When I was pregnant I had many "when you're older" conversations with my belly. These consisted of things I wanted him to experience, things I wanted to do with him, things he'd be allowed to have, etc. Because I was fairly certain he would be an only child I thought about extracurricular activities. Would he like to join a sports team at a park? Maybe he'd prefer some sort of martial arts. Or dance. Or chess! Then I thought about how I'd react to these preferences, if there were any I'd object to. Some women eat pickles and ice cream, I talked to my growing abdomen, to each her own.
With such a broad list of choices I often remembered parents that live by their children's schedules going from school to the park or the studio or wherever their kids activities happen to be, the parents that had to keep straight whether it was karate then swimming day or if it was soccer at the park day or if it was piano lessons day. This seemed like madness to me and I had a very stern conversation with my protruding roundness about only being able to chose one thing per season for the sake of our bank account and my sanity.
At a few months short of 8 years old, Nicholas has not begun to participate in any sort of fun, after school activity even though I do wish he would. The irony is that the reason we haven't signed him up for anything is because we are living exactly how I warned him that I did not want to live. Our week is more than half full, and will likely get fully full in the weeks to come, in the evenings.
Nicholas is currently doing different kinds of therapies 3 times a week. He needs more and will likely be getting more soon. I know he needs them and I do see the value in them. I am glad we have been able to find facilities that are near our home and he has taken well to his various therapists. This is great! He is on his way to treating and managing his problems so that he can function better and feel better. I know he struggles and I have a lot of faith that he will continue to improve with the help he is getting and the help he will likely be getting in the future.
But I am tired. And I'm fed up. I don't want to hear that things will get worse before they get better when I feel like I'm at the end of my rope.
I don't want to sit in these little plastic chairs watching someone try to manage my headstrong child as my rear begins to go numb and boredom has taken over. He's doing it wrong and I can't say anything. He will either give up or kill my child, and I quickly remind myself that this is a professional and my child, as bad as it seems, is likely not the worst he's encountered. Then mommy alert goes off and my butt is laughing at the thought of me being able to dash to my child's rescue because if I attempt to get up my lower body will collapse. I've lost all physical feeling below my butt and legs. And the therapist has given up. He picks up my son like a little rag doll and tosses him an a huge bean bag thing. His little body seems to contort but before I can gasp I hear his giggle. Yeah, I wouldn't do that when I'm trying to get him to write his name and he refuses. I'll lose my shit. That's a more momma thing to do. Maybe I need therapy too.
I don't want to sit in these little plastic cubes that do not allow me to sit in any fashion that doesn't look obscene. I'm on the bigger side and my thighs are big and this cube has me sitting bellow my knees. My legs just want to spread because such bending at my knees causes them to scream so loudly I'm surprised it's not echoing in this building. This room is small and has no windows and the therapist sits in front of the door and I'm clusterphobic. Maybe I should have mentioned that to him at some point. I also have back problems and that is starting to quiver with a dull pain. We talk and it feels like we're going in circles or no where. The interaction between this therapist and my child frustrates me; I wonder if my son picked up a large object and hurled it at him (like he has done at home and at school) if the therapist's reaction would be just as calm. They talk about what certain words mean and I'm not surprised by my son's responses. I'm sure they say something about him, about me, but it's nothing new to me. All I can do is nod to indicate that I am not surprised. Can I go play with the doll house? You boys aren't even interested in it, which is a shame. It's an awesome dollhouse.
These chairs are normal adult people chairs and much more comfortable! But the room is smaller and still no windows. At least the door isn't blocked. We do an activity, as a family, and I'm sure there is value to it so I put on my happy face and play along. I've been working all day, I'm tired, my brain is tired. I just want to sit back and close my eyes. My brain doesn't want to think anymore. But I force it to. This isn't for me, it's for him. For us. I'm getting frustrated. He's getting frustrated. The therapist just watches. Would it really be any different if he did the activity with my son instead of us? I mean, I do want to be involved but why can't we do this after dinner and a nap? I bite my cheek and keep my focus and play along. I want him to get better. I have to believe there is value in this activity that seems silly to me, there is more to it than amusing entertainment for this therapist that looks like he goes home to a dorm room at the end of the day. I glance over to his credentials on the wall. Must. Keep. Going.
I'm tired of spending hours researching disorders. I wish I would have gotten my degree in psychology instead of communication studies. At this point I could probably get an honorary BA in psych. My eyes hurt from looking at a computer screen reading texts in different fonts and different sizes. I'm tired of reading psych reports, even if they are about my child. I do this all day at work, one more psych report won't hurt. But it does. I am tired. This should have been quality time with my wife or my son.
But now Nicholas is in bed and my wife is preoccupied with her phone. I don't blame her, I need the break too. My eyes and brain crave something more simplistic, a cute cat perhaps. But I carry the guilt. I made him, inside my body, and I got it wrong. These things run in families and there are plenty of issues in my family. I need to keep going, this is my fault.
I shouldn't have been so selfish with my demands for my bank account and sanity. Sanity. I wish all I had to do was transport my child from activity to activity and I could just watch with the other parents as he did all the work. That I could sit in the stands or the back of the studio, checking facebook on my phone, snapping pictures of him and posting them, resting in between activities. I wish my bank account's concerns were centred around the probability of needing new cleats sooner than expected than the probability of having to chose to either pay for therapies not covered or forgo them to save the money. I wish my biggest concern was if he will be able to learn the skills he's working on before the tournament and not if he will be able to learn the skills he is working on before he's an adult.
I wish Nicholas could play with other children instead of therapists.
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