Fell on Black Days
School called me just before 9:30 this morning. To come get Bob.
They haven't done that in what...over a year?
I had a feeling it was coming. After he zonked out at school Wednesday, the doc told me to lower his Zyprexa dose to 1/4 of what he'd initially prescribed. I did, and yesterday, he spent the morning in the principal's office, and most of the afternoon in class--not doing well by any means, but at least well enough to stay. This morning, he woke up looking for a fight. When he told me to "get out of" his sink (I was brushing my teeth, as I have been all week) and made some other hateful smartass comment, I wondered if I should bother sending him to school at all. I was still wondering when I dropped him off at Adventure Club at 7:40.
Apparently the Adventure Club staff reported a "rough morning" to the principal, so when class started, she went to the room to check on Bob. He was in the room, at his desk. Four or five other kids were in there, too, and they were all settling in for the morning and all appeared to be normal.
In the time it took her to walk back to her office, Bob had jumped up on a desk, taken off his shirt, and responded to the resulting laughter by calling the kids "stupidasses." The principal went back toward the classroom and was met halfway by Bob, being escorted by his teacher. He didn't want to go with the principal and clung to the teacher, and once pried away and taken to the office, he went apeshit. He head-butted the principal in the face. She finally got him to calm down by busying him with some sort of paper-clip chain. By the time I got to the school, he was sitting at a desk in her office, sullen, defeated, but calm.
I just want to know WHY. WHY was he compeled to climb on a desk and take off his shirt? WHY can he not just sit at his fucking desk and do worksheets like the rest of the fucking class? WHY can't he see when he's in trouble that the best way out of it is to stop and shut the hell up? WHY can't he give me any goddamn reasons? WHY can't anyone?
The next couple of hours at home were two hours of full rapid cycling--rage, sadness, normalcy, then increasing agitation building to yet another rage. Lather, rinse, repeat. As we approached rage #2, one of new doc's associates returned my phone call (new doc isn't in on Fridays) and suggested we went too far the opposite direction when we lowered the dose. (No shit.) At his recommendation, Bob got another half a Zyprexa and a serious rage episode was averted. (Because of the medication or just because, I don't know.)
He's been at the dining room table for most of the day working on various worksheets I found in his backpack and reading a book on vegetable gardening I found in our bookcase (one of the few I thought he could actually read). He's done work, but he's half-assed it entirely and bitched about it incessantly. I've lost a vacation day from my summer so I could spend it here, in the house, playing Jailer/Babysitter/Teacher. And I am qualified for none of those jobs.
At one point this afternoon he asked for a "break" and, when granted permission, spent about a half hour lying in bed. I don't think he was sleeping, but he was lying down and not playing, so I let him be. I cleaned up the remaining drywall dust and other bathroom destruction detritus from our bedroom and reassembled the bathroom. (It could use another coat of the brown, honestly, but at this point, I no longer give a shit.) When I heard him stirring, I told him break time was over and to get back to work. He complained, but he's up there, supposedly writing sentences about the life cycles of various animals.
I'm just exhausted.
Tonight I turn him over to db--joy, bliss--and pick him up tomorrow evening for my "Mother's Day" holiday. Whoop de fucking doo. Mother's Day. Seriously. Like I need some bullshit Hallmark Holiday like that right now. And if one more person sends me some sappy "being a mom" forwarded email, I might commit a felony. I don't feel like a Mom so much as I feel like a prison matron. Even better, I get to spend that joyous non-holiday at a Forced Inlaw Interaction because dammit, some of them only get to see Moosebaby twice a year (like that's my fault, they know where we live) and it's only fair we make an appearance at some family gatherings.
In a perfect world, I'd be at work right now, wondering what sort of "ding ding" gift Bob would present me with after school. I'd be thinking about spending this weekend doing shit I want to do, and waking up Sunday morning to breakfast prepared just for me by my oldest child (with help from my husband)--a child who makes me happy and proud. A child who never gives me any trouble or worry. A child who I am certain will grow up happy and secure and will live a long, successful life.
It's not a perfect world. So I'm going upstairs now to essentially force my kid to do some menial "homework" that he could give a shit less about and that my forcing him to do only reinforces his belief that I hate him.
Fuck my life, as the kids now say. Fuck. My. Life.
They haven't done that in what...over a year?
I had a feeling it was coming. After he zonked out at school Wednesday, the doc told me to lower his Zyprexa dose to 1/4 of what he'd initially prescribed. I did, and yesterday, he spent the morning in the principal's office, and most of the afternoon in class--not doing well by any means, but at least well enough to stay. This morning, he woke up looking for a fight. When he told me to "get out of" his sink (I was brushing my teeth, as I have been all week) and made some other hateful smartass comment, I wondered if I should bother sending him to school at all. I was still wondering when I dropped him off at Adventure Club at 7:40.
Apparently the Adventure Club staff reported a "rough morning" to the principal, so when class started, she went to the room to check on Bob. He was in the room, at his desk. Four or five other kids were in there, too, and they were all settling in for the morning and all appeared to be normal.
In the time it took her to walk back to her office, Bob had jumped up on a desk, taken off his shirt, and responded to the resulting laughter by calling the kids "stupidasses." The principal went back toward the classroom and was met halfway by Bob, being escorted by his teacher. He didn't want to go with the principal and clung to the teacher, and once pried away and taken to the office, he went apeshit. He head-butted the principal in the face. She finally got him to calm down by busying him with some sort of paper-clip chain. By the time I got to the school, he was sitting at a desk in her office, sullen, defeated, but calm.
I just want to know WHY. WHY was he compeled to climb on a desk and take off his shirt? WHY can he not just sit at his fucking desk and do worksheets like the rest of the fucking class? WHY can't he see when he's in trouble that the best way out of it is to stop and shut the hell up? WHY can't he give me any goddamn reasons? WHY can't anyone?
The next couple of hours at home were two hours of full rapid cycling--rage, sadness, normalcy, then increasing agitation building to yet another rage. Lather, rinse, repeat. As we approached rage #2, one of new doc's associates returned my phone call (new doc isn't in on Fridays) and suggested we went too far the opposite direction when we lowered the dose. (No shit.) At his recommendation, Bob got another half a Zyprexa and a serious rage episode was averted. (Because of the medication or just because, I don't know.)
He's been at the dining room table for most of the day working on various worksheets I found in his backpack and reading a book on vegetable gardening I found in our bookcase (one of the few I thought he could actually read). He's done work, but he's half-assed it entirely and bitched about it incessantly. I've lost a vacation day from my summer so I could spend it here, in the house, playing Jailer/Babysitter/Teacher. And I am qualified for none of those jobs.
At one point this afternoon he asked for a "break" and, when granted permission, spent about a half hour lying in bed. I don't think he was sleeping, but he was lying down and not playing, so I let him be. I cleaned up the remaining drywall dust and other bathroom destruction detritus from our bedroom and reassembled the bathroom. (It could use another coat of the brown, honestly, but at this point, I no longer give a shit.) When I heard him stirring, I told him break time was over and to get back to work. He complained, but he's up there, supposedly writing sentences about the life cycles of various animals.
I'm just exhausted.
Tonight I turn him over to db--joy, bliss--and pick him up tomorrow evening for my "Mother's Day" holiday. Whoop de fucking doo. Mother's Day. Seriously. Like I need some bullshit Hallmark Holiday like that right now. And if one more person sends me some sappy "being a mom" forwarded email, I might commit a felony. I don't feel like a Mom so much as I feel like a prison matron. Even better, I get to spend that joyous non-holiday at a Forced Inlaw Interaction because dammit, some of them only get to see Moosebaby twice a year (like that's my fault, they know where we live) and it's only fair we make an appearance at some family gatherings.
In a perfect world, I'd be at work right now, wondering what sort of "ding ding" gift Bob would present me with after school. I'd be thinking about spending this weekend doing shit I want to do, and waking up Sunday morning to breakfast prepared just for me by my oldest child (with help from my husband)--a child who makes me happy and proud. A child who never gives me any trouble or worry. A child who I am certain will grow up happy and secure and will live a long, successful life.
It's not a perfect world. So I'm going upstairs now to essentially force my kid to do some menial "homework" that he could give a shit less about and that my forcing him to do only reinforces his belief that I hate him.
Fuck my life, as the kids now say. Fuck. My. Life.
posted by Mitzi Green at 8:11 AM
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