Time passes quickly when you're working
I have been at my new "temp" job for two weeks now. It started out being pretty funny grading all those 5th grade essays from reading passages. The things some of them come up with are hilarious. But now I'm just sad that the quality is so poor, at least on the question that I have been working on. I hope this is not representative of the nation. If it is, boys and girls, we are in trouble.
Well I'm still on eBay, but am going to get my camera back, and thanks for the suggestions: I will try to sell some back on eBay and recoup the cost.
Since I last posted, my apartment flooded from an overflowing water tank (at least it was not sewage). They took out my furniture and ripped up the carpets and ripped out the pads. There were days of drying with heavy duty fans (that was fun--like living with a 747 on take off). So just last night, I got my furniture back, and instead of sitting on the floor (sometimes wet, but always cold and hard) to write my blog, I am now in an honest to goodness chair with my computer on a desk! I feel like I have returned to the 21st century. So now all I have to do is put everything back in the bookshelves, reconnect the rest of the computer equipment, and sort through the garbage I collected that I really don't need.
I haven't been writing. It's just been too painful on my back to sit hunched over a keyboard on the floor to be creative.
In general, though, I have been in pretty good shape, except for last night when I had some s. ideation and some thoughts of cutting. But just thoughts, no action. Still, I haven't felt that way in weeks, so it's a little disappointing, you know? There was enough time there when I was feeling good (about a month) that I began to think, maybe this is a cure. Maybe I really have graduated from DBT. But no, I haven't been practicing DBT.
One of the things that has been such a stress reliever for me (besides writing) is that I have found out that the Buddhist monastery that my son wants to join is seriously considering him, even with his Asperger's. The abbot has sent him to Montana to live with a lay community there and to learn how to become a good lay person before he tries to become a monk. Now honestly, I want grandchildren. But my primary responsibility is to my son's welfare, and I think this just might be the perfect place for him. He would be with people working on compassion and understanding, and so would be safe. I just don't think he can cut it in the world. And the abbot is very wise. My son must pass a series of accomplishments (I don't know what they all are, but one is that he has to hold down a job for a long while without getting fired or quitting in anger--that will be a challenge for him). He has a job now and a place of his own, and according to the abbot, whom I called to discuss Asperger's with, he is doing well--at least so far. The abbot asks my son to view the job as his spiritual path for now, and that he should be kind and help everyone to be safe and have fun (he is a ski lift operator). This plan for him for the next couple of years or so has relieved my mind. For the first time in his 22 years, there is somebody else looking out after him. I can go off duty. For those who don't know it, Asperger's is a high functioning form of autism where the kids speak like encyclopedias but don't have a clue how to read emotions, facial expressions, body language and other social cues. The mechanism just isn't there. Now the abbot is taking a spiritual view of all this, of course, but I hope he will give my son a fair shake, considering his disability. Asperger's is a particularly incidious syndrome because everyone assumes that since you can talk about anything and everything, you must be able to understand another person. But not true. He looks normal, but his condition is hidden and subtle. It's not like Tourrette's where there are some obvious indications.
There is just no way I can say the amount of relief I feel from him. I sincerely want him to do whatever he wants to do, including becoming a monk. And it would certainly be better than him living in a group home.
Has anyone ever had a child with some sort of special needs that you could never stop worrying about? It is a source of constant tension, even when they are "grown."
Sorry about the delay in blogging. Things have been pretty chaotic around here.
Well I'm still on eBay, but am going to get my camera back, and thanks for the suggestions: I will try to sell some back on eBay and recoup the cost.
Since I last posted, my apartment flooded from an overflowing water tank (at least it was not sewage). They took out my furniture and ripped up the carpets and ripped out the pads. There were days of drying with heavy duty fans (that was fun--like living with a 747 on take off). So just last night, I got my furniture back, and instead of sitting on the floor (sometimes wet, but always cold and hard) to write my blog, I am now in an honest to goodness chair with my computer on a desk! I feel like I have returned to the 21st century. So now all I have to do is put everything back in the bookshelves, reconnect the rest of the computer equipment, and sort through the garbage I collected that I really don't need.
I haven't been writing. It's just been too painful on my back to sit hunched over a keyboard on the floor to be creative.
In general, though, I have been in pretty good shape, except for last night when I had some s. ideation and some thoughts of cutting. But just thoughts, no action. Still, I haven't felt that way in weeks, so it's a little disappointing, you know? There was enough time there when I was feeling good (about a month) that I began to think, maybe this is a cure. Maybe I really have graduated from DBT. But no, I haven't been practicing DBT.
One of the things that has been such a stress reliever for me (besides writing) is that I have found out that the Buddhist monastery that my son wants to join is seriously considering him, even with his Asperger's. The abbot has sent him to Montana to live with a lay community there and to learn how to become a good lay person before he tries to become a monk. Now honestly, I want grandchildren. But my primary responsibility is to my son's welfare, and I think this just might be the perfect place for him. He would be with people working on compassion and understanding, and so would be safe. I just don't think he can cut it in the world. And the abbot is very wise. My son must pass a series of accomplishments (I don't know what they all are, but one is that he has to hold down a job for a long while without getting fired or quitting in anger--that will be a challenge for him). He has a job now and a place of his own, and according to the abbot, whom I called to discuss Asperger's with, he is doing well--at least so far. The abbot asks my son to view the job as his spiritual path for now, and that he should be kind and help everyone to be safe and have fun (he is a ski lift operator). This plan for him for the next couple of years or so has relieved my mind. For the first time in his 22 years, there is somebody else looking out after him. I can go off duty. For those who don't know it, Asperger's is a high functioning form of autism where the kids speak like encyclopedias but don't have a clue how to read emotions, facial expressions, body language and other social cues. The mechanism just isn't there. Now the abbot is taking a spiritual view of all this, of course, but I hope he will give my son a fair shake, considering his disability. Asperger's is a particularly incidious syndrome because everyone assumes that since you can talk about anything and everything, you must be able to understand another person. But not true. He looks normal, but his condition is hidden and subtle. It's not like Tourrette's where there are some obvious indications.
There is just no way I can say the amount of relief I feel from him. I sincerely want him to do whatever he wants to do, including becoming a monk. And it would certainly be better than him living in a group home.
Has anyone ever had a child with some sort of special needs that you could never stop worrying about? It is a source of constant tension, even when they are "grown."
Sorry about the delay in blogging. Things have been pretty chaotic around here.
posted by borderline savvy at 12:36 PM
4 comments
