Twitching and other such nonsense.

Well, so much for that! It's sod's law that if I write about how well something is going, pretty sure it quickly goes to hell in a hand basket and indeed it did. The very day after I wrote how well Sophie was doing and how well we were getting on, she blew up in a most spectacular way. It ended with a physical fight between her and Daniel which was horrifying, she fought, he restrained and it was a miserable and horrible time.
The good that came from it though is that I went with Sophie to the Dr and she laid it all on the line, told the Dr how miserable she was, how out of control and sad she felt and how she could tell she was doing things that were wrong but she felt as though she had no control over herself.
The Dr has referred her to a psychiatrist for a diagnosis, she did mention bi polar disorder which is what I have felt so sure is what she is suffering from. She has had her meds changed and has 2 weeks off work to allow those to kick in.
I am so hopeful that she can get help and eventually have some kind of stable and happy life. It is awful to see her going through what she does and it is completely exhausting and frustrating to have to pick up the pieces and patch everything over for her as she threatens to destroy herself. Hope is a marvellous thing and I cling to it.
I had my second therapy session this week and at the end of it she told me that I don't need her, that her services are to help people cope with the stresses of life and that I am coping, that I seem to have all the answers and there isn't anything she can help me with. That's very flattering but actually I didn't want her to help me cope, I wanted her to help me let go of how scared and sad I am all the time, I didn't feel sufficiently impressed with her to explain that and thought that if she felt she couldn't help me, the chances are, she can't.
I am trying ( again) to help myself, small steps in eating better. H bought me a power plate for Christmas and it is fantastic, it exercises muscles, increases blood flow and bone density. As well as working on slimming and toning it has been miraculous in getting rid of my restless leg syndrome, 5 minutes, lying with my calves on the vibrating plate and it shakes those twitched right out.
It is so funny to use, I was under the impression that somehow I would just stand on it, turn it on and it would tone and work my muscles....oh my goodness, you have to stand on it in a certain way and it HURTS! It truly feels as though you have exercised for an hour after just 2-3 minutes. It is invigorating though and I love that I feel I will continue to use it, rather than sit trying to make myself get up and do it and ....not.
Very touching story about how I found it and H bought it. I have been looking at and reading about power plates for a few months, trying to decide if it would work for me or if it would join the rowing machine under Sophie's bed. I have a friend who sometimes asks me to sell things for her on Ebay and we were having one of those chats, with me saying how I don't sell on Ebay anymore because it's not worth all the hassle by the time they take their fees etc. She told me she had one of those ' machine things that you stand on and it vibrates' and I half heard her but didn't really listen apart from saying I didn't think I could sell it for her.
A few days later, Sophie and I were out in the car and it was a light bulb moment, I got Sophie to call and ask what the machine was called and to ask if it was one of the old type machines with a belt thing on it. I was so excited when she said it was a power plate asked her how much she wanted for it and decided that I was going to buy it. I told H that I was going to buy it and asked him if he wanted to give me some cash towards it for Christmas. He jumped at the chance to not have to try and think up what to get for me and the plan was agreed on.
A few days later, on boxing day, I told him that I would give him the rest of the money to give to Launa when he got to church, we were staying home with coughs and colds, bless his heart he said " Actually, I went 'round there on Christmas Eve and paid for the whole thing for you. He also bought me a couple of little presents for Christmas. He done did good and I didn't have to slide into a fit of 'poor me misery' at all over the holidays. So I already loved it before it began to rid me of my twitching and painful restless legs.
I'd write more but my head is too heavy for my neck tonight, poor old neck, I wish there was a way to lay it on the power plate and shake it better but I'm afraid it would shake what brains I have left out of my ear and then, well then what?

So much to learn....

She's lovely isn't she? She's doing alright this week and the only reason I can think of is because she has had me, every minute she's wanted me. Imagine that. She has tried to have me AND stuff because any self respecting teenager would try that, maybe not once they are 19 but she has issues and amongst those issues is a belief that she has had less than anyone else.
I see that actually, she has. Not less stuff, in fact she has always somehow managed to get more at Christmas and birthdays because girls, to me, are so much easier to buy for, more fun to shop for.....she is so satisfying to buy for because she just loves it all. All my boys have been so particular, they either love it, or they don't. No point buying the latest trend for my boys because the chances are they won't care for it, we did Ghost busters briefly with the big boys, power rangers with the little ones, apart from that it was and is a case of what they love. Lego, drawing, basketball and Dan was desperate for a talking robot one year.
Sophie, if it's pink, fluffy, on the TV, make up related, high heeled, Disney, Beanie, girlie, she'll like it. SO she's had stuff and more stuff and with bells on it stuff.
She has had my time and my soul, my attention and my every last nerve, I realised today that she has never had my fun.
I haven't ever seen, or noticed that Sophie has a sense of humour, so busy have we been trying to vie for what we thought we wanted ( her my adoration / whatever she thought the boys had that she didn't. Me...a break, just a moment where she wasn't trying so hard to snap me in two)
This week I have refused to give in to that wall that tries to erect itself in front of my face whenever Sophie is around. I sound so hard, saying this about my child, but years and years of being sworn at, disobeyed, ignored, disrespected have taken their toll, I have never stopped loving her but I think I stopped being able to show it a long time ago. This week, having seen that pretty much all of Sophie's anger, her raging, her in your face to hell with you attitude is all a facade, it is all covering up how sad she is. I wonder how much of the past years we could have avoided if I had seen what she was doing before now.
When she left yesterday, I told her to be here at 8.45 so she could come to Plymouth with me. She was here at 8am....she doesn't do mornings well at all but she did this one, bright and early and ready to go.
We did go and she was a delight. I enjoyed her today, really enjoyed her, didn't look at my watch once, we took Seth to his basketball camp and we had 6 hours to kill, the gear box or clutch has gone on my car, no 1st gear...2nd gear is a bugger to get but at least it will go into 2nd and the rest? Forget it...so we had to wait for Seth as we are 40 miles away from basketball heaven ( or not, more on that later) no way I could dive home and back again. I had to be sure not to spend too much money because LONDON and BOSTON and now CAR! So we parked up, walked through town and bought magazines, had lunch and we pretty much sat in the car and we laughed, honest to goodness, teary eyed laughing..me and the girl. Glorious. I wish I could tell you what we laughed at but in writing..it so wouldn't be funny in fact we would put ourselves in a very poor light!
We tried on sunglasses....seems like a little thing but Sophie and I haven't done any little things since she was 9 or 10, we went from having fun and loving being with each other to all out war, pretty much overnight.



Her joy at this tentative and new relationship makes it easy to carry on, I feel shame that it seems this easy, and then I remind myself that this is happening now because she has made so many changes. The angry Sophie made fun impossible, the sad and broken Sophie makes it imperative and easy, it is something that she needs and something I can see she wants...so it's easy to give. I don't know any human being that could give affection and attention ( of the right kind) to someone who was resisting every effort.
I think when I saw how she behaved when her dad came to visit...the one person that she has longed to have love her, when I saw her snarl and swear and then hide

I began to see just how sad she is, behind all that rage. Getting just that glimpse has made it not only easy but natural to just love her, forget she is 19, forget she has been a little cow for 10 years or more, just love her.
And I do, really I do. Not just that fierce, must protect her love, I've always felt that. This new love, the brand new love, is easy and natural and it is, well it just is.
She hasn't changed overnight but I think I have. She still doesn't know when to stop and today I still had to speak to her as though she were 10, she left to go back to the house she is staying at...2 hours later she was back here and I had to tell her that I was ready to relax and unwind and that she was expected back at the other house so she should go back and do the chores they had asked her to do..... and she went, without fighting. We are both learning.

Seth went to basketball camp......

Look at that little bloke, he just loves it,


He gets that ball in there much more often than he misses...he's sort of little though, isn't he?
Well take a look at this....the other kids at camp.


Could he be any littler than those big kids? Oh for the sake of all things touching to a mother's heart.



He did 6 hours and was about ready to drop when I picked him up, the trouble is, he doesn't want to go tomorrow. Because he is that little, no-one passes him the ball...because they are all so huge they can block him when he does get the ball..that isn't too much fun when you're 7.
It sort of feels like


Yes, like that.
We're waiting til the morning, maybe he was so tired he couldn't think past how tired he was and I hate to think he will let Billy down if he doesn't go but this is supposed to be fun, it wasn't fun. He's 7. I don't know, maybe tomorrow will show us what to do.
This whole parenting gig is one big lesson that never ends.

So, the funny bits.

Can you believe that there were parts of yesterday that amused me, in a sad kind of way.
We sat for so long in the dismal waiting room, that Casualty department is so bleak, I always feel I want to gather a group of volunteers to clean it and brighten it up and put magazines in or something. It is being remodelled and it's taking forever. The seats are ripped, the walls are shoddy, the whole place is enough to make you feel horribly ill, even if you just went there to drop someone off.
We sat for a long time.....nearly 2 hours and we watched the waiting room fill up and empty and fill up and empty and remember that Sophie was bored ( Fucking bored) she was loudly bored.
"I'm F*in' bored, what the hell? Why are all these people going in before me, we were here first and they keep going in and this whole place has emptied and filled up TWICE and I'm still here, tell ya what I'm going if they don't get me in there soon and WHY AM I STILL HERE?"
"Oh Sophie, all these other people are just physically maimed and injured...you are special and need a special doctor that wouldn't know what to do with all these common bleeding people, you need a doctor of mental patients.....doesn't it make you feel special?"
All the while hoping that she didn't work out that actually that would mean she would have been seen first because HELLO? No other mad people in the waiting room!
Then she began a game of " Maybe that tatty looking man was actually mad because I didn't see an injury ..did you?" That's a fun game and kept us amused for like 13 minutes at least.
I laughed out loud ( you know, Lol'd) for real when they eventually showed us into a room, totally empty apart from a tiny little stool about 4 inches high, one chair and a rubber covered mattress leant against the wall.
"Sophie! Look! They believe you, sort of, because you get a 1/3 of a padded wall! How cool is that?" ( I so make jokes about the things that make me saddest and truthfully? I haven't stopped crying yet. This really is a sad thing, I know I trivialise it but you just have to do what you have to do and this, this is what I have to do.)
She is pitiful right now and I don't see that too much. Seeing that feisty loud mouthed, embarrassing girl of mine, who will punch a grown man, twice her size, as soon as look at him, sit in a huddle and just weep, with fat old tears plopping down her cheeks because she is so lost and so unhappy, well that tears at something inside.
The thing is, just lately I see that the way she reacts to stressful things, is very like the way I react, the difference is what she does after the initial shock wears off. I will panic and I very often shout....then I quickly think about what I need to do to rectify the situation and I get on with it. Sophie panics, yells and then she just keeps yelling. And yelling.
I took her to lunch today and those little things, where it is just her and I, they make her feel so good, when she thanks me and goes away happy, I feel I have done something right. The rest, this awful tough love stuff. I hate it. It does not feel good, it is not empowering and it makes me feel like the lowest of low.
I do it because I owe it to her to help her have a happy adulthood. I can't ( although it would seem easier most days) just have her here and put up with it all because at least I would know she is safe. She won't stop doing what she is doing until she sees that it gets her nowhere.
In her sobbing last night she said that she had stopped drinking and taking drugs because I had told her that Mel and Jordan will not allow her to look after the baby while she is living the way she lives. The fact that she heard that and took such huge steps as to stop doing what she does, is huge. I want for her to see great rewards for what she is doing, right now she just hurts.
I want to look after her and every time I drive away, leaving her sobbing and pleading to sleep the night here....I just can't quite find the words to describe how that feels.
I am sad....but I am not depressed. I know that all this is good in the long term. I can see the tiniest of glimpses that this tough love is working, slowly but surely, she is learning, it is so painful to see and to be involved in, as sad as it is, I know it is the only thing to do. I cry but it is a cleansing cry, it is not a hopeless, lost crying. I am not sinking into a box of misery with the lid closing in on me.
I cry, because it is so sad. She is such a beautiful girl, she really is and as my only daughter I would love to shower her with gifts and beautiful things, to see her have all that she deserves. Life isn't like that though, is it. I do think that when she gets through this, when she has grown and learned and she is standing tall again..she will be the most incredible woman you ever saw.
I just have to pray that she makes it through, the things that have enveloped this girl could kill her, the people she has mixed with, could destroy her.
I actually saw Mr tattoo face yesterday, what a slimy looking, lizard faced man. My skin crawled and the hair on the back of my neck stood on end. I am so thankful she is away from him. I drove past his house to get to school and there were 2 police wagons outside and a circle of policemen outside his door.
She survived living there.
She was fired from the job in that pit of iniquity, praise the Lord. They don't want her there because she has changed..she is no longer that in your face, body flashing, good for anything girl, she is a sad, frightened little girl. They don't want that, they liked her drugged and high. Thankyou Lord for saving her from them too.
I say it again and again, this child of mine has guardian angels. May they never leave her side.

Hair today...gone tomorrow.

I had my hair cut today, it was time. Over a year since I walked through a hairdressers door, my hair was like a sheep's fleece. I think it frightened H. Sometimes I could feel he would love to stroke my hair and lovingly caress me, alas the risk was too high, he likes his fingers, he didn't want to lose any in the matted mess that was on my head.
No point to anything but a spray with a conditioning spray and combing the knots out in the morning, drag it back into a half ponytail thing and pretend I liked it that way. Wind and rain, drizzle and damp are not kind to curly hair, why take the time to straighten hair that will spring right back into a frizzy mop at the very mention of moisture?
So 3 days of sunshine and a boost of whatever the goodness is that makes me walk a bit taller, lift my head and smell the roses. Well for heavens sake....lets see if there is someone brave enough to chop and style. Bless Tricia's heart, she took up the challenge!
Having my hair cut is always a trial to me, I am afraid of leaving the salon looking like a shorn sheep but Trisha is a dream and she and I have such a great chat I forget she is chopping off my frizz and suddenly Ta-Da, all done.
I feel better but I can see that I am still tired looking and jowly. I am looking my age and feeling it. I am afraid if I lose weight I will sag into oblivion. I will flap in the breeze, it is not looking good.
However, I do think I look sort of comfy and alright to be with, considering.
considering Sophie the girl child is on a soul sucking phase. Bless her heart she is doing alright, no drugs, has come through a rotten period of withdrawal , vomiting and stomach pains, misery and panic attacks, all during the night...here, with me. She has been turning up at midnight, 1am.....staying until she feels better and then I send her home. Then she comes back the next day because she just wants to be with me, this is a good thing but it is so exhausting, because she talks and talks and talks some more, about ....I'm not sure what she talks about but she talks.
She has been here and cooked us dinner and eaten dinner and eaten while she cooks dinner and eaten after dinner and she is looking better.
16 days until she has her appointment, I can do this. I really hope she can do this too.
I so want for her to be happy, at very least not to be so crazy wild in her head, I wonder sometimes how her head stays in place when it is so filled with so many thoughts and emotions and STUFF, all fighting to be in charge and in front.
I want to hear her talk about a boyfriend and dates, I want her to be able to work and be in a routine, knowing where she should be and where she belongs.
I really need for her to believe and accept that she is an adult, that she can rely on herself and ask for and receive help but not expect everything to be handed to her. I am so tired with teaching Sophie. I just want to be able to love her, to enjoy her and sit back and watch what she can do.
She is 19 physically, but she is still such a little girl in so many ways. When she lived and worked with Dan, she grew up a lot, she saw that working and earning her own money was a good thing. All of my children are generous and she certainly was when she was earning good money, she came back here and fell so hard back into the drugs pit that she erased all the good she had achieved while she was away. Physically I have been worried for her, she was close to causing herself irretrievable damage. I hope she has escaped that and that she will never be in such a bleak place again. I wonder how often I can watch her hurt herself, I don't want to do it anymore. Ever. I know she has incredible hurt inside her, I can't do anything about that, if only I could, there is the most terrible pain in a mother's heart to see a child so troubled and sad.
I have adored this girl of mine, with a fierce passion. The love I have for her is so different to the way I love the boys, I admire so much of her fight but I wish it weren't all channelled towards me!
( I just did a quick spell check and saw that I had written towards me as one word, spell check wondered if I meant to write twats...why no but thankyou for asking, sometimes I would like to say twats, though this wasn't one of those moments.)
Jordan and Mel have a new home, the flat they live in is being remodelled and so they have to move ( something that made me feel like curling into the fetal position and sucking my thumb) hey are moving on the 10th to a house that is almost within spitting distance. Wonder if I will find myself walking past the house and popping in when that baby is here, I am so glad I love Mel and she seems to like me, I love that they come for dinner and relax and then go home!
The little boys have 2 weeks off school from next week, we have got Seth a place at a basketball camp for 3days, 6 hours a day of basketball, can you imagine his excitement? I wish you could bottle that joy and save it for a rainy day, he walks past me every now and then and pats my arm and says thankyou. He blessed the food at dinner tonight, well that was the plan anyway
"Dear Heavenly Father, thankyou for this day and thankyou that I am going to basketball camp, I ask thee that I will enjoy basketball camp and have a lovely time, also I ask that mum and dad can have a nice time while I am at basketball camp, in the name of Jesus Christ Amen." I'm pretty sure the Lord knows he meant to thank Him for the good food and ask that it be wholesome and good for our bodies. God's like that, He understands what is in our hearts, even when our mouths are running away with themselves.
Meanwhile, I am very grateful that my hair turned out pretty alright and ask that my poor weary face not sag anymore until at least 2015 because I am not ready for jowls any droopier than they already are. Amen.

Shirt WAS so ironed before I sat in the car and screwed it up with the seat belt, face was so NOT ironed before I went and had a hard adult life and left it uncared for and unmoisturised, I use all the best creams now but I think it laughs at me and tells me I am 10 years too late. Hair is pretty though.

Blast it, trying to be all clever with the camera didn't hide that double chin, did it? Hair's soft though.

You asked for it......you got it!

Here we go then, some answers just for you and probably some rambling, just for me!
I am emotional tis evening after an evening with Sophie, she came by today with tulips and a pink rose and a smiley face, lovely. We went, armed with chick flicks and chocolate to Mel and Jordan's home and spent a great and happy evening together, we watched 'The holiday' and 'music and lyrics' wonderful girlie evening, when it was time to go, Sophie started to say that she wanted to sleep here tonight, this wouldn't be a good idea, I can't let her feel comfortable and begin to believe she can move back, also she hasn't a bed here, she would have to sleep with Seth or in the front room, she has a room of her own to sleep in where she is staying.
She was like a little girl and was begging and pleading, saying she would sleep on the floor but she just wanted to be near me and in my house. I had to kiss her face and pat her leg and send her in to the house, she was angry and then she stood at the door pleading. I cried all the way home but have to stick with the decisions I made.
Tomorrow I hope I can get her in to see my doctor, she needs more help and she seems ready to take it. I can but hope.

Anyway, Brenda......if you saw me you would immediately realise that I am not one to have favourites where chocolate is concerned! I love pretty much all of it, curly wurlies are delicious but there is so much more to the chocolate shelves here in the UK, I am fair though and spread my consumer pennies through out the companies, Cadburys usually win although Galaxy is a close second!

Suzanne, I will send you some smarties after I send Jennifer her tea, which will most likely be in about 34 years the rate I am moving!
How did I raise my 2 boys to be such glorious men ( did you call them that or is that my word?)
Well, I was single, which meant that I got to do what I thought was right with nobody contradicting me or setting an example other than the one I wanted them to see. I didn't have a plan and I didn't read any books, I prayed a lot and went with what seemed right at at the time.
I was tough, much, much tougher than I am with these 3 boys ( which worries me abit because I want them to be good men too and sometimes I think they are more likely to be brats unless I get tough again) I was so worried that someone, anyone would ever look at my kids and know they were from a single parent family that I was unbendable in the way they were raised, I had every definite guidlelines, they were clear to everyone and I didn't bend them.
I was never afraid of what people thought, ever. If they misbehaved, wherever we were I made it clear that I disapproved. I didn't wait til we got home and I didn't allow what other people thought prevent me from doing what I thought needed doing.
We had enormous fun, we had adventures, we had lots of love and a closeness that I don't think I have with Seth, Isaac and Eli because it was just us. I felt it was me and them against the big bad world, the fact that they had been abducted and so abused made our family even closer, I chose to be alone for so long so that I was free to be who they needed me to be, when I saw they were healed and that there was time and energy left for someone else, I met H, almost right away. I am convinced that if I had been married, either to their dad or H, any earlier the boys would never have been healed the way they are. It took 5 years, complete years of my being available day and night to deal with the night terrors, the nightmares, the daytime fears, the insanity and the horrible, terrible pain that we all felt. There was no spare anything, not emotion, not time, not energy or space for anyone but us in those years, then there was the healing time, the time to just grow and recover, enjoy and relax, then came H, perfectly timed.
I consciously taught them about women, about being kind and firm, about thinking about feelings, I taught them what I know, that real joy can't be found, it can't be demanded, it comes from giving joy. If you try and make others happy, absolutely every time it comes right back to you, when you forget what you think YOU need and you concentrate on what the people around you need, you get joy. Buckets of it, more than you can ever hold onto.

Sarah, Seth and Isaac were extraordinary babies, 11 months apart, they were complete opposites. Seth spoke ridiculously early, by 15 months he could name every dinosaur and tell you what they ate and where they came from. Isaac screamed for 5 1/2 months, didn't talk at all until he was 4 1/2. Seth was lazy.....feed me, fetch me, get me, please me. Isaac wouldn't ask for a drink he would just get it himself, he walked at 12 months and pretty much did most things for himself...and Seth.
Isaac was the happiest little boy as long as he could see H or me, at 14 months he turned, almost overnight from a happy boy, sociable and easy going, into a little boy who cried if he couldn't see me and would scream bloody murder if it looked like he was going to be left with anyone, even gramma, whom he adored, he stopped looking at people ( other than me or daddy) he hid behind his yellow blanket and shut out the world.
I didn't really think too much about how quiet he was, I didn't think about how bizarre Seth was either because they both had so many of H's quirks, I assumed that they were mini Hs.
H is painfully into routine, he has 'things' that are more than just important, they were essential, silverwear that is the only silverwear he uses, kept in a specific place in the drawers, one type of socks that are put in a drawer on their own, he will only have 2 pairs of dress pants and 2 pairs of casual pants, if I buy more he throws one pair away. In fact I don't buy his clothes because they have to be right.
Isaac chooses clothes and then wears them, only them for weeks, even months, every day. He hates socks with seams, he always knows where his things are, he folds his clothes and puts them where he can see them when he puts his PJs on, when he takes his PJs off, he puts them at the end of his bed so he knows where they are ( same ones every night) I wash them and put them where he left them.
If he sees something in a store or if I see something I am pretty sure he will like I buy 2, always..that way I know he will always have the right clothes to wear.
Seth started school on the day Isaac started nursery, it was only then, within 2 days that I became aware of just how different these little boys were to the other kids.
( Remember I have never had, until Eli, a 'normal' 4 year old boy, Dan and Jordan were so damaged by being abducted and Seth was so clever and so NOT average!) Isaac was so terrified of everything and everyone at nursery, Seth had no idea how to play or interact with children his own age, he was baffled as to why these 4 year olds didn't enjoy discussing whether camelons should be in the primate family and WHY DO THEY RUN ABOUT PULLING ON EACH OTHERS JUMPERS? What was all that about???
Within a week I had been summoned to the special ed teacher and told that we needed to get a diagnosis on both boys, especially Isaac because he was never going to be able to fit in without enormous help.
I asked to sit and wait with Seth, he was happy, he is so clever and to be honest he is SO like H I could see that even if he IS different, even if he never adjusted and fit in, he wouldn't care , he would, like his daddy, assume that everyone else is weird and he is just perfect , he would feel sympathy for all those people who just didn't get it all!
Isaac was diagnosed very quickly with aspergers syndrome and has had fabulous help from teachers and speech therapy, I insisted from the very beginning that I would not co-operate with anyone who tried to make Isaac 'normal', I refuse to change who he is. I have only ever wanted for Isaac to be able to function in the world and be happy, I truly couldn't care less if he is never the life and soul of a party, I don't care at all if he is always on the outskirts of the world if he is happy there. If he is content wherever he chooses to be, that's good enough for me, as long as he chooses where he is. I don't want him to ever be outside longing to be a part of what he sees but being too afraid.
The miraculous thing is, by making him feel that HIS world is just fine, that no-one expects him to do anything that makes him afraid, by letting him set the pace and in things that are unavoidable, like school by being there with him, by having his own helper that has always been there to help him feel secure,by being clear that he is safe but here are things he has to do, even if they frighten him..by letting him see that he has control over most things in his world, he has begun to leave his world and come into ours. I am sure he will always be different, rigid in his ways etc but to see him now, just 2 years after we were told that he would probably never really function in a way that was 'normal' I have no doubt that he will be an amazing adult and a happy one to boot.
Seth is doing well too, he is, as predicted, way ahead academically, he has friends who share his passion for basketball ( more of an obsession but at least a healthy one!) he is funny and happy and has his fathers total lack of understanding when it comes to emotion. He will be fine.
When Isaac was diagnosed, the pediatrician told me that he is 100% sure that both Seth and H have aspergers too, that didn't come as a surpise at all, these apples didn't fall far from the tree!
Elijah has not a trace of aspergers or autism, not a bit. He is the only 'normal' 4 year old I have ever had.

Clara....both pictures are of me, my hair is very, very curly, the older I get the curlier it gets but it drives me scatty, every now and then I crack open the expensive starightening shampoo, conditioner, straightening serum, anti frizz heat protecter and the GHD straighteners because I just have to feel less crazy and more sleek and shiny. The straight hair lasts until I walk outside, the moment the air hits it, it curls again.

Becca, my sister Leah reads my blog, I think she sometimes shows it to my mum, I send the link to my 2 other sisters if there is something I really want them to read but they otherwise don't bother. I mistakenly sent the link to Dan once when I wanted him to see some pictures and was mortified when I realised what I had done, I do not want my kids reading this until I am dead!
This blog was initially for me to rid myself of the demons that I had following so many traumatic incidents, nowadays it is much mreo for entertainment but I still often vent my frustrations on life, it keeps me sane. I don't want to feel I need to curb what I write in case my kids read it and get hurt or feel guilty. When I knew Dan had the link I was so mad at myself, turns out he is a typical man anyway, said he loves the pictures and says there is way too much writing for his liking so he would look at the pictures and not read ( even if that isn't true he sounded convincing enough that I feel safe writing what I feel and don't hold back) He did call and tell me that his ex partner had accessed his email account, got hold of the blog and read it...right through apparantly, he called Dan a few times and tried to convince him to demand I delete certain parts.....as if.
He now knows that is never and wil never happen, my blog, my thoughts, read it if you like, or don't that's the choice, censoring MY blog is what I do, not what someone tells me to do. Knowing this man could still be reading unfortunately has stopped me writing about Dan many times, purely because what I say could get back to Dan and that isn't fair, I will boast about him because he is splendid but I can't give details.
I saw ( through google) that Sophie got hold of the blog address and had been reading ( was so obvious from the words she used to google!) So I don't know if she reads very often, I doubt it because the way she is, she would have to call me on things I say or correct me when she thinks I am wrong ( which is almost always!)
Jordan could care less, he doesn't have internet access and has so little time anyway that I am sure he would find much more interesting things to do with his time!
Julie Q, the picture with the horse was taken when we drove to the moors about 5 miles away, those are wild ponies that have learned that people in cars have food, they have picnics and they share the goodies, so when you park up and get out of the car they come running! I am such a woosy when it comes to animals, I really am not an animal lover and the sight of those ponies surrounding me made me almost wee my knickers. The fact that the kids and H were laughing fit to bust at me made it worse, every time I tried to open the door a bit to get out or even back in....they came at me! That look was genuine fear mixed with hysterical laughter at how ridiculous I was being.

Julie Bo, I am going to work on an answer to your request and make it a post of it's own. My faith is such an anormous part of me that I rarely share it. I know that many of the things I believe are not what the majority believe. In the UK it is quite tough to be openly religious, it is not something that is accepted as it is in the states, it was such a breath of fresh air to be in America where people are so much more at ease with their faith.
I have to think about how to share what I feel and take time to write it in a way that I think will make some sense!

I have loved answering the questions, keep them coming, it's fun not havbing to think about what to write about, my brain needs a break right now!