a place of my own.....

I am giddy about this blog Ana invited us to create with her! My 16 yr old son has had a blog going for about a year now and I have been jealous that he has a place in his life to let his thoughts flow freely.

I am so tired this school year. My assistant teacher and I are counting down the days left until our almost 3 week winter break from the kids in our class. This is a group of kids I am struggling with more than any group of children I have taught. When our state evaluator (I work as a pre-k teacher so we are evaluated every year by the state and our principal) she said that she observed at least "a half dozen kids who seem to present continual behavior challenges in the classroom" I screamed, literally outloud in the front office, "Yikes"! I felt confirmed in some ways, it was not all in my head that these kids are a load. I think there is one child who may have ADHD the rest are just used to having their own way and have never had to share or follow directions before. My parent conferences with their parents were very enlightening ;)

It has been pretty exhausting to come home from this challenging group of 4/5 yr olds to my own children. The other night on the LDS board when I vented about my current struggles with my ADHD/Aspergers daughter several people were quick to memo and post to me saying "be tougher" "you are just not firm enough with her" "If my child said that to me (even with the ADHD diagnosis) I would (fill in the blank)........" Part of me was thinking, "I just wanted to vent, let me be! :-( " another part of me thought, "true, true......" and the bulk of me thought, "I did punish her quite extensively imo but frankly after 10+ yrs of parenting Alex I am pooped out and just need a break!" Adding pre puberty hormones to her already high maintenance personality has just been sooooo exhausting to me emotionally and physically. When I discipline my other two kids for something they have done out of sheer disrespect (like calling me an ugly name) I don't feel the same ache I do when I punish Alex. Her life struggle is so much harder than theirs. I know some of her ugly behavior toward me is just a way to let off steam. I don't condone it and I do follow through and use as many of the tricks I have under my hat but man on man is she the child I *hurt* for...... This morning I had to drive her to school and we were on a tight schedule, as usual she was screaming as we are walking out to the car that she hates all her coats (she has 5 coats, all nice and fairly new) , her life is awful, we have nothing good to eat in our house, people are mean to her, she doesn't understand any school work etc. She threw her backpack on the ground and a project she was bringing to school on the ground. I tossed her stuff in the van and then dragged her to the car (literally) and tossed her in and buckled her up. She screamed bloody murder all the way to school. I dropped her off and told her to go to the bathroom and splash her face with cold water and get some breakfast. I emailed her teachers to let them know what happened in the morning. They emailed back and said they had no clue anything was wrong. She was happy and chatty and doing quite well. Huh????????? I heaved a big sigh and went about my morning not quite knowing how to feel....... This afternoon on our way to her gymnastics lesson I asked her how things went, she said "great!" No memory of this morning that she will admit to :(

We have another appt with the psychiatrist on the 7th and he is sure he will have a referral to a psychologist/therapist by then so we can get support (all of us) on a weekly basis. Crossing my fingers we find "just the right" person easily.