Mon. Memorial Day 6-26-2025 PWYC

[Costumelady]

Well I sorted the mail and got all of the bills paid or scheduled. C decided he was fixated today on suits. He is 30 but played dress up all day, I went with him to help match black dress slacks to a suitjacket he found at Goodwill. He got slacks and a white shirt at Kohl's and then went back to goodwill and found a blue suit jacket and gray pants and has ordered him self a tailored navy 3 piece suit online for a wedding this fall. I was teasing him and said he needed a button that says, No really I am straight and like girls. He laughed. He is what you would call metrosexual - very stylish, very tidy, likes to cook and clean and organize - he has more shoes than I do and loves to dress up- he could be a model. He has a look for teaching, he wears black skinny jeans and a black music tshirt ( he has like 20) and then a button up shirt over it and crazy socks. He tried on 4 suits today. N is gay but if you met C and N and I didn't tell you which was which you would say C was gay and N was straight. N once told me, I love girls I am just not sexually attracted to them. C loves girls but gay men are very attracted to him but he is not at all interested. N has more women friends and 1 partner. I think all the women think C is gay too. C and N lived together for 5 years and have different last names and would arrive to work at the theater sharing a poptart and be bickering like an old married couple and they had to remind people they were just brothers. Too funny. R went on a date with an older woman today - he is 26, she is 37 - she is an assistant teacher in my building. They went to play frisbee. Not sure how I feel about this but I will let it run its course. They are both on the spectrum so maybe it is will work out. She is a licensed math teacher but couldn't get a job as a teacher this year, she would really like to replace my position but I don't think it will happen. She is getting to teach summer school as a trial this June. I don't think they will fill my vacancy. She is an ok math teacher (not as good as me but better than the other teachers and she is young and can learn). I give her credit for the students in her classes she helped in passing math - they didn't pass anything else which is what worries me as my replacement. Math is only 1/4 of the tests, the rest are reading and writing based classes.

Lucylee, my husband is very routine based and has a definite process for everything he does. He does stim but that looks so different for everyone. He bites his knuckle (has a huge callus)

Whoever said their child touched every corner of furniture that is a type of stim too. I twiddle my hair, (pick my nose privately but I do), twiddle paper in my pocket or threads sticking off my clothes, skin pick and push up my glasses a lot. C grits his jaw over and over, sings or plays on ukhele random songs all of the time and shakes his foot. R bounces his foot and snacks a lot which is actually a stem - constant eating (my teaching assistant does it too). I am not sure what other ones they exhibit but we have all learned to hide them well.

[Harriet]

Trying to decide whether to arise super early and eat a meal before 6:30 in order to satisfy a requirement for med procedure tomorrow, napping later, or to just try sleeping late and hoping hunger will be at bay without food. Ddolder is encouraging me not to eat within their window, one way or another, so that there will be no question when meds are suggested, that I can have whatever seems right to them.

Either way enough sleep is wise, so I wish you all a good night.

Twins', it's nice to hear you and dh are safely home.

Hi to costumelady.

blessed, I'm so sorry it was a difficult morning. You are doing a remarkable job, surely the best anyone could do. You know the whole situation - think how many times you have caught just the right clue and helped at just the right time.

[Lauralind]

Ohh wow blessed. Your poor mom is going through so much. Must be so stressful. You're doing amazing.

This is a really interesting conversation. I still haven't received ds report yet. He's so very anti social at times though everyone likes him. I wonder if the term is he masks very well. Outside of home. And I never noticed the stimming. The assessment lady said he was moving his hand in certain way like flexing his hand. And he taps. Yup. Oh and here I am stopping myself from chewing my hair . And I tap too my foot or fingers... I always thought of that as musical because I do play music. Your descriptions of you as adults is very eye opening.

His latest challenge again is sleep. It very often not restful at all and he wakes up like a bear... grumpy and tired and just can't cope with school or church or whatever. Very smart. Top marks in science. And yup very non fiction. Facts and info he can jabber it all off. But explain his feelings or answer specific questions... either stubborn or selective mute. He just can't find the words.

Phew it's bedtime soon and I feel it today. A few more weeks and work will be easier. 2 trucks again today. I receive freight at the hardware store. Another busy day tomorrow.

And to top it all off do you all know what a fox says? He screams like a big cat. Eeks if I had let Casper go he would have been gone after the thing. It took work to keep him going in walk direction. The fox I almost thought he was going to follow us. And then further up were bear droppings on the pavement. Ugh... not my idea of fun.

[lucylee]

DGS chews on EVERYTHING. He doesn't even realize he is doing it. His shirt collars always end up with holes in them, papers are never safe around him, toys, anything. (DS also chewed his shirt collars as a child, but DGS takes this to a new level.) His teacher in 2nd grade called ddil because DGS had chewed up all the erasers on her pencils. He also picks at anything handy -- such as the leather covering on his belt from Sunday... the zipper on my wallet, ink pens, again -- nothing he touches is safe.
DH and routines -- oh my goodness. Dmom said once, "If he does something twice, it's a habit and he has to do it every time." That was true. He couldn't stand any change in his routines. I like routines, but I am more flexible than dh was.
Neither of them had stimming behaviors, except sometimes DGS will hit his palm with his fist when he is telling something he's really excited about. DH used to say he loved to see DGS get so excited, and he could always tell because of that behavior.

Well -- some of you probably saw my J&C post. Dmom is okay. Like the long ago baseball player Dizzy Dean, "X-rays of her head showed nothing." Actually, it was a CAT scan, but apparently it was fine. They also did an EKG -- fine. They did not do bloodwork, which surprised me, but she seemed to be doing okay when we got home, and I left her alone for the night.
We went to a different ER. Our local hospital ER shut down last Friday night. The hospital in Next Town is the one we went to with the bowel impaction [last week (?)] but they are always crowded and dmom was very hesitant to go anywhere at all. DDIL and the ambulance EMTs convinced her to go, so we went to a "stand alone" ER about as close as Next Town, but which we had never used. It is affiliated with a different hospital and dmom didn't want to use that hospital, but she agreed to go to the ER anyway. We were so lucky -- NO ONE was in the waiting room when we came in, and they got to her right away. We were there maybe three hours, but they did get pretty busy after we arrived and there were a few times we thought we had been forgotten, LOL. But I was pleased with all the people and the facility itself.

Lessons learned today:
* Shower before bed as much as possible, but if I do not shower before bed, I MUST s2s before I leave the bathroom in the morning.
* Don't skip a day of routines -- one never knows what the next day will bring.
* Never tell anyone I need some time to myself. It jinxes my day. (When DGD asked to spend tonight with me, my first response -- to DS -- was that I needed a night off. I will now depend on the Lord to give me a night off when I need it.) Sigh. Playing with dgd would have been much better than sitting in the ER and worrying about dmom for hours.

And of course, I'm still concerned about her. Who knows what the future holds, but we just have to take it one day at a time and be thankful for every day that she is able to live alone and maintain her independence.
She expects home health nurse to arrive tomorrow... and boy, that lady is going to be in for a surprise when dmom opens the door.