I forgot to weigh myself this morning, so I have no numbers to offer you. I did go up a pant size and they’re still tight, so I’m pretty sure I wouldn’t have liked the number anyway. By the way, if you’re waiting for an email, call, or thank you note from me, you can safely assume that it has slipped through the sieve I like to call my mind, but that I was grateful/thinking of you at the time. *sigh* Sorry.

As you know, I’ve been going to the lectures at the University of Washington Autism Center all month. The final talk is this week. It’s on reducing stress for parents of kids with autism spectrum disorders. That’s pretty much right on target for us because this month has pretty much kicked my butt and I think Sparky would say the same.

I’ll write a post sometime in May about what we learned at all the talks, but for now I’m going with a list of cheers and jeers for this month of extreme (for me, anyway) ups and downs.

• Jeers to our kids’ dentist. I took BeBop two weeks ago and he pretty much scolded me for bringing BamBam in with us and for staying with BeBop. I didn’t have much choice, as BeBop flat out refused to go back there or stay back there without me. I had forgotten to mention his sensory issues when I made the appointment, so I did when the dentist was talking to me. He said the diapers pretty much tipped him off. Asshat. Then I took BamBam for his first checkup last week. I remembered to tell them about his autism when I made the appointment. At the beginning of the appointment, the dentist said, “Really? He has autism? His eye contact is really great.” At the end, he said that BamBam did much better then even a typical two year old and then went into a mini-diatribe about how it’s always something: in the ’80s everyone was dyslexic, in the ’90s everyone had ADHD, and this now everyone’s autistic. You’ll be glad to know that I refrained from grabbing a drill and sticking it in his eye. I also didn’t thank him for un-diagnosing my child in the ten minutes he spent with him. I did give him an acerbic look and tell him that BamBam has had a lot of therapy, then took B’s hand and walked out toward the exit. The dentist hurried after us, backpedaling the whole way. He’ll remain our dentist, mainly because he’s close by and the kids really like him. And I’m too lazy to find someone else right now for twice a year visits.
• Jeers to Zeek’s Pizza for kicking off a truly horrible weekend with the worst service we have ever experienced. But I do thank them for the free meal, once it finally arrived.
• Jeers to big zoo events on sunny days in Seattle. We had to abort the zoo idea when we couldn’t find parking, after a horrendous traffic jam to get there, and we’d already told BeBop we were going to the zoo, so we went to the children’s museum instead. It was there that BamBam began his meltdown that seems to have lasted (with short reprieves including the bubbles one shown below) into Monday. I decided it might be an ear infection and took him to the doctor today. His ears are fine. For now.
• In fact, jeers to the whole worst-weekend-ever-that’s-actually-bleeding-into-the-week experience. Sparky and I decided it was at least the worst we’ve experienced in the fifteen years we’ve known each other. On Sunday, we both felt completely unable to deal with the kids from the moment we got up. That’s never happened before. We have a rule that only one of us is allowed to lose it at a time. So much for that. My heart bleeds for all the single parents and parents whose partners don’t pitch in for the whole tag team thing. I honestly don’t know how you do it.
• Cheers to BamBam and progress! Here’s a little taste of it:
  • He’s been trying to put on pants. He can get one leg in and then he’s lost, but he’s trying.
  • He’s been throwing a ball and a balloon when I say “throw” and waiting for me to say it.
  • He followed a point! He didn’t see me throw the balloon, it went behind him, so I pointed to it and he turned around and looked right where I pointed!
  • He’s been saying “pop” and “bubbles” and once he said “pop bubbles.” I’m attaching* a video so you can see. Well, the video is pretty shaky, but I think you can hear it. At the beginning of the last segment, he says “ubbles” which is how he says bubbles.
• Cheers to BeBop, whose potty training is coming along rather nicely. He’s going to school in big boy underpants tomorrow!

Okay, that’s mostly jeers. As I said, it’s been that kind of week.

*Of course, the video won’t load unless I upgrade and I’m not prepared to do that right now, so you’ll just have to imagine it. It’s pretty cute. If we’re friends on FB, you can see it there.