Finding My Voice Again

I was *that* person blasting industrial techno music as I drove down the street. I had a 2001 silver Pontiac Sunfire and it had a pretty good sound system. Better than my home one, anyway.

In my car, barreling down the highway, my music disturbed no one (or at least not for long as I sped by).  I sang loudly, in tune thank you very much, and didn't hold back. My car was a concert stage. Yes, I was *that* person.

The second I got pregnant for the fourth time, that stopped. My world went silent. I wanted no noise. I don't know why - call it mother's instincts or something, but I no longer felt the need for noise in my car.

My world went silent

After my son was born, of course I did not want to hurt his delicate little ears, so there was no noise in the car other than his protests from the car seat. He hated the car seat!

We didn't spend a lot of time apart during the early years, but I found when I was out in the car alone, I still wanted silence (can you blame me?).

It's only recently that I'm starting to slowly go back to my old ways. I am slowly making my way back to my previous free-spirited, child-free, fun-loving old self. Except I'm forging a new me with a child.

Aside from just getting out more again, I see it as an analogy for my life in general. I had to be his voice and advocate for him when he couldn't speak. I had to fight for evaluations and services, so I had to find my confidence as a mother and get a new voice.

Things are pretty stable now, despite a lot of changes (new daycare, new house) but I feel more at ease about the future and the decisions we've made for him. I'm just getting this new voice warmed up. Soon I'll be singing it from the rooftops.

App Review - Mini Forest Flyer and Mini Sound Box

Earlier this year, I introduced you to Toca Boca, a Swedish company that makes apps we absolutely love. Since that review, we've actually downloaded more of their apps - Toca Train and Toca Store.

We can't get enough of them! Which is good since they've now teamed up with another developer and call their new partnership Sago Sago.
Together they've created two new apps:


Sago Mini Sound Box and Sago Mini Forest Flyer. I'll share the company's descriptions with you:

§  Sago Mini Sound Box engages children through visuals and sound allowing them to explore at their own pace. The app features layered functionality – kids tap to create a sound, tap in different areas to get different notes, fling them around, tilt the device and see them move, tap with multiple fingers for specially-colored balls and tap and hold for a fun surprise.  Some children find themselves repeatedly tapping and holding for the fun animations while older kids will figure out how to play a little tune like a piano.                                                          

§  Sago Mini Forest Flyer sends children on an adventure of guiding a bird to different areas on the screen to uncover fun animation sequences. The open-play environment allows kids to take the engagement in any direction or path – they are in control.  Some may gravitate to certain actions and watch them over and over, while others will treat it as a race to uncover as many animations as they can.  In nearly all cases, children will begin to narrate their activity.  

 I'll admit a little mistake now. I got free promo codes for these apps so I could review them and I got excited an downloaded them to *my* iPad. Usually, this isn't a problem and I just take them from the cloud and download them onto the Little Man's, but that didn't work, so they're stuck on mine. What I'll probably do is pay for them once they're available to the public. (Sound Box will be available May 16 and Forest Flyer on May 23)

Anyway, all this to say, I fell in love with them immediately while on my lunch break at work. I liked Forest Flyer so much, I forced a co-worker to try it out and he liked it, too! I finally let the Little Man try out Forest Flyer this evening and he explored it and laughed at the different scenarios. He played some of the same animations over and over again and laughed, so I say it's a hit.

Also, bonus for parents: these apps have no ads and no offers to make in-app purchases. It's just simple worry-free fun!

Let me know if you try out any of these apps and what you think!

Allergy Awareness - What To Do

Allergic Living Magazine is giving out a simple 6-step infographic to help people know what to do during a possible allergic anaphylaxis reaction. 

You can download it off their site or mine (just right-click and "save image"). Share it with your friends!

What To Do After You've Completed a Goal

If you read me often enough, you know I talk a fair bit about making goals and having a vision board and all that good stuff. But I realize I left something out...

What do you do after you've accomplished the goal??

I mean, aside from make new ones. I have this vision board up in my room and I had a goal still on it that I had accomplished: my trip to Asia. I didn't know what to do!

Do I take it down? Then what? Burn it? Throw it away? It all seemed kind of weird and most websites talk about how to make a vision board, but not what to do after!

So I searched online until I found something that resonated with me - after the goal is complete, take it off the board and keep it in a new scrapbook full of all your completed goals. Oooooh, what a nice idea! I can look back later proudly, and keep track of how well this wonderful goal-setting thing works!

What sort of celebrations do you hold after you complete a goal, or is completing it celebration enough?

Happy visioning!

Mother's Day Eve

So, what are you doing Mother's Day Eve? BlogHer has some great ideas and ways to celebrate.

I think it's a great idea, but I just don't think I can manage it this year. All my weekends are taken up with packing right now (moving soon!) and I guess what I'm saying is I'm not able to take time for myself to party? Sounds bad, doesn't it?

 Ok, I don't think this celebration was created to make me feel guilty.

I just have to plan better next year. So what will you be doing?

Why We Didn't Get Tested

While the special needs of our sons are different, we share a lot in common with the author of this article concerning why we chose NOT to have prenatal genetic testing.

I'm not sure I've written much about our choices publicly before. At the time, the emotions were very raw and I was tired of being judged. But it's been a few years now, so here goes!

I was pretty distraught after our first miscarriage. I tried to get someone to do some tests, but no one would bother after just one miscarriage. By the time we had three, I finally got a doctor on our side - we ended up at a private clinic and had genetic testing done. We were sent to a genetic counselor to break the news - we both had genetic abnormalities and the likelihood of us having a live birth was around 25%. With that also carried a chance of a developmental delay (unspecified) of around 5-10%.

I got that news right before my 28th birthday. I was pretty upset. I wasn't sure at that point that I wanted to try again. Overwhelmed with the news and caring for my ailing father at the same time, I booked a two-week solo trip to England and Morocco and decided I would deal with life when I returned.

I came back with a new perspective. I got pregnant a month later.

When that embryo seemed to be sticking, we were offered all sorts of testing. At first it was gentle prodding, so that we could make an "educated" decision to terminate early. One doctor refused to take me as a patient because I was refusing an amnio. I left that office crying, feeling like I was being accused of carrying a genetic mutant and not a child.

I had to explain over and over what a privilege I felt it was to be carrying any child at all and I truly did not care what was potentially "wrong" with it. I had tried long enough to get pregnant, I wasn't about to throw it away! My belief is that all children come with challenges; no child is perfect, no child grows up and does EXACTLY what their parents want them to do. Such is life. If you cannot accept imperfection in humans, then maybe you should not have children.

We still had a lot of testing done in the form of ultrasounds, but not for the purpose of abortion. They searched high and low for any organ malformations. They kept their eyes on the brain, the kidneys and heart. They found nothing wrong.

In the end the embryo that stuck around became Little Man and he may have some issues, but he's damn near perfect to me. I believe he's been sent to us for a purpose - we all have a purpose - and he makes me a better person.

Marriage Counseling

Hubby and I are nearly done this most recent set of marriage counseling appointments. It's interesting to me how we evolve and there's always something different to try to understand. I took it for granted that he *got* certain things, even when I'd said the same things over and over. Sometimes you need to hear it from someone else, I guess. Or just in a different context. She said something I've been saying to myself for quite a while also - it can be interesting or insightful sometimes to figure out why you do/feel the things you do, but after a while you just have to get on with life! I rarely care in any detail about the causes of my neuroses, I only need answers on how to overcome them. Yes, my parents did bad shit to me. Ok, it's over now, move along!

On the other hand, it might be useful for me to know, but I don't really know how I made the switch to "calming the f&%$ down" when it comes to talking to Hubby. I did realize that previously, I was internalizing things instead of just immediately putting words to what I felt. For example: at the new house, Hubby wants a dishwasher. I don't particularly feel the deep-seated need for one that he has, but I'm willing to go along with it to make him happy. I recently suggested we get a small portable washing machine since the one we'll have when we move will be smaller than what we have now and laundry takes up a significant amount of my time. Hubby said he didn't want two washing machines in the house because he didn't want appliances all over the place. I walked out of the room grumpy.

Previously, I would have gone somewhere to be grumpy, told myself that obviously my husband hated me and I must not deserve a washer because he wants me to suffer doing endless piles of laundry for the rest of my life and so on and so forth. Then at some point later I probably would have blown up at him for something stupid and he wouldn't know what the hell triggered it, so he would think his wife must hate him and not want him around and doesn't love him and .....whatever f'ed up stuff our abused-childhood minds come up with (awww, so much in common!).

THIS TIME, I walked into the living room where he was, and I said in my most grown up voice, "it's not fair that you get a dishwasher and I don't get a washing machine." For realz. And he said, "you know, I thought about it and I agree. You just want to save time, just like I do." Cool. So then we went and had SEX. No, actually, we didn't. The kid was up. But whatevs.

And then I went back to doing whatever I was doing and realized I hadn't yelled at him, so I went back and was like, "I just said how I felt without yelling at you." And it was good. And a magic unicorn farted a rainbow across the sky. 

And that, children, is how you don't have a divorce. The End!