Last night Z and I were lucky enough to attend a session about preschooler behavior at the school that provides speech and O/T services for C. Not only is this two part class being offered free of charge, childcare is also provided. Jowonio is an incredible institution.
C was evaluated and qualifies for occupational therapy (O/T). But I’m going to be honest. We don’t really understand what it all means or how the therapy is going to help him. The sensory stuff, which is C’s issue, will be covered in the second class next week. I’m hoping that what we learn can influence how we help C at home.
I’ve been both looking forward to the class and really anxious about it at the same time. The boys were having a rough time behaving yesterday afternoon and I engaged in some rage eating to try and calm myself down. Z came home early and decided we needed to get outside so we took a walk and dropped by our friends’ house. They had invited us over for dinner, but we’d declined due to the class. And then we just sort of showed up anyway. We are awesome like that.
My grazing continued and I’m not going to lie, I drank a hard cider pretty fast. My friend roasted a chicken and the last thing I did before we darted out the door was pick a bunch of crispy skin off the carcass and devour it. I am a delightful dinner guest.
In the previous several hours I’d eaten an obscene amount of cheez its, two cheese sticks, a bunch of pumpkin seeds, some pistachios, a cider, delicious mashed potatoes and carrots, chicken, and a shitload of chicken skin. My anxiety was climbing right alongside the number of bad choices I had made.
On the way to the school my stomach started to hurt. So when I saw the spread of food set out for the class I grabbed a plate and loaded up on cheese, crackers, carrots, dip, and grapes. I also snagged one of those big logs of tootsie roll. I pounded that shit back pretty fast.
The class was 90 minutes. About 20 minutes in the colossal amount of food in my belly started producing gas. As my belly expanded enough to make me look 5 months pregnant my jeans started to cut painfully into my flesh. The stabbing severe pain made me break out in a sweat. There was a group activity and everyone had to ask a question. Someone ahead of me used the one I’d been able to think of in my gastrointestinal distressed stupor, and the one that popped out of my mouth instead was both dumb and borderline offensive. I was no longer able to listen to the speakers and was pretty unsure how I was going to make it through to the end of the class.
An hour into the session we took a quick bathroom break. I was not sure what would happen if I stood up, fear kept me glued to the seat. The last 30 minutes were torture. Finally, finally the class was over. I carefully stood, clenching my butt cheeks and prayed to any deity that might exist that the gas would not exit my body quite yet.
I hobbled alongside Z to pick up T and C from a classroom. The boys were having a blast. I was trying not to cry. Z started playing with T and I knew that I did not have a lot of time before I gave birth to my gas baby. I whispered in Z’s ear that I was in terrible pain and we had to go NOW. He has been with me long enough to take that kind of proclamation seriously.
Finally, finally I sank into the drivers seat and closed the door to the car.
I let it rip.
The boys sat in awed silence. Finally T said, “Wow.” Z looked at me with his patented combination of amusement and pity. “Good lord, do you need to change your pants?” he asked.
I summoned every ounce of dignity left in my body and stiffly proclaimed that I did not, in fact, have to change my pants. And then I started laughing. We all started laughing.
Z and the boys had s’mores around our fire pit the other night. They told ghost stories and this was C’s. I recorded it before bed that night so I could text it to the grandparents.
For the first time we let T do a little of the pumpkin carving. He was very careful with the knife and still had all 10 fingers when he was done.
Star Wars pumpkins! We used stencils from a set our friend gave us. The boys loved them, but holy crap, it was very slow going!
