Now it's mostly better, and the cracks are held together with duct tape
The Boy was setting up his phone on Tuesday, adding me, his dad, my siblings and The Brother to his contacts. As he added each one he sent them a text to say hi.
The Brother: Why did you send me a text?
The Boy: I was starting a conversation
The Brother: But you’re right next to me
The Boy: Yes, but it’s always good to start a conversation
I win. Where is my medal?
I have decided that I have Schizophrenia. I have come to this conclusion because I am now sure I have Capgras delusion. If I have the latter, I must have the former.
Capgras delusion is a psychiatric disorder in which a person holds a delusion that a friend, spouse, parent, or other close family member (or pet) has been replaced by an identical impostor.
I am convinced that The Boy has been replaced with an impostor. Therefore Capgras. Therefore Schizophrenia.
I am happy with my new self diagnosis. I am happy with the impostor. I hope he sticks around.
I told The Boy that he would get a mobile phone as soon as he was going somewhere that he might need to be rescued from. Of late he has been meeting his school friends and has had some scheduling SNAFUs. I have also had a few moments where I needed to tell him something, like “Come home for dinner”. We were both ready.
We talked last week about him getting his Christmas present early. He decided he was not OK with not getting a big present on Christmas Day.
We talked again on Sunday and he decided he was OK with not getting a big gift on the day.
We sat down this evening and wrote out what each of our responsibilities were in relation to his phone.
Me:
Buy credit
Him:
Clean out the car once a week
Shower at least twice a week
Other light chores on an ad hoc basis
Hand up his phone at bedtime every night
We discussed that this is an IF -> THEN situation. If he doesn’t meet his responsibilities, I won’t meet mine.
Then I called his new phone and asked him to find whatever was vibrating. The look on his face was priceless.
He spent the evening setting it up and it took all of my restraint to not just take the phone from him and do it myself. That is what I have done for my kids for years after all. Do the things because I am The Parent and they are The Kids. What happens when The Boy is old enough to do it himself? The Parent becomes the assistant, sitting on her hands so as not to squash his independence, his self sufficiency, his ability to problem solve. All the things I want him to grow and develop as travels on his journey to being The Grown Up.
Of late, the internet turning off has been his cue to go to bed. What if when the WiFi cut off, there was data there to take over? He would no longer get the cue. Unprompted he set an alarm for bedtime because he was aware that he wouldn’t have that WiFi cue.
As he went to bed he said “Is this a dream?” He had dreamed last week that he got a phone and was very sad when he woke up and realised it was a dream. I assured him it wasn’t a dream and he told me that he likes his phone very much.
Today was a win for both of us, both separately and together.
I love that we have reached a place where we can play act the things that were so difficult for us last year. He can pretend to refuse to go to school (to which I respond with lighting a match and telling him that that is his future going up in flames) but we both know he is going to school. I can wag my fist and tell him that if he doesn’t take a shower I am taking away his iPad, his shoes, his bedroom, his underpants, everything but we both know I don’t take things away any more and we also know that he showers on the regular.
Joking about these things keeps us connected to how much we both like this functional relationship that we have. Brief reminders of what the alternative is allows us to remember why we are here, how we got here and that here is way better.
Last night was shower night. I asked if he was taking a shower, he said he might. I have to admit I started getting frustrated after the 5th might so I walked away and started working on our family jigsaw. After a few minutes I heard:
Him: Mom, will you put some music on my iPad?
Me: I might
My Mother: I don’t think he got the significance of that
Him (to my mother): She said she might put the music on because I said I might have a shower.
He took a shower. I didn’t get around to the music but because I haven’t passed the deadline for when I said I would have the music done (we talked about it on Wednesday, I told him it would be done by Sunday) neither of us was bothered by me choosing to walk instead of sit at a computer.
It is the easiest way to refer to it, without actually referring to the component parts.
Do you mean when you were breaking stuff?
Do you mean when you were refusing to go to school?
Do you mean when you were watching YouTube until 1am?
Do you mean when every second word that came out of your mouth was a curse?
None of them, thanks. The Time That Went Before suits me just fine. It is representative, not descriptive. We both know what we mean.
The Time That Went Before ended in two stages, in December 2016 when we moved house and in March 2017 when I read the statement to The Boy and the rest of our multi generational unit. There was progress and change in the gap but none as profound as the impact that the statement had on our home.
When The Boy read the last post he said “You’re wrong. You used to say yes all the time, too many times”.
He was referring to The Time That Went Before.
I say yes a lot. And I mean a lot. Actually, I say yes most of the time. I say yes to most things. I can’t think of the last thing I said no to.
I can hear you thinking “OMG! She is a push over”. I can guarantee you I am not that. I am as far from that as I have ever been in my life.
In the Spring I started asking myself why I was saying no. The answer was usually “Because I said so” and yes, I said that to myself. I was saying no because I was the grown up, because I knew better, because I wanted to, because I thought I should. All sorts of reasons. Needless to say, I couldn’t support the position with anything other than “because I said so”.
So I started saying yes, unless I had an actual, honest to God, valid reason for saying no. Sometimes yesterday’s yes, became today’s no (or more likely a different yes) but that was usually because “we tried the snack an hour before dinner and then you weren’t able to eat your dinner so today so a) a snack before dinner is not a great idea or b) a smaller snack”.
I went from saying no because I was the grown up to finding a solution that worked for both of us. Most of the time, if I was stuck in the middle ground, I would ask myself how I would respond to my brother if he asked me.
If the answer to “What would I say to Fred*?” was “Yes” then the answer to the kids (for the most part) was yes.
It is interesting reading back over that. Reading it now I realise that I am wrong. I rarely say yes or no any more. As in, I rarely say those words. We talk. Yes and No are single words. They usually have a full stop or an exclamation point after them. They are the end. They are not open for conversation, they do not invite discussion. They are the embodiment of disengagement.
We went from
“GIVE ME X” with me reacting with a one word answer
– to –
“GIVE ME X” with me responding with more than one word
– to –
“Can I have X?” with me responding with a question as to why they wanted it
– to –
“Can we talk about me having X?”
That is how we got to him turning to me in Tesco to ask me to have a conversation about a him having a mobile.
I regularly tell him that I don’t understand his question if I think it is something that is open to interpretation. I don’t speak tween boy. He doesn’t speak grown woman. We grew up in different times, we were exposed to different things, but I can flip a bottle, sing along to most of the songs and why yes, I dab like a pro!
I wasn’t ready for parenting. Well, that is not strictly true. I was ready for a heavily idealised version of parenting that would include both of my child’s parents being better versions of themselves, a change that would happen as we crossed the threshold of the maternity hospital. Yeah, that didn’t happen. Neither of us were better versions of ourselves, and our first born felt the fall out of that.
I can’t go back and cope with his poor nursing better.
I can’t go back and cope with his poor swallow better.
I can’t go back and cope with his delayed speech better.
I can’t go back and help him deal with the frustration that all of those things brought.
I can’t go back and cope any better with the fact that he wore pyjamas for a year.
I can’t go back and cope any better with his hanger (the anger that comes with hungry)
I can’t go back and cope any better with my lack of coping.
I can’t go back and help him deal with the fact that it hurt him to be in the world.
I can look back and see a collection of things that all make sense when they are seen together. Poor nursing, poor swallow, delayed speech go hand in hand with chewing porridge, not liking the textures of some foods and hating brushing his teeth. It turns out all of his body feels all the things.
I can look back and see that when he is having a hard time he feels all the things all the more.
I can look back and see that when he couldn’t get one of the 32 available socks to fit, he was having a REALLY HARD TIME just being himself.
I can look back, take note of all of those things, and use them today to help him live well in a world where he feels all the things.
I hope in what I write here you will come to understand how incredibly awesome it is that my son is currently wearing a €16 pair of shoes from Penneys.
That is a reflection of how far we have come.
About 6 months ago I told my parenting coach that I was dreading the teen years (we are not there yet, but we are knocking at that door). She asked me why, and used the word “fun” in her comments. The idea that it would, or even could, be fun was beyond my comprehension.
She was right. We are having fun. It is not fun ALL THE TIME because I have to be the grown up some times, but we are having fun… probably 80% of the time. The other 20% is not horrible, it is just the practical things like school application forms and dentist appointments.
I didn’t think parenting could be fun… now I want to tell everyone that if they are not enjoying it, they are missing out.
The parting greeting in AlAnon meetings is “Keep coming back, it gets better”. That is how I feel about parenting The Boy right now.
This morning, in the supermarket, the boy turned to me (beside the salad section)…
Him: Mom?
Me: Yes?
Him: Can we have a conversation about me getting a mobile phone?
Me: Sure. When?
Him: Now?
Me: OK. Before we talk about you actually getting a phone, we need to talk about what having a phone means.
Him: OK
Me: What do you think it would be OK to do with a phone?
Him: Well, it wouldn’t be OK to talk to or to text random strangers.
Me: Obviously, but yes. Anything else?
Him: Hmmmm
Me: Would it be OK for you to take it to bed with you at night?
Him: No. That would be silly. I would give it to you when I give you my iPad*
Me: OK, that is good.
Him: How much is credit?
Me: About €15 a month
Him: So… (pause)… I get €24 pocket money a month, right?
Me: Yes
Him: So… (pause)… I would have €9 left after getting my credit
Me: No, when you get a mobile phone you will become more expensive to me but I am so impressed with you that you are willing to pay for it with your own money.
Him: Cool
Me: What do you think are the responsibilities of someone who has a mobile phone?
Him: Do more chores so that you can work more to make more money to pay for the credit?
Me: Well, helping out with chores so that I don’t have to do them which will make my life a bit easier, but yes.
Him: Like what?
Me: Well, my car is always dirty and I never remember to tidy it when I am not driving it and I can’t tidy it while I am driving.
Him: I could tidy your car. It would take a long time the first time but after that it would be quick and then your car would be tidy. I can do it while you are cooking dinner.
Me: That’s a great idea. If you are old enough to have a phone, then you are old enough to know that you are going to start getting smelly soon and so you will need to shower more often.
Him: OK, I kind of do smell already.
Me: Then it is time to start showering at least twice a week.
Him: So, when can I get a phone?
Me: Well, what sort of phone do you think you should get?
Him: An iPhone
Me: Obviously. I don’t want to support an android. But which iPhone?
Him: I was thinking not as old as a 4s and not as new as a 7. Maybe a 5s? Does that one have the fingerprint thing?
Me: Yes. That is the phone I was thinking about too.
Him: I will help you do things and show you that I am responsible enough for a mobile phone.
Me: Great.
Him: So, can I get a phone for my birthday? (it is still 6 months away)
Me: On the understanding that you do the things that show that you are responsible enough, I don’t see why not.
Him: Cool. How will I know what my phone number is?
I love the combined innocence and maturity of his ability to converse these days.
*He gives me his iPad at 9pm when the internet turns off and it is his time for bed.
