After feeling guilty for many years, I had made my peace with it.  It wasn’t like I was spending Saturday nights out on the town or heading to the beach on Sunday mornings.  I was just…resting.

And then came Tyler.

I knew I wanted to raise him in the church and I figured I was somehow going to HAVE to find the will to get him there.

He is now six.  And really needs to start CCD next year.

I think I am feeling well enough to try to take him to church, only now, no real surprise here, he doesn’t want to go.

Lately he has been expressing interest in religions.  How does Orthodox Judaism differ from other Judaic religions?  What is the difference between being a Christian and being a Catholic?  (Yep, I’ve got a budding genius on my hands.)

It seems like the perfect time to start going to Mass on a regular basis but when I talk about trying out a service after our Saturday activities or attending a Sunday school class to learn more about God and Jesus, Tyler says, “Maybe next week, Mommy.”

It would have been so much easier to have just taken him to Mass from when he was a baby, when he had no choice in the matter, but I just wasn’t feeling well enough at the time.

Lots of Chronically Ill and Catholic Mom guilt here.

As a child I remember being at Mass with a bunch of little children’s religious books which I would read to pass away the hour that I did not understand.  Music was always the best part of the Mass for me and I started singing in the Children’s Choir when I was ten.  I did Folk Group in junior high and also sung in the Adult Choir.

At some point I guess I am just going to have to drag Tyler to church, and soon.

I just hope I have the energy.

Photo Courtesy of Living-The-Mission (Wiki)

The post Tuesdays With Tyler: Losing My Religion first appeared on Mama Sick.

Tyler also had his heart set on one of those bouncy places and there are none around where we live so I knew we would have to travel some distance. Tyler has only made a few friends too.

Tyler has had such an upheaval this year, I really wanted him to have something special and normal.

Three boys came, two whom we have met here and one good friend who’s mother drove him from New Jersey.  We sort of had the party on the sly since we only had a few kids.  No party room with outrageous fee needed!

Okay, this is a lousy shot, but all of my “action” shots pretty much came out blurry. I had to show you that the kid did have some fun, so bear with me here.

The happy party-goers.

No real explanation needed here, right?

This party was such a victory for me because up until about a month ago, I would not have been able to even attend a birthday party, much less host one for my son.

By the way, you can look at Tyler’s fifth birthday party here.

The post Tuesdays With Tyler: Birthday Party With Pictures! first appeared on Mama Sick.

Total amount of stress, preparation, ordering toys:  10 days, 5 hours, 37 minutes

Total time it took to open gifts:  15 minutes

Worth it to see your child’s delight:  Definitely

The post Tuesdays With Tyler: Christmas in Pictures first appeared on Mama Sick.

I brought up a concern about some muscular weakness.  When Tyler uses a stylus at home he can write on his little computer and if he uses chalk he can write on the sidewalk.  He has always had difficulty riding a bike and he struggles to button or snap his jeans.  They told us he will be evaluated for this, to see if it is a matter of that he just won’t do it or that he can’t, and whether it actually is a muscular issue.

All of the women there truly seemed to want to help Tyler.  The principal even sat in on our meeting.  Things sure have changed since I went to school, when the principal was a man to fear and you never heard from him unless you were in serious trouble.  She told us that she has met Tyler and that she knew he was a good kid, that he had touched her heart.  She also said that a lot of kids have trouble transitioning into kindergarten.

All of the people that knew Tyler had wonderful things to say about him, his amazing memory, how well he told a story.

On another front, we decided to let the psychologist go.  She had drawn up this behavior chart for Tyler that was broken down to before school and then after that every hour when he came home.  Basically, every hour he would either get a star or not, depending on whether he was good.  Grant and I felt that seemed like overkill; every hour we would be discussing with Tyler whether or not he was good or bad?

We told the child study team why we decided against this psychologist and they all thought the behavior plan was too much.  We aren’t going to rule out therapy in the future, but we didn’t click with this therapist.  Also, thankfully, some of the issues that brought us to see the psychologist in the first place have improved.  Tyler has only hit me twice, does not use bad language (we all “swore” it off) and is speaking to us less violently.  I pray that this was a stage and that he is learning to get a hold of his anger and use better words to express it.

So, Grant and I signed on the dotted line last week to agree to the evaluation, which won’t start until after the new year.  I can only hope that the child study team is as genuine as they seem to be and has Tyler’s best interests at heart.

The post Tuesdays With Tyler: Another Meeting With the School first appeared on Mama Sick.

Practicing his smile for Santa as we waited on line.

As we waited in Santa’s Enchanted Forest on line, Tyler had all kinds of emotions running through him.  First he wasn’t sure he wanted to sit on Santa’s lap, then as we got closer he got very concerned about his appearance. “Do I look clean?” “Does my mouth look clean?” “Am I drooling?”

Drooling?!

The mall we went to had a great Santa.  I gave his assistant Tyler’s name and when it was his turn Santa said, “No, this can’t be Tyler, he got so big in just one year!”

I heard a little of what they were saying and it made me kind of sad.  Tyler told Santa that he wanted another Leapster Explorer, that his had broken because he had thrown it on the floor so many times.  “I got angry”, he said.  I heard Santa say that getting angry once in a while is okay but that he has to be careful when he gets his new computer.  I think this Santa is better than the therapist I am taking Tyler to! Hmmm.

After taking the picture and getting off Santa’s lap, Tyler told me he only could remember one thing he wanted and I told him that was okay, Santa knows what else he wants.

When we came out of Santa’s Enchanted Forest I took this picture.  Tyler just seemed so happy that I even decided to make it our Christmas card this year.  I entitled it “Have a Holly, Jolly Holiday!”

And I sincerely hope you do.

Love,

Emily

The post Tuesdays With Tyler…And Santa! first appeared on Mama Sick.

But I digress.

This weekend Tyler told Grant that Drizela has been beating him up on the playground.  They chase each other around and then when Drizela catches him she pounds him.  Tyler had mentioned this to whomever the adult on the playground is and he said Drizela would stop for a while and then go back to doing it.  It got to be where Tyler was afraid to go out on the playground.

It is an interesting situation when one’s five-year-old boy is being beaten up by a five-year-old girl.  I have always taught Tyler that you never hit, but that you especially never hit a woman or little girl.

Over at my aunt’s July 4th party this past summer, Tyler was playing with my cousin’s three-year-old and took one of those mini footballs and bopped her on the head.  She just looked up with him with her innocent baby blues and I couldn’t get over there fast enough.  My cousins must have thought I was crazy.  “Tyler, you never, never hit a little girl, NEVER, especially your cousin who is younger than you, and especially because she is a little girl!”

My cousin’s wife said, “Oh, that’s okay, it was no big deal.  ‘Amelia’ is an equal opportunity hitter.”  “You have two daughters and I have one son”, I told her, “I want to teach my son from the beginning that you never hit a woman and it starts with never hitting little girls.”  I made Tyler apologize to his cousin.

So now my son is on the receiving end of a tough little girl’s blows.  It’s not exactly something you let two kids settle on the play ground by themselves, and some may say even if it was a boy hitting Tyler, the issue should be raised.

New Jersey has one of the strongest antibullying laws in the country which just went into effect this school year. So we have decided to go through proper channels and have made an official complaint against the little girl.

I still don’t want my son hitting a girl, but I also don’t want anyone hitting my son.  I want Tyler to know that he can always come to us when he feels bullied, even if it is by a five year old little girl.

Photo courtesy of Obsessive Mom.

The post Tuesdays With Tyler: When Girls Attack! first appeared on Mama Sick.

Tyler no longer sleeps in bed with me but occasionally he will spend a night.  Now that it doesn’t happen every night I can enjoy it more and treasure the fact that some day he will not even want to live in this house!

We had turned out all the lights.  Usually if I can get Tyler into his “sleepy position” he will go out like a light.  He was still playing in the dark.  I had just gotten a Hello Kitty from the Build-A-Bear Workshop for my birthday. “Mommy, I think you are going to be mad at me.”  “Why, honey?”  “I was playing with Hello Kitty and by accident her slipper came off.”

“That’s no big deal”, I said, turning on the light to fix Hello Kitty’s slipper.  “I would never be mad at you over something you did by accident. Now, let’s go to sleep.”  “Is Hello Kitty mad at me?”  “Oh, no I’m not mad at you”, I said, in my best Hello Kitty voice.

A few minutes later we were laying in the dark and he asked, “Mommy, if I kicked you in the stomach and punched you in the eye, would you still love me?”

I think God or perhaps my dad in Heaven was guiding me as a parent because I came up with the quickest and best answer I could.

“Honey, I wouldn’t want you to do those things, and I might get mad at you if you did that, but, I would still love you.  You are my son and there is nothing you could do that would make me stop loving you.  I love you more than anyone else in the world, and I always will, no matter what.”

I hugged and kissed him.

There’s not too much more to write about after you write something like that.  Tyler knows that the feelings of aggression he has towards me are wrong, horrifyingly wrong, but he still has them.

Knowing that my son has that self-awareness, that he lives with this pain…it is almost too much for me to bear.

Except that I will bear it, because he is MY SON and I WILL always love him.

The post Tuesdays With Tyler: A Mother’s Agony, A Son’s Anguish first appeared on Mama Sick.

Because of the sidewalk conditions, Grant and I decided to take Tyler trick or treating at a really nice mall about 35 minutes from us.  It was the best decision I have ever made about what to do about the problem of Halloween.  I can’t walk from house to house, so I used to drive alongside Grant and Tyler while they trick or treated.  Going to the mall, we got a wheelchair, and I was able to take part in everything!  I highly recommend this option if you are unable to walk any kind of distance.

If you’ve been keeping up with us, your memory is correct.  This is the THIRD year in a row that Tyler has gone as Spider-Man for Halloween!

Working out for Tyler to get into his Spider-Man costume has obviously paid off. Check out those muscles!

Weary of trick or treating, Tyler blew off some steam at a cute little indoor play park, free of charge that he is almost too big for.

I had to bribe Tyler that if he went to the play park he would have to take a picture with Mommy. Whatever it takes!

Even Superheroes Have to Eat

Luckily Tyler is a reasonable Trick or Treater and he didn’t want to stay at the mall more than a couple of hours. He got plenty of candy anyway!

Grant and Tyler examining the "loot"!

You can’t miss what you’ve never experienced, so Tyler really didn’t care that he missed the big Halloween parade at school.  He was happy with all the candy he got.  Now if I can only stay away from eating it…

The post Tuesdays With Tyler: Halloween! first appeared on Mama Sick.

I did own a scary skeleton from my Beanie Baby collecting days!

I couldn't resist picking up this skeleton nutcracker from Target. The Haunted Movie Theatre is something I painted probably about 20 years ago!

This past weekend we went to Michaels because the outside of our home was still “not scary enough”.  I was surprised at how reasonable the prices were plus God bless their coupons!   One aisle got Tyler scared so badly he cried, “Let’s get out of here!”

Tyler's pick from Michaels: The super scary huge bat!

Also at Michaels we picked up this foam Haunted Tree House craft project.  As I was buying the foam glue I had my doubts.  I am craft challenged, you see.  But I have noticed that since Tyler was born, the “Mommy Craft” part of my brain has kicked into gear.  Somehow I have even become a better artist.  Has anyone else experienced this phenomenon?

Tyler and Mommy's special Halloween project! I am so proud of us!

I hoped you enjoyed seeing what our home looked like for Halloween.  With a lot of help from Tyler!

The post Tuesdays With Tyler: Halloween at Tyler’s House! first appeared on Mama Sick.

One of them was Spookley the Square Pumpkin and maybe I did try reading it to him, I did have a captive audience; he certainly was no critic!

Since 2006 I have been reading Spookley to Tyler every Halloween and have found the little square pumpkin to be getting more popular every year!  If you are not familiar with little Spookley, he happens to be the only square pumpkin in the pumpkin patch and all of the other pumpkins make fun of him.  He has trouble doing pumpkin things like rolling around.  In the end a fence breaks due to a huge storm and Spookley winds up saving the day because he is able to wedge his little square body into a hole in the fence and all of the round pumpkins bump up against him.

I won’t ruin the end of the book for you but the theme is that just because someone is different does not mean they are not the same inside, or can do things even better than you can sometimes.  It’s a good lesson for every child, but as the years go by, even more so for our family.

Spookley now has a movie which came out a couple of years ago.  It’s pretty good, except they change things a bit to make it longer.  They now have Spookley stuffed pumpkins to cuddle with. This year there is even a Spookley app which I downloaded for Tyler and we both love it.  It is the whole story with sound effects and touch activities throughout. It was well worth the $2.99 I paid for it.  Now we can enjoy Spookley in a whole new way!

I guess Grant can really pick ’em.

The post Tuesdays With Tyler: Spookley the Square Pumpkin! first appeared on Mama Sick.