Posted by Kimberly on June 25th, 2008 — Posted in Diva Girl, Kipple, No Pudding Until You Finish Your Meat
There she is, my newly minted fifth grader. A far cry from the nervous little girl who stood on the school steps last September, isn’t she?
It’s been a long year for my Diva Girl. Between the adjustment issues that come with changing schools to the sliding grades and finally the diagnosis, it’s been quite a ride on that big yellow bus. But you wouldn’t know it from that picture, would you? That is one happy little girl, thrilled not only with the vast expanse of summer that lies ahead of her, but also with the long stretch of Grade 4 that is now behind her.
And that’s really my goal at this point in the year–to have a child who is proud of what she has accomplished, and who is looking forward to the opportunities and excitement ahead. The report card, for me, is pretty much just a bonus at this point.
Oh what a bonus it was, though!
If ever I needed confirmation that putting Diva Girl on Concerta was the right thing to do, this report card is it. The Cs? A pale memory. In some cases, she went up more than a full letter grade from last term. But even that pales in comparison to the fact that for the first time this year, she didn’t get “Ns” in conflict resolution, co-operation, or problem solving! Which still wasn’t the best part. No…The best part was the final comment:
Sabrina approaches new learning situations with confidnece, and she effectively synthesizes information from all subject areas. Sabrina has demonstrated improvement in her independent work skills, requiring less teacher support during independent work periods Sabrina willingly works with others in class, and is willing to resolve conflicts when they occur. She is doing her class work with more care and attention to detail. Best wishes for success in Grade 5!
That right there is everything I’d hoped for when I first sought the referral to Dr. G. That right there is the Diva Girl I always knew was there, just waiting for the opportunity to shine. That right there is why I know that Grade 5 is going to be everything Sabrina’s smile promises it will be.
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Posted by Kimberly on June 22nd, 2008 — Posted in The Ladies, Diva Girl, Zen Baby, Kipple, No Pudding Until You Finish Your Meat
What do you when you want to eat the children? Turn them into cotton candy confections, of course!
I’ve had some Hannah Montana Hair Colour Sticks tucked away for a while now. When I bought them, I thought that it would be a fun First Day of Summer Vacation project to (temporarily and with a product guaranteed to wash right out) dye The Ladies’ hair funky colours. Last night, as I was contemplating eating my own young, my gaze fell on these stick and I thought, “why not.”
Yes, I was still Very. Angry. with Diva Girl. Forget ebay, I would have happily PAID to have her tweenilcious self taken off my hands. But seething anger and resentment wasn’t really getting either of us anywhere, and I didn’t really see that ending soon without one of us making some sort of grand gesture to end the hostilities. And I think we all know that it wasn’t going to be her; even if she had, if we’re being honest here, it’s not like I was in any mood to accept any sort of peace offering anyway. So, it was up to me to make the move and pull us all out of the pit into which we’d descended over the course of one spectacularly crappy day.
One would think that showering a child whose staggering sense of entitlement and lack of gratitude had caused many of the day’s conflicts would be counterintuitive, but it seemed to work. United in our common project, the stresses, slights, and slurs of the day fell away. She remembered that in addition to being the Meanest. Mom. Ever. I can also be the most fun and I remember that in addition to being a raging brat, my oldest daughter is also funny, fun, and kind of cool.
Regan was just happy that the yelling stopped. The pretty colours in her hair were just gravy, so far as she was concerned.
So yeah, no regrets over either giving one more gift to a child who didn’t seem able to appreciate what she already had, or about turning my children into something more likely to be found in a circus tent than a schoolroom Not even when Diva Girl reminded me that her class will be presenting the end of school mass on Tuesday. At which she’s doing the reading.
Because could there be a more literal representation of the direction “Be joyful in hope” than these two? What’s more joyful than being allowed to dye your hair hot pink and electric blue three days before school ends? And what’s more hopeful than the mother who allows it?
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Posted by Kimberly on June 20th, 2008 — Posted in Diva Girl
I decided after last night’s epic meltdown–the kind of tantrum where when you give in and do what the kid wants she gets more out of control–to change Diva Girl’s dosing schedule in an attempt to avoid the twelfth hour crash we’re currently experiencing. I have been giving her the pill between 7:30-8:00 so that it has time to both kick in before school and wear off before bed, but clearly that’s not working out so well on the homefront. Or maybe a little too well. I don’t know. I just know that I’m not prepared to deal with a toddler in nine year old clothing much longer.
I figured since the meds are quite obviously wearing off after almost exactly 12 hours, I would push back the time I give them, thereby getting more at home benefit: If I gave them at 8:30 instead of 7:30, we’d only have a half hour of unmedicated time to deal with, versus the hour and a half of holding on by our fingernails (or not) that we’re doing now.
So, today was to be the dawn of a whole new era in calm. Diva Girl would have the tools to be her charming, funny, in control self, I would be relaxed and easy going with the tantrum alert level reduced to a pale yellow, and everyone would join hands, sing kumbaya, and get to bed on time with no whining.
Things were on track for that, too. I reached for the pill bottle at 7:30, just like usual, and then remembered my new resolve and put it back to wait another hour. And then I forgot about it.
Yep. You heard me. Instead of giving Diva Girl her meds an hour later, I just didn’t give them to her at all. Which, I suppose alleviates the whole crash issue, if not exactly in the way I’d planned. Good thing she doesn’t have any tests today. Or oral reports to do.
Yeah, as an ADHD mom, clearly I RULE.
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Posted by Kimberly on June 18th, 2008 — Posted in Diva Girl, Kipple
I don’t want to say that Diva Girl is a different kid since our first visit to Dr. G, because she’s really not. She’s still the same sparkly, energetic, enthusiastic, dramatic daughter she’s always been. But she’s also more than that–in a good way for once.
Lord knows she’s always been “more,” but lately her “more” is also “less.” She’s more able to settle and focus and less willy nilly and restless than she’s been in the past. As counterintuitive as it sounds, I think that by making her “less more,” the drug she is on is allowing her to be more herself, and not less.
Since she’s been taking the meds, she’s brought home level 4 math tests, mastered her math facts, had a perfect reading assessment, and had her teachers–who don’t know about the diagnosis or the medication–go out of their way to tell her what a great day she’s had at school.
She’s even reading now. She’s always liked books and stories, and she’s always had the ability to read, but she could never settle in and just read a book before. Now she reads 150 page novels in one sitting. And then goes looking for more.
It’s not perfect. There are still moodswings and meltdowns. Some pretty epic meltdowns, actually. And giving a lifelong insomniac and incredibly picky eater a medication that lists its most common side effects as sleeplessness and appetite suppression definitely isn’t ideal. But even with these drawbacks, it’s been worth it. Watching Sabrina finally have the chance to be who she is has been worth the sandwiches that come home at the end of the day untouched, the dinners she doesn’t want to eat, and the long, long nights we endured while she was adjusting to the medication.
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Posted by Kimberly on June 4th, 2008 — Posted in Diva Girl, Kipple
It was not by accident that I christened Sabrina “Diva Girl” when I started my first anonymous blog way back when. From the moment she arrived–with bright, curious eyes and a definite pout–my firstborn child was “ON.” And turned to 11.
We used to joke about it when she was a baby–how alert she always was, how she always seemed to be in perpetual motion, still only in sleep–but eventually, life with Sabrina settled into a routine and the high energy, non-stop rollercoaster ride became normal. So normal, in fact, that when Regan was born I was convinced that there had to be something wrong with her–I believe the phrase I used was “brain damage”–so very different was this quiet, sleepy baby from my idea of a “normal” newborn. I’ve often wondered if Regan really is as Zen as I think she is, or if she just seems so in comparison to her sister. Either that, or her easygoing, laidback take on life is a brilliant form of self-preservation….
Anyway, eventually I stopped waiting for Sabrina to “grow out of it” and just rolled with it. This was how she was wired–my pirited, volatile, unstoppable Diva Girl. Which is not to say that I didn’t notice that, to put it nicely, my kid was often “more” than the other denizens of the playground; just that it did seem like all that big of a deal anymore–she was doing fine in school, had stopped crying, and had managed to make a couple of friends. If she at times still seemed overly impulsive and emotional, well…She was my daughter, after all. Basically, in the absent of any pressing stimulus, I became complacent in regards to her issues.
I don’t know if it’s the change in school, the surge in pre-pubescent hormomes, or simply the boiling energy that seethes inside Diva Girl finally reaching critical mass, but this year complacency has not been an option. This year, between the return of behaviours I’d thought banished by the end of Grade One, the Laura Incident, and the falling grades, something had to give–and I was afraid that it was going to be me. Or worse, her.
That was what really tipped the scales for me, Sabrina herself. Sure, I felt pretty confident that she would sort it all out eventually–the crying and class disruptions had already fallen off, she’s friends with Laura now, and I was fully confident that the poor grades were in no way a reflection of her intelligence or actual abilities. But was “eventually” really good enough? What about the now? Didn’t she deserve to be the best she could be now, while she was waiting for eventually to kick in?
That was my “A-Ha Moment.” The moment I realized that I didn’t want to be responsible for my daughter being less than she could be. So, I took some advice (some of it from some of you), did some research, and acknowledged what I’ve known since before Diva Girl’s first birthday–That she has always exhibited many of the signs of ADHD and despite the charm, intelligence, and sparkle that help her to offset that, not only was she not outgrowing them, she appeared to be growing into them more and more. And it was time that I started taking some steps to help her with that.
After some serious tap-dancing around my family doctor’s anti-ADHD bias (she’s in the bad parenting/just set tougher limits camp, apparently), I got us a referral to THE ADHD Guy in our city The Guy the SPSTs all speak of with respect. The Guy who doesn’t simply “push pills” to “shut parents and teachers up.” The Guy I felt confident would would look at all the evidence and help me figure out how best to help my difficult, complicated, wonderful daughter meet her full potential without any agenda of his own getting in the way of that goal. Turns out he was also The Guy who would change everything and restore my faith in myself as a parent and in Sabrina as a child.
I’m not a bad, permissive, or lazy parent. Diva Girl is not a bad, out of control kid.
After a 90 minute appointment in which he assessed everything from her motor skills to her reading ability, The Guy–let’s call him Dr. G–told me he felt confident in diagnosing Diva Girl with a very profound case of ADHD. In fact, he was a bit shocked, given the depth of her issues, that we’d managed to make it all the way to the end of the fourth grade without the school initiating the assessment process. In his opinion, her ability to charm, coupled with reading and math skills a full two grade levels above her age (take that, report card Cs!) allowed Diva Girl to fall through the cracks until now. Now though, she’s hit a safety net, and hopefully that will make all the difference in helping my daughter become the happiest, most successful Diva Girl she can possibly be.
I never set out to label my kid. That is truly what that process was about for me. I simply wanted to understand her so that I could do a better job parenting her. But I have to say, having that label has provided me with a world of relief. It’s not that the ADHD is an excuse for Sabrina’s less than charming behaviour, but it can be a reason for it; that is enough to allow me to step back off the parenting ledge and, instead of continuing to pound my head against the wall, remember that she’s often not doing it on purpose and that if she could stop, she would.
That’s the name of the game these days–putting brakes on the runaway train that is Diva Girl without losing any of her natural sparkle or verve in the process. It a tricky process, and one I’m still learning to navigate. But I’m hopeful that the more Sabrina and I figure this thing out, the more fabulous my Diva Girl will be.
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Posted by Kimberly on May 12th, 2008 — Posted in The Ladies, Diva Girl, Zen Baby, Kipple
Mother’s Day really isn’t a big deal to me. I of course make sure to honour my own mother with a specially chosen mushy card and token of my affection, appreciation, respect, but for myself the day is a bit of a wash. Solo moms are rarely gifted with tiny velvet boxes and our kisses tend to begin with the kids, not Kay, so the anticipation factor tends to be fairly low–limited to whatever teacher generated craft has come home this year.
Not that the crafts aren’t lovely, wonderful, meaningful, blah blah blah…But really….It’s not like the kid thought this stuff up on her own. And after the “Mom&Me Cookies” debacle back in the first grade, when I was presented with a jar of dry ingredients, a recipe, and an overexcited six year old who spent the entire day nagging me to essentially make my own damn gift, I’ve kinda been soured on the whole teacher-driven maternal appreciation thing.
So, since it seems somehow tacky to encourage the children to remember to tell me how much I rock, I pretty much just let Mother’s Day go except for using it as an excuse to buy myself something pretty. It’s not like I really need the cards and flowers to know that I’m a great mom and they love me, and really, if I have to ask for them, I don’t want them at all. Needless to say, my expectations for this year were, as always, fairly low. I was planning on calling it a red letter day if I got to sleep past 8.
Motherhood is nothing if not surprising, however. And sometimes, even when they make you cry, they are even good surprises.
That, my friends, is my Diva Girl, growing up before our very eyes. Up until now, she’s been reasonably oblivious to the whole Mday experience; like most kids, any occasion that is not designed to culminate in her being showered with gifts doesn’t tend to figure high on her list of priorities. This year, however, for the first time my daughter celebrated Mother’s Day without any external prompting. According to my Mom, who witnessed this little project in the making, it was all Diva directed–she decided on the shape and picture for the card, and then spent an hour with the Zen Baby working on her sister’s poem before creating her own ode to my maternal awesomeness.
You know, little velvet boxes are nice (I got one of those too–also Sabrina’s idea), but they really can’t hold a candle to the genuine love that shines through a poem that contains a line thanking you for letting the kid play in your room. I never really realized just how much I’ve missed getting a Mother’s Day card all these years until I held that painstakingly created cardboard butterfly in my hands on Sunday morning. But that’s ok, because those two poems, a decade in the making, were totally worth the wait.
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Posted by Kimberly on April 3rd, 2008 — Posted in Diva Girl, No Pudding Until You Finish Your Meat
I’ve noticed in the past year or so the term “Helicopter Parent” has become part of the parenting lexicon, a label used to describe those overly invested parents who micromanage their kids’ lives–and especially their schoolwork–to the point of pretty much doing everything for them. Other than rolling my eyes at the idea, I’ve pretty much ignored the phenomenon because, well, clearly that’s not me: I’m a very hands off parent, especially when it comes to school; I’ve always believed in allowing Diva Girl to succeed or fail on her own merits rather than making it all about me.
It’s been a conscious choice, this hands off policy I have towards Sabrina’s academic achievement. I recognized early on that one of the more complicated aspects of balancing my career with my children–beyond the daycare juggling, working mom guilt, and other every day concerns of every working mom–would be resisting the impulse to turn my daughter into my student.
Teachers are in a uniquely difficult position when it comes to the education of their children–we have an insider’s understanding of the system and what is required to succeed, which makes it that makes it that much more difficult to refrain from stepping in to ensure that our little preshus gets the best grade possible. It’s a very tempting, very slippery slope, and one that I have no desire to slide down, so I’ve always made an effort to keep home and school separate when it comes to Diva Girl.
For the most part, it’s worked pretty well. Sure, I’ve been tempted to get involved in an assignment or two, confident that I could make it that much better, but the ability to recognize how fundamentally wrong that statement is has always been enough to stop the helicopter blades from rotating before they achieve lift off. Of course, the fact that Diva Girl has always shown herself capable of getting her As and Bs all on her own has made it easier for me to keep my feet planted firmly on the ground and focus more on encouraging her to do her best than what that best is deemed to be.
Until now.
For the first time, Sabrina has brought home a report card filled not with As and Bs, but with Cs and it is challenging everything I believed about myself as the parent of a school aged child. I used to believe that I didn’t put a lot of stock in grades, that Diva Girl’s willingness to put forth her best effort in any given area far outweighed any achievement in my eyes. How then to reconcile a report card that was–to my mind at least–not good enough with my oft-spouted philosophy that your best is always good enough, no matter what the numbers say? Especially when I do believe that despite the lackluster results, she is trying. However I also believe that my daughter is not a C student–two facts that unfortunately seem to be in direct contradiction with each other, given the evidence marching down the report card page.
All of my self-delusions about my lack of unhealthy investment in Sabrina’s school progress came crashing down as I held that report card in my hands, speechless in the face of this unexpectedly lackluster achievement. To be perfectly honest, each C felt like a personal affront–as though they were an indictment of my ability to parent rather than an assessment of Sabrina’s math and reading ability. In other words, as I processed that report, my maternal rotors started turning.
And then my Diva Girl brought me crashing back to Earth with one simple question, “Are you disappointed in me?”
Normally by now I would have already told her how proud I was of her and commented on her various achievements as reported by her teachers. Clearly th fact that I hadn’t done that this time spoke of my disappointment as loudly as if I’d shouted it at her. And looking at all those Cs, I thought about shouting. Looking into those big hazel eyes, however, I thought about how, in the grand scheme of things, a couple of Cs on a fourth grade report card isn’t really that big of a deal and about how my sense of self worth as the parent of a Good Student paled in comparison to my child’s sense of self worth as a Good Person, regardless of her achievements as a student.
I don’t want this not even failure to define my daughter’s sense of who she is and what she can accomplish when she puts her mind to it. While I clearly do not want her to believe that she is a C student, I also don’t want her to think that a C isn’t good enough when she’s giving it all she’s got.
So that’s what we talked about this time–what she thinks she can accomplish and how she can better meet those goals. And of course, as always, we talked about how proud I am of her and how confident I am that she can conquer the world if only she puts her mind to it. What we didn’t do was climb on board my mommycopter –not because I didn’t want to enact a rescue mission, but because even though it’s what I want, I’m still rational enough to know that it’s not what she needs.
Sure, I want to see Sabrina take to the skies and soar, but only if she’s the one at the controls.
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Posted by Kimberly on December 31st, 2007 — Posted in Diva Girl, Kipple
I’m not sure if I’ve mentioned this before, but even if I have, it bears repeating: I hate New Year’s Eve. It may even beat out Valentine’s Day as my least favourite commercially manufactured holiday. At least with Valentine’s Day, there’s candy. With New Year’s there’s just overinflated expectations and, now that I have a child old enough to indulge in same, whining and tears over the indignity of being denied the right to watch crappy tv until a giant ball drops from sky, thus ending an evening with far too much hoopla and not nearly enough payoff.
I have a hard enough time working up enthusiasm for the whole clean slate thing that I don’t feel–my personal New Year starts the first day of school–without being confronted with the “But Arthur gets to stay up until Midnight!” argument. Dude. Arthur is a fictional talking aardvark who has a pet dog (seriously, wtf?). I’m hardly going to be swayed by the fact that his parents let him do something. And even if I were so inclined, this is also the family that produced the whining wonder that is D.W. Again, hardly a stunning endorsement of their parenting decisions.
I’m really not up for this tantrum tonight. I’m tired, I have a headache borne of negotiating one too many battles over toys today, and no matter how many times I pick it all up, it still looks like Toys R Us threw up in my livingroom–forget sugarplums, at this point I’ve got visions of garbage bags dancing in my head. Enduring the monumental tantrum that is brewing over bedtime really isn’t how I want to spend the last moments of this year. But I also don’t want to start next year having set the precedent that we stay up until midnight. It’s not something I’ve done in past years, so why should I now just because some kids tv show put it into my kid’s head that this is what you do for New Year’s Eve. Thanks Arthur! You really dropped the ball on this one.
So, no reflective, navel gazing year end post from me. No uplifting looks towards the future. Just a sincere belief that it would be great to sleep through the initial moments of 2008.
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Posted by Kimberly on December 25th, 2007 — Posted in The Ladies, Diva Girl, Zen Baby, Kipple
Few things put the vastly different personalities of my daughters into stark relief like Christmas Morning.Diva Girl is a whirling dervish of excitement, blowing through the Christmas tree like the Tasmanian Devil on speed; The Zen Baby, not surprisingly, takes a more relaxed approach to the festivities.
Where Diva grabs her stocking and immediately unpends it all over the floor, thereby ensuring sensory overload what with the jumbled mess of toothbrushes, lipgloss, temporary tattoos and various odd and ends strewn about before her, Zen Baby is meticulous in her stocking excavation, each item withdrawn, examined, and exclaimed over before moving on to the next–until her sister grabs it and dumps it all over the floor for her, that is.
Within an hour of waking me up (at the crack of dark, but it’s one of the few times a year I don’t mind) and racing to the tree, Sabrina will have gone through all of her presents. Everything will have been catalogued, touched, and tested. Practically the minute she processes what the gift it, she’s moved on to the next thing. In her half of the room, the toys are scattered with reckless abandon, mixed, mingled, dropped where she was when the next thing caught her fancy. Regan, however, is still playing with the first toy she saw, and half of her packages remain ignored under the tree. It’s not that she’s not interested or lacking in gratitude, she just hasn’t gotten that far yet. She will, given time (and the mom-imposed restraint shown by her big sister), but it’s just not a priority to her. She likes this toy, and she will savour it.
Two very different little girls with two very different approaches to presents, and I suspect, life in general. One who lives full throttle, out loud, determined to wring everything possible from every experience and constantly leaping before she looks, the other with the unique ability to immerse herself in life, to fully experience each moment before moving on to the next, and always careful to be sure exactly how high the ledge is before she jumps. Both perfect in their own ways.
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Posted by Kimberly on December 23rd, 2007 — Posted in Diva Girl, Kipple
As you may have gathered from the preceding “hoopla,” I am very big on Christmas tradition. There is, however, one seasonal tradition that I could definitely do without: Diva Girl’s traditional holiday meltdown.
For as long as I can remember, December 23rd has marked the day that Diva Girl official gives up on the concept of the Nice List and wholeheartedly embraces her place among The Naughty. I don’t know if it’s the pressure, the anticipation, or what, but every year is remarkably the same–Sabrina always ends up losing her shit in a spectacularly ugly way.
Much though I’ve worked so hard to create the belief in Santa, to nurture it and protect it in the face of an increasingly cruel, unforgiving world, today is the day that I fantasize about pulling back the curtain and revealing the whole thing for the sham that it is just so that I can explain to my daughter exactly why she won’t be getting any presents this year. I won’t of course. I’ll jingle the bells and nibble the cookies and fill the stockings, and if I’m honest, I’ll look forward to doing so all day tomorrow–I love my daughter after all, and the idea that she would be disappointed on Christmas, screaming in frustration rather than squealing in delight, is just not one I truly want to entertain.
Except…Maybe a little, in my Grinchier moments as I deal with the noise noise noise of her lack of gratitude and her unwillingness to help out and her just general crappy attitude as best described by loud, angry screams and rants against the injustice of it all. When I really do wonder why, exactly, I spent all that time, effort, and money getting her just the right things, the things that show just how well I know her, just how much I love her, even if she can’t always see it, when I could have been out getting a pedicure and a really great pair of shoes. The answer, of course, is that I do love her. And I do love to make her happy, and I do look forward to seeing her face when she sees what Santa has left for her-despite all indications to the contrary–under the tree.
But I wonder, would it be wrong if, in addition to the Littlest Pet Shops and the 17 different kinds of fairy, if Santa also left a little note this year, telling her to get with the program and stop with the tantrums before she manages to completely take herself out of the running with him? Or is my heart really just 2 sizes too small?
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