to work or not to work?

Well, Ive been thinking things through, and have failed miserably to come up with any real answers. But I have put some feelers out and some things in motion which may give me some answers eventually. Or not.

Basically, i am trying to decide what to do about work. Now I only do three days a week, it's OK - I don't much like the commuting, but the actual work is fine, and gives me a break from stuff at home. But, 3 days a week does not bring in much money - I would be better off giving up altogether! And, re-training into a difficult field like law is hard enough at my age anyway, but the chances of getting a part-time job when I am academically qualified are virtually non-existant. No-one is going to give me a training contract part-time when there a literally thousends of younger, dedicated, go-getting graduates applying for each position. And the thought of remaining a secretary for the next 30 years is not that alluring.

Plus, I have to be realistic about my home life. Aggie is doing well at the moment, but his prognosis is, at best, that he will get worse slowly, and at worst, that it will continue to deteriorate as rapidly as he did in the first year of having PA. He does his best (for a man), but barely keeps up with the needed housework & child care at the moment. And if he has a bad day/week/month, pretty much nothing is done. I am going to be needed at home at least for periods of time.

And I am starting to really think through what Mstr A's asbergers is going to mean as he gets older. I have been telling myself that he will eventually learn social skills as he gets older and understands the importance of at least pretending to understand. But, honestly, that is only going to happen many years from now. He will get a lot worse before he gets better. Most people are in their twenties before they really start to understand tolerance and true empathy. Teenagers are notoriously bad at it:-) And mstr A's behaviour is unlikely to change much. 2 year old behaviour in 2 year olds is considered normal, if annoying. 2 year old behaviour in 5 years olds is considered difficult. 2 year old behaviour in 8 year olds is considered inappropriate. 2 year old behaviour in 13 year olds is considered criminal. He is already too strong for Aggie to physically control, and the chances are is physical behaviour will get worse as he gets older and more frustrated. I worry that I am not available for him/the school.

BUT, I'm not a natural "carer". It's not a role I particularly enjoy. I prefer to work outside the home. But find it important to work hard & and act professionally at work. I can not just do the minimum possible & take time off non-stop. It's a dilemma.

We are still looking at fostering, which would give me more to do at home & a bit of money. But I'm not sure it will work out with Aggie & Mstr A.

I am also starting with the CAB in a couple of weeks, so may find that gives enough "out of the home" work.

But in that case, I have to decide what to do about college. There seems little point putting so much time, effort & money into qualifying in an occupation that I will never take up. But then again, I quite like the idea of having it as an option if things work out better.

I have decided, as usual, to just wait and see for now.

Agencies (of hell)

In my quest for work, with a minimal time frame and Christmas in the way of what little time there was, I signed up with a bunch of agencies in the expectation that they might be able to find me something that i hadn't found myself. I didn't really mean to, but when scouring for jobs online, there were quite a few (well, loads) advertised in Bristol on a coupel of known sites, and when I clicked "apply" I was automatically applying through a different agency for each one! I was pretty annoyed tbh, as I had searched agency A and B as they were specialised legal recruiters, and ended up being registered with Agency C through to Z without ever wanting to be!

Anyway, it didn't take long for them to really piss me off. a) because none of them seemed to actually have the jobs they were advertising. b) because they all wanted me to spend at least an hour with them in central Bristol, BEFORE mentioning that they did not actually have said jobs, costing me time and money unecessarily. c) because they were all revoltingly cheerful & enthusiastic about my CV and how it should be easy to get something, while simultaneously saying that they did not have much suitable right now and d) because they then promptly all sent my CV to the same companies, without checking wioth me first if I wanted to work there, or more importantly, had already sent my CV there by myself. Which probably pissed off the companies, and definitely pissed me off, as I am quite capable of sending my own CV out to companies!

Only one actually got me an interview. I'm still waiting on the results of that. I have managed to get three interviews for myself without any professional recruiters involved! Grrrr. Plus, one talked me into doing some temping while I was waiting for a FT post to come up - against my better judgement. then after I had agreed to do it, they mentioned that it wasn't actually legal, but medical "but they need similar skills", even though I had specifically told her I need to work under a lawyer to gain my qualifying experience. But having agreed at 1pm on Friday afternoon, I did not want to back out and let them down. And the money was good, even if it was in the most inaccessable parts of Bristol for me. So off I trot on Monday morning, feeling pretty disgruntled at the 90 minute commute (including getting lost quite a lot). My mood is not lightned by the fact that my mobile starts ringing 30 minutes after I leave and then every 10 minutes for the next hour. I arrive at the venue and spend 10 minute looking for a parking place (having been tld "there's plenty of free parking there") making me a few minutes late. get into reception, pick up the annoying phone message telling me the job has been cancelled! GRrrrrrrrrr. what a waste of my morning!

I've got another interview )mine no- agencies involved) on friday afternoon, so I think i shall not bother with agencies any more. they are just annoying! Plus, what with Mstr A's diagnosis, and LMD's birthday tomorrow, and tons of stuff to do round the house i could do with the time off at the moment.

It did mean I had time to go out for a blast on the bike today. I'm starting to remember how it all works now:-) More thrilling than terrifying this time.

Finally!

At last, we have an official diagnosis of Asbergers syndrome for Mstr A. They had a professionals meeting yesterday, and we were invited to see the paediatrician today, and told that there was a unanious agreement that he was an Aspie.

horaay! I feel very relieved - and a bit guilty that I am happy he has something wrong with him! But mostly pleased. Now we can actually start to officially get extra support for him in all sorts of things. Hopefully the school might get a bit of funding to help them supervise him out of class (they do very well inside the classroom, but playtimes & trips are still a major problem), and we are looking into (mostly) moral support from local groups and organisations.

Now to tell everyone:-)

I wonder if I should re-apply to the local swimming lessons - under DDA legislaion I could now insist on going in with him whatever the idiot teacher thought about it. But then again, whereas I'm all for fighting for your rights when necessary, i don't really see the point as we are doing better with the further away lessons now. It depends how life works out fo me I suppose. Aggie can not go in with him if I get a job too far away, so we'll see what happens.

update

Hmm, whats happening around here?

Work is getting pretty catty, as everyone gets more and more desperate to find something else, while still holding onto their post until the last second to get their redundancy (doesn't apply to me, as I've not been there long enough but I'm the first out too....) . 2ic in the Family Dept wins the book on first to get another job - and a really good one at tha, which seems to have really pissed off some of the other staff. ho hum. Water off a ducks back as I said to her - and think of the pound signs rolling round each time they say something stupid.

I've got an interview on Weds for a clinical negligance post which could be interesting. i don't fancy land law, which seems to be the thing that everyone has vacancies for. The interview is for a temp post, but in a big company so possibly wit scope for something to come up if it works well. If not, having the summer holidays off doesn't sound too bad. Otherwise i've had some unecessaril cheerful recruitment people on the phone telling me how great my CVi s - but none of them have produced an interview, never mind a job, so I don't take too much notice of them. Although, tbh, I haven't decided whether I should get another job at the moment or not. on one side, I would like some continuity of work and to rack up my qulifying employment. on the other hand, I am not too happy about Aggie looking after LMD full time. I suppose it will basically be decided by what happens;-)

Mstr A and LMB started swimming lessons again today. LMB started off a bit nervously, but after 5 minutes was well into the whole concept and had a great time. She reveled in the praise from the teacher, and interacted well with the other kids. I reckon she'll go up a class in just one term she did so well. Mstr A has tried swiming lessons a couple of times before rather less sucesfully, so this time I booked him back into the centre I used to work at, which hs smaller classes - although it is further away. I chatted to the teacher first and she seemed quite confident (and knew what Asbergers was, which helps), and she did manage him pretty well. his attention wandered a few times, but he did stay with the class and seemed to learn something, so hopefullly his swimming will start to look a little nicer by the summer:-)

I'm off to London again this weekend to meet up with the siblings. If the trains manage to run in the morning. You'd think rain was unusual in Somerset the way they go on!

We're not flooded here, and it hasn't snowed, much to the kids annoyance!

Say what?!

We all went up to London this weekend just gone, to visit my family (well, some of them anyway) and let the kids play with their cousin G. On Saturday, the children were all playing rather nicely after lunch, while the grownups chatted round the table. As my sister is an Occupational Therapist working with people with mental health issues (I don't know, she doesn't really know! Nobody knows, but it's sounds like a tough job whatever!) she's a useful font of information for me, seeing as an awful lot of our clients have mental health issues (the sad thing about working in family law is mostly all your clients have major problems in their life. They wouldn't need a solicitor if everything was hunky dory, would they?) so we were discussing some people in generic terms.

Of course, she calls hers patients, and I call mine clients, but basically, in most cases we're trying to get the same things for them. At one point the conversation turned to the perceived difference between deliberate and unconscious self-harm. I said that one case I found really sad was an addict who was the most fantastic mother most of the time. But then she had a relapse, and the baby was in real danger and was taken away. i said I did not see that she would ever get it back, and it was sad, because when straight, she did everything right. Sister S asked if it was as sad when the mother was a fantastic mother except when she had a psychotic episode due to a mental health problem. I said it wasn't, because it was quite possible that mother could be reassessed later, and would have at least some access to their child. Sister S pointed out that shows a decided bias from the courts in what the consider to be involuntary behaviour (psychosis, disability etc) and "voluntary behavior" like drug addiction and prostitution.

I was about to agree that in most cases theses people were not voluntarily doing it when Master A piped up from the other side of the room, "Prostitution? That's what i am"

My sister, other and I all looked at each other then almost simultaneously asked him what he meant:-) He clarified for us, "in the school play. I'm the prosecution" (he is doing Goldilocks in court this year - how cool is that? I always thought it was a bit of an iffy story!). he then went on to tell us how exactly to say it, and spell it, and that we had got it a bit wrong:-) fortunately he did not ask what our word meant, since he hasn't quite got to grips with sex yet, never mind that!

Poor Mstr A. He's good at getting it just slightly wrong enough to be completely wrong in adults eyes. At the beginning of term, all the children in his class had to do a poster of why it is good to be me. They were put up outside the classroom for all the parents to look at. It had a picture of them in the middle and lines off to descriptions of what made them individuals. Mstr A's 1st line went off to "What I like" underneath he wrote "my friends, Tom, Robert, John*, call girls, smiley. For weeks I watched parents go over, look at it, double take, and look worried. I did ask him what it said (obviously). he read it out to me. People I like: Tom, Robert, John and all girls in brackets! Mstr A's writing made the first bracket look just like a C and the last one just like a smiley!

Silly mum!

Still, good news, kind of. We saw the educational psychologist today. She was quite convinced that he showed many Aspie behaviours, and congratulated us on having done such a fantastic job of managing him. she even wrote down some of our techniques for future use:-) She said that it was good that we had spoken to him about it, and that it would be fine to use the word "asbergers" to him, even if it was not actually diagnosed - which is the opposite of what the paediatrician said! Although she was not upbeat about getting an actual diagnosis still. partly because she was very keen not to diagnose. she kept saying it would not get him any extra help on its own and he was managing well enough at school without the formal diagnosis, and it would follow him through life. But also because she said we have managed it so well, some of the behavioural issues are not much of an issue with him, since the management techniques keep it under control. Huh, so we were supposed to let him ruin his life just to get the diagnosis? But a full report from her will go a long way and hold plenty of weight. It's certainly made me feel thatI am not just being a pushy parent anyway, which does worm it's way into my mind every now and then:-) After all, all 7 year old boys are pretty difficult! In a way it's comforting to know he is abnormally difficult;-) Weird huh?

slogging on

Life is just slogging on at the moment. LMB's chicken pox scabbed over pretty quickly and she went back to school admidst wails of protsts. I thought it was just that daddy had spoiled her while she was at home, but as the days went on I had to wonder if there really was a problem. I finally managed to get a couple of names out of her today and spoke to the staff, so hopefully that ill be an end to it. She's only got two more weeks there, then we're off on holiday and she's staying off to do some fun things before starting big school, so i want them to be good weeks.

LMD finally caught chicken pox - yesterday 1000's of spots suddenly appeared all over her. Literally1000's and literally all over - she's got over 100 on her face poor love! In her usual awkward way she waited pretty much the full incubation period before getting it, she couldn't have it at the same tiem as LMB! Which means Aggie has to have another week off his groovy drugs. His skin's getting quite bad at the moment:-(

I had some issues at work last week - you'd think that a law firm would manage to implement employment law - or at least not do anything so *****ing stupid that they are begging to be taken to tribunal, but no. Apparently not. I seriouly considered leaving & taking them for all the money they deserve to pay out, but in the end decided just it write it down for future reference, then ignore it. My solicitor was on leave so he couldn't sort it out - although he was steaming when he got back yesterday! And I decided that I like him, and the rest of my department, and the work, and the set up is convenient for me, so there is no need to leave at the moment. But it was pretty stressful for a few days.

My nice new lap-top lasted one full day:-( Then it died:-( I'm back on the old one now Aggie has put it back together - sticky keys and all!

Mstr A started a week of football (soccer) lessons today. After all the successes we've been having recently, and the apparent non-aspie findings of his assessments I thought we might have got over all his behavioural issues. His school report was great, and he's started playing imaginitive games with the girls - but it was not to be, He spent half the time ignoring his coach and the other half hitting the other kids:-( We've had a long talk this evening, and he's written a letter of apolog, so hopefully he'll be a bit better tomorrow, but I'm not sure:-(

Although he loves his golf lessons - and seems to be doing pretty well at them. And he's asked to do some music lessons (if I can find anything that doesn't cost an arm and a leg) so perhaps we should consolidate his solitary persuits before working on team things.

Mstr A moves forward

We had our second appointment with the paediatrician today. Only a year since the last one, so that's not too bad!

At least we did see the same Dr. Theoretically we should have changed as the other paediatrician covers Mstr A's new school.

It went quite well, I think. She talked to us about how he was getting on, and what issues were still causing problems. Then she asked him a few questions about school, which he happily answered - without once turning to face her or look her in the eye, which helpfully backed up what we were saying about his social awareness.

she wants to do a load more tests - some written ones for us & the school to complete, and a long interview type one which she'll book in soon(ish). She also said she would chase up the speech & language referral, as that was stymied when we changed schools! and follow that up with a meeting of all the professionals, including th school & us to discuss the way forward.

I mentioned that we'd used the word Asbergers to Mstr A, and his school friends because he had asked. I knew she would, and she did, immediately purse her lips and say we shouldn't label it until he is diagnosed. But it's going to take YEARS to get a real diagnosis, an EVERYONE says what a typical aspie he is. And he was asking. What should I say? you're just different? He'd ask different how? Should I try to explain to his 6 year old school friends that he is "behaviourally challenged and has social awareness issues"? A word is easy for them to grasp, and it can always be changed at a letr date if necessary. But since I have had a "diagnosis" from a consultant, an educational psychologist, various autism support workers and numerous interested parties. as well as my own research, I think it is a likely diagnosis.

On the other hand, he is doing really well at school now - mostly working within the group and staying in class a good 75% of the time. He understands that bhis behaviour neds tobe modified & learned for each situation, and he has made friends that are willing to come to his house and nvite him back to theirs occasionally. he's still hard work, but we're working on it.

I decided to get in with him for his swimming lesson last night, as although he has not been wandering off from th group so much this time round, he also hasn't been learning much swimming. One-to-one worked really well. All I had to do was keep his mind on the lesson, and he was well away - swimming his first full width without help:-)
all in all, a pretty positive move forwar for Mstr A

Woo-Hoo!

We got our money out of the bank! (if you don't know what I'm talking about, see Aggies blog here and here). They agreed to settle for £30 less than we claimed - the £30 court fees we'd paid to show that we really were serious about going all the way:-) that's the mortgage sorted for the next couple of months:-) Plus one over on the banks. Woo hoo! Of course, it was coupled with a very stern letter saying it wasn't their fault, they weren't a ccepting liability or admitting fault, and that if we ever deign to even sneeze in the bank's direction again the will close our account. but that's OK, we've been wanting to close our account for years - ever since they were taken over by RBS and became shit. It's just that we were alays too overdrawn for anyone else to take us on. Now we've got an extra couple of grand in the bank, our overdraft is low enough to move. we're changing banks next month anyway.

Mstr A started swimming lessons again on tuesday evening. it's a bit of a rush for me, but he managed to almost participate in the whole lesson. Also, when I spoke to his teacher (10 secs before the lesson started - even though I wrote to the pool weeks ago) about him having aspegers, she said her day job was working with autistic children, so at least she knew what I was talking about, and did a good job of keeping him with the rest of the group.

I have decided not to attend the interview for the PGCE course tomorrow. despite having put in the effort to write up my notes of Dracula:-) Bath is really a bit far, and I like what I'm doing. If this had come up two years ago it would have been different, but I'm going to stick with law for now.

And on a totallydifferent note: I see that Cadbury's schwepps are going to split into Cadbury's and schwepps. Umm, wasn't that what they were originally?

And how come the gov't regularly complains at how much the olympics is going to cost us, and is appalled that the bill for new roads, public transport, houses, facilities, total regeneration of some really revolting slums, and unimaginable PR across the world is nearing the £10 billion mark, but the same gov't is telling us that we desperately ned to spend TWICE that much on a couple of new Trident nuclear weapons, which will be aimed out into the middle of the ocean for the next twenty years?

Every day, in every way.....

Life is slowly getting sorted out here. Apart from the money thing, obviously. i don't know when that might happen:-( But I'm certainly feeling more positive about life in general.

Work is working:-) It's interesting enough, not too taxing, and the early finishes are just fantastic for my stress levels. As is not being stuck with the kids all day every day. i always said I wasn't cut out for motherhood. they really start to piss me off after a while;-)

Mstr A has settled in to hos school brilliantly. In fact, we haven't had any poblem since Xmas, and not only is he able to name a number of friends, and have them come to play, but they are starting to ASK to come back:-) When I nabbed his teacher yesterday to ask how he'd settled back in after half term I was told that his interactions with his peers in the classroom are now not noticably much different from the others! he sits with them at their desks, and now on the carpet for story time. He plays with other children, and has started joining in their imaginative games too. there is still an issue with personal space and consistancy of his academic work, but he has achieved so much. Pretty much everything i was hoping for.

plus, when I spoke to the new after-school club leader, to make sure she was aware of the issues, she told me that he plays well with the other kids there. then, just to reassue me that i wasn't projecting any neurosis onto my poor boy, she said she's worked with special needs kids for the past 17 years, and would say that Mstr A shows pretty much all the classic signs of Asbergers. Which in wierd way is nice to hear, because every time he achieves a bit of normality I start worrying that I'm making up excuses for his behaviour, which is one of the the worst things a parent can do for their child. it's horrible being torn between wanting him to get better, and wanting his behaviour to be defined as something specific, so absolving me of guilt:-)

Oh yes, and he re-starts swimming lessons next Tuesday. I wanted Monday, but they had sold out. Hopefully we'll get a swap soon, but we'll work with tuesday. I'm intending to take the girls along on alternate weeks so they can get back into swimming too, as they haven't been for ages. I loved swimming when i had the time to do it (hopefully i will again one day, when they are safe to leave in the pool), and want my kids to be able to experience that lovely feeling of peace & weightlessness and total isolation you can have under water.

I'm really looking forward to re-enactment season starting again. It'll be nice to spend the weekends outside again. Still got lots of stuff to do though. i really shouldn't spend the evenings blogging!

Going well

Everythings going pretty well for us here atm. Which means I have little to blog about;-) I mostly rant here:-)

Work is working out nicely. I am getting to grips with the different cases and things we do. There is enough work to keep me busy, but not so much that I feel overloaded with an impossible task. The level of the work is fine - it will get dull pretty quickly, but it's right for now as I find my feet. And I reckon it will probably increase as and when I am ready. The hours have panned out beautifully, and I don't think the early finishes are causing too much hassle for my colleagues.

Mstr A seems to have settled down at school. He has lots of friends, there are rarely problems when I pick him up, and he is definitely learning more and more stuff all the time:-) He even appears to have learned that he should do his work on time! There's a bit of an issue with personal space & his infringement on other people's, but we're working on it......

I haven't got a lot further in the making of this seasons re-enactment clothes - but there's still a month to go;-) hmmm, and a stone to lose if I want to fit into my new dress........

The college course is also going well. Although I still haven't done any homework, and I really do want to start doing some mock exam papers soon! But the stuff at college all makes sense, and the papers don't look too bad - when the book is open in front of me anyway!

I've had a few enquiries for courses which I've had to turn down:-( There's just not enough time to justify traipsing aff around the country. Plus I am officially no longer self employed now, so couldn't take a profit home:-(

of course, the money situation hasn't improved much. We're still seriously overspending each month:-( I don't really have much of a solution for that except try to muddle through till LMB goes to school in September, and/or I get a pay rise (yeah, to double my salary like!), Aggie gets retired (fingers crossed), a parent drops dead (all as healthy as the proverbial horse!) or we wi the lottery.

OK, I'm just going to try and muddle through till September *sigh*.

no idea how we're going to sort out the school holidays yet either. I'll worry about them when they come up.

My mother STILL has her job, despite working for the NHS in a role that was supposed to have been cut 6 months ago, so no help there:-)

My sister S is finally splitting up with her partner, so is pretty stressed out by all the legalities and procedures and general nastiness splitting up incurs. But it's a long way away, and although I feel bad for what she's going through, I can't help much, so I can't get too stressed about it personally.

Even though I am now cycling 4 miles a day, and not snacking hardly at all, what with being at work all day, I have lost a total of...............


absolutely zero!

Yep, not even 1/2 lb of wieght lost! bah! perhaps I need to start actually practising what I preach, and eating breakfast, and a proper lunch? It's such a lot of effort though! But I was hoping to a) get into my re-enact ment dress and b) to look vaguely reasonable for my sister A's wedding in june.

Oh yes, and I've finally decided to stop being a lazy mother, and stop letting LMB be a lazy baby, and have started workig on getting her dry at night. She is still wearing napies to sleep, which I'm sure she can't really need, even though they are always soaking in the morning. So I have stopped. I put her on the toilet before she goes to bed, then again when we go to bed, and leave the potty in her room. The first night she stayed dry till 6am, then wet the bed. Last night she made it through - using the potty but keeping the bed dry. Lets hope it continues:-)