn't have a chance to tell her (the therapist) anything about Diva or what's been happening here. Today I grabbed the opportunity and shook it like a mangy dog. I told her about the kids being on unclothed house arrest, about the recent theft and vandalism, and about how they snuck out just this past Saturday and did all the wrong things again. I was jittery and teary and a mess.

This wonderful lady knows all about it. She's got some good experience in this field. Even better, she gave me some hope!!! There is something in this state called "continuum of care." It's a state sponsored mental health program, and she thinks Diva (and Sproing, for that matter) probably qualify. She assured me (as Lady Grace did in her recent comments) that Diva's behavior is extreme, it is as bad as it seems, I am not a failure as a mother, I'm not imagining things. I have a phone number. I will call first thing in the morning and ask for two application packets. There is a process, we'll have to have meetings or something, have home visits, explain ourselves. I don't know exactly, and it will take a little while. I hope it doesn't take too long. She says there is an excellent chance that residential therapeutic placement is probably in Diva's future, and she indicated it probably would be relatively soon. I don't know what "soon" is, exactly, but I'm pretty sure it isn't soon enough for me. OH! And part of the process involves them getting the kids on Medicare. Because Superman earns money, we don't qualify for Medicare. The therapist said most private insurance providers only allow 30 days for in-patient residential care. That isn't anywhere near long enough for this child. Either of these children, actually. So evidently by going through this program they can be eligible for Medicare. Which is good, because we don't have money to provide the care they need otherwise.

I don't know details. Oh, lookie! A website! (Google is my friend) This is cool. I can download the application form.

Alright folks, I'm off to explore that website. You will certainly be kept informed of developments.

(I feel better than I have in weeks! I feel hopeful!)

Trying desperately to maintain mental health

I have had a difficult weekend. I am desperately grasping at those strategies they tell me are good for preventing me from going over the edge. I've been pretty close to the edge of insanity. Here's a list of positive things that I've done today.

• took a shower, got cleaned up after 2 days of not bathing
• listened to peaceful and/or powerful classical music
• sorted the dirty clothes and washed a load of really smelly towels
• got out of the house. I took Twitch and Sproing to the store to get a wading pool to soak in, a bag of ice, and some sodas. We're trying to beat the heat.
• cooked supper so it was ready when Superman and the girls got home at 7 this evening
• stated as clearly as I could to the boys that I was having a very bad day and they should cut me some slack, and that is wasn't their fault I was freaking out

This list leaves out the times I lost it with (specifically) Sproing. It doesn't include the moments I spent banging my head with my cell phone, or the screaming and tears scattered throughout the day. No, this is just a positive list. This is a list of stuff I did that I feel good about. See? There are some things from today that I feel good about. I'm gonna hold onto that thought.

On a lighter note-
Here's your word for today. It somehow seems like a useful word for most of my readers to know. :P
callipygian
PRONUNCIATION:(kal-uh-PIJ-ee-uhn)
MEANING:adjective: Having well-shaped buttocks.
ETYMOLOGY:From Greek calli- (beautiful) + pyge (buttocks).
USAGE:"And it hasn't been lost on modern film directors that a nice set of tights can showcase the callipygian assets of a well-formed leading man."Heroes in Hosiery; South China Morning Post (Hong Kong); Jul 20, 2006.

Quotes and stuff

I see lots of signage on my job. Some of the signs have pithy sayings. There’s a sign at the church near the high school that says “He who angers you controls you.” I like that. I allow myself to get angry at people sometimes. My daughter Diva likes to aggravate us. The psych report mentioned that she does this in a (successful) attempt to have control over us. Ouch.
On a more humorous note, there’s another sign I see regularly. This week it says “Schizophrenia is better than dining alone.” It pokes fun at mental illness, which isn’t PC, but it’s funny nonetheless. IMHO.