Nothing Like The First Day

Evan's fist day of 2nd grade....

Here is to a fresh new school year. To learning more, and making new friends. Harder math and more challenging reading. Improved handwriting.

But for us, as parents, it is always about so much more...

I don't know about others, but for me, it is always about being one year closer to the day he will leave the nest. One less year to have him with us. It is always the year I will be more involved, more patient about teaching him new things. Watching him grow a little more. One sad day, I will be able to sit back and see that my work is finished. But now, in the middle of the greatest responsibility the world has to offer, I am amazed and realize that these are the days for which to live.

Speaking of Babies, Did I Ever Tell You WHY Evan is a Miracle?

It was just a couple of weeks after we saw the two pink lines on the little stick when the beeding started. The OB referred to it as "threatened spontaneous abortion". Miscarriage. But maybe not, because there on the screen was a tiny beating heart. The shock of realization on John's face will never leave me. His baby, who he said looked like a bean, there in living color. So I started the visits to the oupatient lab every other day, where they would leave black bruises on my arms in order to siphon from me the blood that would tell them that our baby was thriving. And every other day, we would wait and cry and pray that he was. Or wait for the call that it was all over, that we would try again, that they needed to schedule a D&C. We just waited.

Then one day it was over. I was so happy on that day. I envisioned my body making the discovery that this angel was there to stay for 40 weeks. To stop trying to get rid of him, that he was no intruder, but rather a welcome passenger. The nausea and vomiting were signs of life within me, and they were welcome too. We picked names. Emily for a girl. But what for a boy? He should be named after his father, we decided. But we hated the idea of relatives in southern Kentucky calling him "Junior". So we perused the books for boy names. The control freak in me was beside heself. We needed a boy name. Brady? Tucker? No, too trendy. Then one day I saw it: Evan: Welsh version of John. Little Evan for a boy. Named after his father, but still his own person.

The happiness was short-lived. My body is stubborn. I felt the first contraction a few days later like a gentle tugging within me. But wait. Accoding to the calender, I still had 5 months to go. That gentle tugging turned to tearing, ripping, searing pain. Thoughts of all of the bleeding, John's excitement, Evan or Emily, pink or blue...they all swirled in my head as John rushed me to the hospital. And the first feeling I ever got of John-and Andrea-Against-the-World was when the young doctor told us that th medication did not work, that the contractions were continuing, that he was sorry, but I was having a miscarriage. I wonder what he thought of us, as we clung to each other, crying those big hot tears, grieving for the baby that wasn't to be. Married for about 6 months at the time, we were all each other had in that moment. I imagine it was pity he felt. Or determination. Whatever the reason, a second dose of mdication was given, and the contractions stopped. And we rejoiced. And I returned home a few days later. Only to return again. Same scenario, different day. Again and again we grieved for the loss of our baby, only to find out that it was another near-miss.

After 2 weeks of trips back and forth to the hospital, we met the doctor who would test our resolve. More pre-term labor. But this ime, the doctor and nurse came in to the room and pulled up chairs by my bed. They started speaking of babies with profound disabilities from prematurity. Of families wrecked with medical expenses. Of our youth. The doctor actually said the dreaded word next. Abortion. He told me to let God have our baby, that it wasn't in the cards, that we could have another. I didn't understand. Was the baby okay? Wasn't it just my body? Didn't they have medicine to stop the labor that had been working? Wasn't I at 20 weeks of pregnancy? The age of viability, as they had been telling me during previous visits? I didn't understand, but we knew we needed to find a docotr who wanted us to have our baby like we wanted to.

A couple of months went by, and we switched hospitals to one with a top-rated NICU in preparation for a birth of a very premature infant. We toured the NICU. The hospitalizations continued as we braced ourselves for heartbreak. I learned what the "Special OB Unit" was at Good Smamritan in Cincinnati. I spent over a month there, on magnesium sulfate drips. At such a high dose that I was not permitted to get up to go to the bathroom or even roll in bed by myself. I had chest x-rays every oher day because such high doses were associated with fluid on the lungs. They would cover my arms in hot packs to relieve some of the pain from the viscous fluid going into my veins. They said it was about the thickness of corn-syrup, and that is why it was so painful. Every third day, they would come in and stop the drip because it was not safe for me to be on it any longer than that. And every third day, the contractions would start back up. I got yet another course of steroid injections to prepare the baby for the early birth that could not be stopped. I met a maternal-fetal specialist who was the best in his field and began to get ultrasounds twice a week. We learned tht it was a boy in there. That there was no infection in the amniotic fluid, and no other reason for me to be having the preterm labor. "Sometims this just happens", they told me. But with each week, I got closer to the day that our baby could be born, that the rate of survival for him increased just a teensy bit.

I ws sent home. I was on a medication that would lower my blood pressure so much that when I would take a hot shower, I would pass out from the further dilation of my vessels. I was on another that caused such horrible acid reflux that I was essentially vomitting without wretching. Huge moutfuls of hot sour acid would wash up without any warning. But my baby was okay.

It got to the point where we thought Evan would survive, and we begged the doctors to deliver him. "You can help him", I woul plead. I just wanted them to make it stop.

A little past midnight, on September 1st, 2001, it finally did. I was havng hard contractions, and a nurse midwife who had never seen me before insisted that I was not dilating. And she said I wasn't due for anothr 5 weeks. We laughed at her like maniacs and begged for the on-call obstetrician. I blurted out words like fetal fibronectin,amniocentesis, ultrasounds, steroid courses in all 3 trimesters, hCg levels, magnesium sulfate, age of viability... She started telling me about "what is best for the baby", and a cried hot tears as I told her of the unspeakable hell I had endured for my body to continue to provide a home for this growing baby. I knew from my experiences that if you start labor at 36 weeks, they will let you go. I was 35 weeks. And I didn't care about a few more days. I couldn't do any more. My body was physically, emotionally, and mentally drained in every way imaginable.

The OB finally came in, and he ordered everyone to get off of me. He put his hands on my giant belly and felt as contraction after contraction ripped through me in waves. Contractions that felt like they were ripping me in two, but were not causing any results. And he told me to breathe through them. The monitors came off as he let me feel this last bit of pain unencumbered by the trappings of modern medicine. And he explained to me how they usully do c-sections after just a day of labor, citing failure to progress as the justification. And I had been in labor for literally 17 weeks. I had endured my hell, and he wanted to help it end for me with a c-section.

After that, I didn't feel another contraction. They never stopped, even as th doctor cut through the soft layers of my abdomen. And I was prepared for the silence that follows a cesarean birth. The birth canal doesn't squeeze the fluid from the baby, and often they need to be suctioned. Plus this was a baby who was early. The last to develop is the lungs. He may need help. But from the instant he was exposed to this world, my son let out the lustiest cry I have ever heard in a newborn. And tears choked my voice as I shouted out that his lungs were okay, long before I had ever laid eyes on his beauty.

There is not a day that goes by in my life wih Evan and John when I don't look at my little family and have waking nigtmares of what could have been. Where I do not thank God for the sloppy kisses and brown eyes that sparkle with laughter and amazement and wonder. Where I do not count my blessings. He truly is my Evan from Heaven. Our miracle. A tribute to God or Allah or the science of modern medicine. Or maybe a mother and father's determination.

Drawing the Line (With a Broken Pencil)

Evan comes home from school yesterday, walks through the back door, and flings his backpack on the kitchen floor while telling me that he was on "red card" today for behavior. John's immediate words were: "Son, you are grounded." Evan looked dejected and sad but did not protest. I think he has gotten to the point where he accepts his punishment with defeat. And I cannot help but notice that while last year, Evan loved school and would be heartbroken on days when he did not go, this year he dreads it.

So my baby boy spills it to me. He was using a little boy's pencil for one reason or other. We know this little boy and his mother and the child honestly cries over everything. Anyhow...Evan was using the pencil and pressed too hard on his little paper and the lead broke. I made sure I clarified that the lead broke and not the entire pencil. Evan's response: "No mommy, just the black part at the tip." Of course Whiny Butt started to cry. Mrs. X sharpened his pencil for him, and all was right with the world. Until she disciplined my son for that.

I have gotten to the point that I am not taking the school seriously. It feels as if they are ganging up on my little boy and I will not stand for it anymore. If they are going to punish my son for accidentally breaking the lead of a pencil, I can no longer go along with their methods. Up until recently, if Evan was on red card, for whatever reason, he has been punished here at home as well. It is a slap in the face to know that I may have been punishing my son for such trivial infractions. That I am spending a fortune to take him to a private child psychologist for "behavior issues at school" when the misbehavior is this.

For the first time since all of this has started, I called the school and let them know I was pissed. As a matter of fact, I told them this: "If pencils are such a rare commodity at an elementary school that a child has to be reprimanded for accidentally breaking the lead, then please let me know and I will be glad to send a case of pencils in with my son the next time he attends your school."

I also instructed my son that the next time someone teases him, he is to tell that child this : "My IQ is twice your parents' annual salary, so please do not speak to me." And when someone is physically agressive toward Evan, he has been instructed to report to the nearest school employee with this statement: "I do not appredciate X's physical aggression toward me and would appreciate it if you would address it." He may only be 7 years old, but he will use those words, too. I cannot wait for him to do so.

I'm tired. I do everything I can as a parent to help my son learn to value education. I try to be as active a participant in his education as I can, backing up the teachers and administration. But through this process I am now starting to turn the focus on advocating for my son, who is being mistreated.

A Mother's Urge To Protect Her Young

I was never prepared for this hurt. No one tells you when you decide to have children that you wil physically feel their pain. You cry when they get their immunizations as babies. One time, when Evan was 10 months old, he had a stomach virus that left him dehydrated and his electrolytes completely depleted. He had to have an IV, and I had to leave the room. I could have sworn I could feel the stick myself, outside of a closed door, in the hallway of that ER. None of it prepared me for this.

Evan went to see the child psychologist today. She got down on the floor with him, playing with Legos, and managed to pull out of my child all of things he never told me. I sat by silently, trying to focus on the questionnaires she gave me to fill out, while my son poured it all out to her. In his beautiful mind, he could not understand why he had to do the mundane schoolwork presented to him in class. He knows this stuff, so why should he have to prove himself to his teacher? Then we got to the part where his retention in kindergarten was discussed. It was all I could do to keep myself from breaking into gulping sobs when I heard the sadness in his little voice as he explained to her in very adult terms how the children at school called him a dummy, or stupid, or retarded because he was forced to repeat kindergarten. How they pick on the Southrn accent we all find so adorable. How he is taunted about being a "rich" kid because of the shoes he wears. He said sometimes they combine it all: Dumb rich hick. Never, in all of this time, did I imagine my bright and beautiful child would be the butt of jokes at school. Never did he utter a single word about any of this. I told him as we were driving to his appointment that we were going to meet a lady who was going to help us with the problems he was having at school, and how important it was that he tell her the complete truth about what is truly going on. I am so proud of him. He did just that. I sat there and let him speak.

Her opinion of my son is that he is a "social butterfly with an abnormally high intellect". That he never should have been forced to repeat kindergarten, and that the school should be doing more to offer to him more challenging and engaging work. We will continue to meet with her to work on these issues. His IQ? I will not report that publically, but I will say it is freakishly high.

But then I came home. After grocery shopping and playtime, homework, bath and bedtime have passed, I am alone in a silent house. And I feel this deep, primitive urge to wreak havoc on the morons who did this to my son. He has been hurting and I could not fix it. I know about it now and still am not sure I can fix it. I want to keep him home tomorrow. I want to tell him he never has to go back to that place, full of cruelty for him. My understanding of the teacher's view, my desire to back the school, and my inclination to put up a united front with them in front of Evan? Those are all gone. I want to fight them tooth and nail to ensure that they do right by my child. If he had an impairment of any kind, the law would force them to come up with an individualized plan to meet his needs. Well he has needs, just at the opposite end of the spectrum, and I do not see why they should not legally be forced to accomodate Evan as well. And the children who have tormented him, when in truth he is exponentially more intelligent than they are??? They need to be dealt with by the teacher. How could she not know this was going on?

I have not made a decision yet as to what I plan to do about this. I need to speak to John first, and he will be home from work soon. Private school? Home-school? Just change districts? Raise hell at his existing school? Maybe a combination of any of those. Hell hath no fury like a pissed mother. And I will go down protecting my baby.

Worried

Today is the day I am taking Evan to meet with the psychologist to get to the bottom of the trouble in school. I am terified to hear her say that I am a bad mother, that somehow I am to blame for this. I love my son enough that I can tolerate the pointing of fingers if it means his life will be better. But this gets my thoughts going on how we, as parents, are not given instructions on how to raise our children to be responsible and competent adults. Sure, we can read the research by child psychology experts and pediatricians. But they come with no guaruntee. When I was a young child, corporal punishment was the way to go. Part of what kept me in line was the idea of going to the principal's office for a paddling. Of course I never had to, but the fear was there. And now? Parents aren't even supposed to spank their children, let alone the staff of his or her school. So how do we know that, years down the road, the techniques and research and methods invoilved in disciplining our children will not turn out to be a no-no as well?

And then there is the guilt. What if this is not a discipline problem at all? What if this is something psychological and/or physiological? I have been grounding little Evan and taking away his priviledges for some time when he acts up in school. But what if he cannot help it?

The whole thing just breaks my heart. As a healthcare professional, I know that mental illness is the same as being sick in the way we traditionally think of " being sick". But the stigma of it, even after all we know, doesn't even escape me. I just cannot get over the fact that I am taking my son to a psychologist. Therapy bills aren't supposed to rack up until after I have screwed him up for 18 years. How bad am I that we are having to start now?

Just Mommy and Evan

Today was a beautiful day, and just happened to be my first afternoon off in quite awhile. John started his new job today, and so it was just Evan and I. We had a really good time reading books together, playing outside and more. Evan made a new friend, as you can see from the pics. I couldn't resist taking out the camera and getting a few snapshots. As the sun went down, we ordered a pizza and played board games inside before it was time for bed and bath. Really just a nice, peaceful, simple day. In a way it made me really sad because it reminded me of how little time I truly have with Evan nowadays. And I got a refresher in just what an amazing little person he is turning into.

Mommy's Little Cub

Evan came home from school yesterday with a flyer clutched in his grubby little hand. His face was aglow, and I waited patiently for him to explain what the excitement was about. "Mommy, I can be a Cub Scout!" Then John got excited as well. So tonight at 6:30, together with my boys, I will be heading to a Cub Scout meeting. John is sure this will be his opportunity to interact with his son. I am pleased that they will get the opportunity to do this together. John says that while he was never a scout, he is a veteran of the "biggest Boys' club there is". He is sure he can teach the children skills about survival and more.

In the meantime, I received a call from my beloved son's teacher. Apparently my child called another faculty member a "doo-doo head" and now my son has to serve a detention. I do not understand him at all. I was the child who cried when she got her name put on the board as a warning. My husband was the kid who got suspended for fighting all of the time. I think Evan is a mix of the two. I just never counted on my 7-year-old son having to serve detention. I went through my entire school career without ever having to serve one. What is going on with my child?

My Salvation

Just when you think the amount of stress in your life is going to completely break you....when you look at your child, and think to yourself "what am I going to do with him?"...When your to-do list has nothing even remotely enjoyable, but is rather a laundry list of the most mundane tasks which will require more time than you have available in a single day, even without sleep or work. That point, that speck of time...That is when a child, armed with nothing but a cheap Happy Meal toy, can do something to make it all just go away. In that second, you are just happy. You are laughing, joyous, smiling. Perhaps true happiness in life comes at a time when you can realize that these are the moments to live for. Despite the white hairs cropping up on my head which I am convinced are solely his doing, I love being this child's mother.

Ahhhhhh, Monday!

Yep, that's what I indeed said! John is at work, Evan is at school, and the only sound in this house is the hum of the a/c and the occasional clack of the keyboard. I walked past the pool to take Evan to the bus stop this morning, and the glass-like surface of the still water in the pool seemed to beckon to me. I'll get that part of my day squeezed in shortly. For right now, I am dreading it. I thunked myself down in front of the computer, and my house is freezing. Even my big, comfy, worn OSU hoody (which as seen me through several football seasons thus far) is not cutting through the chill in the air. Must...turn down...a/c. My house feels like an ice cave at the moment.

Ok--Turned off the a/c. I now am wrapped in a blanket as well.

So what is there to talk about? Well, the neighborhood parents piss me off to no avail. My son is going to be 7 in about 2 weeks. He is old enough that I no longer have to hover over him like a toddler. But he is still young enough that I would not dream of allowing him outside without supervision. This is the case for playtime, or any other time for that matter. I wake up and after helping him get ready for school, we walk to the bus stop together. He is supervised, and lately, this is the only time I am alone with him. He is not to the stage where he is embarrassed by his parents yet, so he puts is small, warm hand in mine and we walk together. Of course we are the first ones to the bus stop, and I get to listen to him talk about whatever pops into his head. It is not always convenient. Lately, around here, mornings are starting to have a sort of crispness about them. But I could not dream of not doing this with him.

Well, this morning, Evan and I are waiting for the bus, and we start to see other kids wandering toward the bus stop. This is what gets me: very small children, younger than my son, walking to the bus stop alone. We live in a U-shaped complex, so the bus stops at the entrance to the complex, and we are expected to meet it there. It can be quite a walk, unless you live right by the entrance. So wtf? There is no way these parents can see their children from their homes. Do they not care?

So of course, one of the kids decides to misbehave. He takes his mud-coated shoe and stomps on Evan's immacualtely white Jordans. I wanted to yell. Badly. Those shoes were pretty expensive as far as kids' shoes go. And I work hard to be able to give my son nice things. I bit my tongue, but was secretly cursing the parents of this little boy for not supervising their child. (And also for bringing the little monster into the world.)