Thursday, November 20, 2008

Reconnecting

I've been wishing I had a space to talk about certain things that Twitter and Facebook just don't accommodate, so this seemed like a likely spot.

It's mid-November 2008. Burk's been out of work, barring a brief stop-over at a startup, for 18 months. I have been resisting going back to work, but have been sincerely looking for about 3 months now.

Lydia is almost a year and is mostly awesome. She's beginning to find a voice for her frustrations - or just beginning to get frustrated with her limitations. Two teeth, not walking yet, says 'mama, dada, alldone, and HI!"

Miles is almost 5. He's driving me nuts and really worrying me and delighting me often within a 15 minute span of time. He's experiencing stomach-aches all the time and I don't know what to do with it. I don't think he's making them or using them purely as a manipulative tool, but he's been to the doctor about them twice and nothing seems to be actually wrong. He's not eating much of anything. He's so picky it's finally sent me over the edge and I promised myself I wasn't going to be that Mom. He says about 4 times a day that he has to throw up. He never does. Sometimes he's in actual distress about it, sometimes he says it with zero affect and I have a hard time not getting mad at him about it.

Miles is really interested in guns, fighting, blood and death. 4 of my favorite subjects! He's obsessed with Star Wars, which at one time actually was a favorite subject, but now makes me want to shoot myself. Still, he's incredibly polite. He's beginning to display empathy. He's still smart as a whip and curious and interesting. His laugh is outstanding.

We've been having a hard time lately also with his attitude. He's gotten irrational (I never get to do anything I want to do...) and demanding and we're not enjoying it. We're sort of torn between coming down harder on him and giving him consequences for when he ignores us or doesn't do what we ask or just acts like a complete pain in the ass and trying harder to understand what the need is under the behavior. I'm firmly in the camp of BOTH. I think he needs the boundaries that consistently applied discipline gives to feel secure, but I also want to know what's going on with him. At Lydia's class the phrase was 'you can't fix the problem unless you fulfill the need underlying the behavior' or something like that. I agree with that, but I am not as averse to behavior mod in addition.

Lydia is just so much simpler. I keep catching myself and trying to spend more time with Miles, do more fun things with him because I'm sure he can tell how we gravitate to her and her sunny demeanor and enthusiasm. But he's entranced by it as well. Miles told me the other night that he loved me, but that he loved Lydia more. I wouldn't say I love her more, but I hear ya buddy - it's a lot easier to love Lydia. He also told me he loved me more than Dad. I tried to redirect that one. Burk is great with them both, but he's got serious tone issues with Miles. He goes from zero to PISSED OFF is .04 seconds. At least it sounds that way to Miles and to me. Miles keeps telling me that 'Dad is always mad at me and yelling at me.' As I mentioned - Miles is a big fan of "Always! and Never!" so take it with a grain of salt, but I wish Burk could ease up on the tone. I've mentioned it to him (Burk) and he's very open to changing, but...then he doesn't.

enough for now.

Things to talk about -
FEAR & money
Going back to work (and fear. And money.)
Mom (and fear and money)
Religion (and fear?)
Friends locally and far flung
Fat.
Family.