In the Great Land of Undiagnosed Aspergers

We are here, with the in-laws.

And I have to give credit where it is due, the girls were absolutely great, both of them, with the travel. We left our house and took a cab to the airport. Then we flew to O'hare, had breakfast, and got on another plane. Then we took a bus to the car rental place and picked up our family minivan and drove a long way to our hotel. Except for refusing to sleep the entire time, the girls were wonderfully behaved. Through all the changes, and boring parts, they were great. It helped I think, that I put them both on those cutesy animal- backpack leads from Wal-mart. They kind of had no choice in the airports.

We had to wake up the girls early in the morning to make our flight. We had to wake them. I get a great pleasure out of that! Both kids are dreadfully early morning people and many a war has taken place over their morning behavior. Genea cannot stand to be alone and will go to extreme lengths to get someone to wake up with her. Now, mind you, she shares a room with Teena who is also a morning person. So she wakes up Teena if she is not already up then the two of them proceed to be pains in the butt and destroy the house if someone in charge does not get up with them to take names.

Never one to let an incidental learning opportunity pass by, I asked them all day how that felt. Was it fun to get up before you were ready? NO? Why not? Hmmm, how do you think other people feel when you wake them up.
So, was it fun when you had to get up early? Hmmm?

Where the in-laws live, is a place I like to call Aspergerburbia. It is a small town where everyone knows everyone and then some. There are a few places in the United States where the most scrambled of all the Egg-Heads gather and this is one. My fil is a nuclear physicist and mil teaches music here.

If you have ever heard of Tony Attwood, he is an expert in Aspergers Disorder, which can also be called high- functioning autism. He is a great researcher and educator, I have seen him speak. This quote is directly from his website to describe what makes an autistic person a person with Aspergers:

"The person usually has a strong desire to seek knowledge, truth and perfection with a different set of priorities than would be expected with other people. There is also a different perception of situations and sensory experiences. The overriding priority may be to solve a problem rather than satisfy the social or emotional needs of others."

When I went to his seminar in Milwaukee a few years ago, he started with a funny story. He said, he plays a little game of picking out the Aspie in a crowd, with ranking and points etc. Then he said, when he is with a group of scientists/ accountants/ engineers the challenge then becomes to pick out the person without Aspergers. It was really funny the way he told it anyway.

So to summarize, I am visiting with a pair of people who don't have 2 social skills to rub together to make a fire. And no one else here does either. And no one thinks anyone else is...off center. They live with their own kind here in what they call "academia".

Lest anyone think I am being mean, or making this up, or exaggerating I will give you an example. One mere hour into this visit, my fil brought up the future love making abilities of my daughters. Yes, yes he did. At dinner, the mil brought up her problem bladder infection, how she got it, and then discussed her subsequent yeast infection. At dinner.

But actually I enjoy brief visits with them. The mil is the type that scoots around telling you all day how she just wants to make everyone happy, which is code for I have to control every single facet and its possible outcomes or I will die. So, that can be fun. Did I mention the OCD yet? There are no strangers to pharmaceuticals here! So really, we fit right in.

There are a few things I want to do here. First, I must go yarn shopping. I must knit, knit, knit like the wind! Second, I must go to the Coach outlet and Liz Claiborne outlet. Third, I want to go to the church with the Holy Dirt.

I'm gonna assume the first 2 are self explanatory.

I am totally cranked up about the chance to take Genea to visit the Holy Dirt, and Teena too. There is a church where a miraculous event occurred a bazillion years ago. Water appeared as a stream or something, and then disappeared, leaving just the dirt. People who visit this spot have reported medical miracles, there are braces and crutches lining the walls with little stories about how people were healed. I am not trying to be disrespectful in my description, I just don't remember all the details, it has been more than 10 years. Anyway, I cannot wait to take Genea there. I am going to bring some dirt home too, just in case it doesn't take right away. And Teena, I think I will set her right into the hole (in the ground where the dirt is) and tell her to sprinkle it over herself. In the olden days when this was discovered people would eat the dirt, but I will save that for an emergency.

Outwit, Outplay, Outlast

Where is Teena?

Seriously, where is she?

Question: Teena, why are you wearing only one sock?

Answer: So I can see the pretty nail polish on my toes

B-I-N-G-O-

When Genea first came, she was 4 years old. She, like many 4 year olds, did not know the alphabet or her numbers so I set about teaching her. Of course the most interesting thing to any toddler is themselves or another toddler, so I started with her name. And progress was slow. But when she got it, she got it and that is the end of that. Once it goes in the little iron fist of her brain, you can be absolutely sure it is in there, and in there good.
I taught her to spell her name using the children's song about the little dog named Bingo. So we did it like this:

There was a family
that had a girl and
Genea is her name-o
G-E-N-E-A,
G-E-N-E-A,
G-E-N-E-A-
AND Genea is her name-O.

Only, it turns out Genea had learned a few things along the way, and the right words to that song is something she had already learned. So, she merged the two in her iron fist brain.

G-E-N-E-A
G-E-N-E-A-
G-E-N-E-A
AND Bingo is Genea's name- O!

So I have a strange feeling she will teach that song to her own children this way.

THIS is Bothering Me

The tragedy involving Jennifer Hudson's family is desperately horrible. Her mother and brother were killed a few days ago in Chicago and her sisters' 7 year old son is missing. If you don't know, Jennifer Hudson is a singer and actress who is from the south side of Chicago originally and it seems her family still lived there.
The crime itself is absolutely terrible. To describe it, to put words to the emotional aftermath, is impossible. The pure, scathing agony is unimaginable.
What I don't understand is where is that little boy and why is there not a big search going on? There has been an Amber Alert and the FBI is involved and.....so....what...? I live 3 hours from Chicago (by my driving) and I have seen only the exhibitionist type of news on the subject. Like, this doesn't concern us but isn't it tragic. It has been several days now and again...where is he and what has happened to the little boy? I don't understand how he is involved in the murders. Was he supposed to be at his grandmothers house that day? Or did he go missing from school? Why is there not a nationwide alert going on with photo's and information streaming?
I have to say it, I really do. And if you don't like it, then bite me.
That cute little blond white boy from Nevada was nationwide news when he went missing, what, 2 weeks ago. And I am thousands of miles from Nevada. It was all over the papers, the tv news and internet pages. Updates came several times a day, and even when there was nothing new to report, reporting happened.
So here is the link to the Amber Alert for Julian King:
http://www.ncmec.org/missingkids/servlet/AmberExternalFCServlet?act=retAmberCase&amberId=6797
I hope he is okay.

I think I'll take up smoking again

Seriously.
What the hell is so bad about smoking anyway. Cut a few years off my life? The gorky years in a crummy stinking nursing home wearing a diaper? Talking to my imaginary dog about my imaginary trip to Hawaii?
Seriously!
Settle in, this is a long one.



We have a lot going on and coming up. There is the trip to Chicago to the home of the Most Spoiled Children on the Planet, along with visiting children from out of state, and a Show. This involves 3 days of travel, 2 overnights at my parents house, and many, many deviations from our regularly scheduled weekend of staying home and trying to not kill each other. Aside from the traveling part, I was looking forward to seeing some of the family from another state and doing some fun things in the city. Genea does not like anything new. She has the rest of her life scheduled to be exactly the same as yesterday. I learned the hard way, the realllllly really hard way, that cuing Genea in to an impending schedule Change does only one thing, and that one thing is to freak her out from that moment until approximately 1 week and 2 days after the Change. (There actually is a pattern there for those of you with sharp eyes ....see she will include the Change in her repertoire of scheduled events for the following week assuming the Change is a permanent addition to her schedule no matter what I tell her different, therefore her last freak out will be 2 days after she realizes the Change will not be repeating. Which is another Change).

Then, 2 days after our return we are leaving for a week to visit the other grandparents. Big Change. With a scary new thing. Flying. On an airplane. And folks, I know this is strange but you probably would not be to this paragraph if you were not expecting some strange payoff. You would have changed the channel by now as it were. Check out this one--- Genea has spent the past year believing her previous parents are living on an airplane. Oh yeah, no typo's.

No one knows where she got this idea, but somehow when she officially came to our home to live she put them on an airplane that never landed. Evidently, this was all part of the Magical Thinking that young children will develop to explain something traumatic to themselves. Every time she noticed an airplane for a year, she told everyone in her range that her Non-Mom and Non-Dad were on it. Even Teena would say it. Now, I slowly and carefully landed the aircraft across about six weeks over the summer, and released the Nons.(I was going to call them the Others but I remembered that whole plot line has been used elsewhere.) Notice the word "I". "I", may have landed them, but I have no idea where Genea put them. And she is not telling.

So, not to change the subject or anything, but moving right along. We have a lot to cover.

About a week ago, I noticed Teena going potty more than usual. She usually waits until the last possible second and springs up from whatever fascinating life altering activity she was doing to ricochet off the walls getting to the potty and fyi, get out of her way. But I saw her going a few more times than is her normal one day, and then she had a peeing accident. So I called the Doctor and made an appointment for the same day and Teena proceeded to stay away from the potty for the next 4 hours. I was sure the office staff at the Doctor would be snorting at my overreaction as soon as we turned the corner with the nurse. But, I was right, she had a UTI. Well she was thrilled. And so excited to be taking medicine! She basically felt ok so she was just happy to get to go out. Notice that a change in routine makes Teena happy. Then she got to have special juice. What the hell is so special about her juice? It better be ef'in' special for $12.00!!! Regular store cranberry juice is from concentrate and all the brands had sugar and a bunch of other stuff in them. So I went to a health food store- why do these stores always smell icky? Anyway, REAL cranberry juice with an actual cranberry, is pricey and incidentally, disgusting. Turns out there is a great reason for adding all that other stuff.

Yesterday, Genea came home from school and said she felt sick. I felt her forehead and it was warm. I had The Husband look at her throat because she said it hurt. I will get strep if there is one single germ in a 20 mile radius. I even had Scarlet Fever this past spring. That's why I had him look. Throat was red. Call the Dr., because we have all these trips out of town coming up! Sure enough, strep. More medicine. Nothing gets my Mommy Gene fired up faster than one of MY babies in pain. I will kick any ass necessary to save my babies from pain including an invisible germ. That was yesterday.

Now today, the girls are so excited to be home together unexpectedly that they are behaving like the Mexican Jumping Beans they used to sell at gas stations in the 70's. So I hear. Teena is devastated that her medicine is all gone and Genea gets to take it now. I finally realized I should probably separate them or they will both be sick. Of course I am feeling run down and sickish but I can't tell if that is my normal feeling shitty or if it is sick-shitty. Unexpected bonus now, our trip to Chicago is cancelled. I was going take Teena and go by ourselves but it turns out no one wants us anyway. Since we could be carrying a Death Plague across state lines.

With all these great times, I have been thinking, what would really make this all even better, is to start smoking again. Ahhhhhhh.

Several hours into this post, the girls will not be separated. The best I can do is to make a pillow wall between them and hope the germs don't jump up and race over. Genea should not be toxic anymore anyhow.


Does either of them look sick?
Teena is starting to feel warm.

Is it Really Real Simple?

You probably know this magazine, Real Simple. If not, it is a beautiful monthly magazine that is very popular about how to simplify your life in 250 pages or less. At least, I think that was the intention.

But now, 5 years later it seems they have run out of ways to be simple and now are focused more on ways to get them some payola by selling their own more complicated but really pretty ways to put your stuff out of view. I am a person who needs my stuff in view or I forget I have it, so this fancy stuff is useless to me and this might be why I may take a slightly taunting tone when describing this publication. In the April 2008 issue, the 'beauty' segment features a guide to neutral nail polish to match your skin tone, and very simply proceeds to list 40, yes 40 suggestions of brands and color choices along with the useful tip to ''wash your hands well after applying sunscreen. Its ingredients can make sheer polish look dull and grimy''.

Anyway, the mag also has a segment they call the 'aha' use for everyday items, in other words a new way to use something you already have. For example, all those used bounce sheets. You could knit them together and make a ghost costume for your child and she would be the best smelling ghost at the party! (This is me exercising my right to satire, or shit I think is funny that may be not entirely factual- my sense of humor is not for everyone). I actually had an AHA moment of my own but I did not submit it. I will share it with the Internet People of the Air.

Start with a used up sock, cut off the grimy dull foot part and cut a hole out for your thumb.

Then, put your 'I knitted way too much and typed way way too much' brace from Walgreen's on over the raggedy sock. No matter what the label says all of these braces make your hand sweaty. Not with this AHA suggestion! Then you can put the sock top in the laundry and wash it in your $16.00 green laundry soap! In your little green bucket of rainwater! Then re-use the water for your green coffee! That you grew the beans of in your backyard and baked in the green sun using your green hubcap as a reflector! Ok, I probably took that too far. (!)

My Genea as an Adult

I wonder what my girls will look like as adults. I started and erased this post 3 times because I started by writing that I had an idea of what Teena would look like, but as one of the facets of adoption I would not know at all what Genea might look like. But really, no one knows about either of them. I think it is normal to imagine the ability to predict but the truth is you can guess and thats all. So it isn't any different trying to imagine what Genea will look like growing up.

Recently, we were laying on the couch together and she fell asleep (this is a point of progress for her, that she can fall asleep with another person next to her). And I was watching her as her features relaxed and she drifted off and I think I saw her growing up face. So like any good and crazy parent I popped off flash bulbs at her instead of leaving her in peace while she slept. If I look at this picture and tilt my head to the left, I think I see what is a hint of her adult face.

I guess we will find out in about 14 years.

The War of the Tacos

Everyone with children has funny stories about kids and food, especially if the kids are girls. If by chance those kids are my girls, then the funny part becomes what they will eat, and that is not much. The Husband, he has no patience with this at all. He, however is a boy and like most boys he only requires that the food be done moving before he will eat it. I grew up with a sister and our eating habits were so bad they made the evening news.
(Well, that's what our mom said). So legendary that 35 years later it is still talked about (ok, by our parents).

In my house, we just recently recovered from the Battle of the Rice-o- roni. The adults are proud to report a victory after the 4th appearance of said Roni for dinner. And with the addition of a slab of cheese. And, a reduction in standards. No matter how we got there, the adults won!

So, I made taco's for dinner. Cooked the tortilla's even ! I don't expect much from these culinary experts of refined palate anymore. However, they have eaten these taco's before. In fact, I made up a batch of taco meat awhile back and they ate it. They verbalized their approval. This was the exact same meat. I mean exactly. I had made extra at the time and I froze the rest of it. THIS was the SAME beef!

Sniff. Poke.

Agitated looks pass between the girls. With only the visual cues of their secret language they decide who is going to take one for the team. The first one speaks.

"I not like this"

"Sure you do, you have had it and you love it"

" I not like this taco"

"Just try it"

She bites. Her head rocks back. She gags, and she cries. "I not like this taco!!!"

The other one, we never get to the first bite. She pokes at the shell and tells me, " don't like this, don't like this beef, don't like this cheese. This cheese not yellow, this cheesez white".

Well girls, I tell them, this is dinner.

Later the same evening they find a bag of tortilla chips and launch into the combination Beg-Whine. They want taco chips. They must have tortilla chips noooowww! They tell me, we are hungry! Really.

Remember the olden days before really good antidepressants when parents would be mysteriously gone to "rest their nerves"? THIS IS WHY!