with everything going on lately, the fact that my last post was my 100th completely passed me by.

yep. it did.

things seem to be progressing. the house is still sitting there. we cannot bring Lil'K to the site so getting in and getting the few remaining items I want out is proving a little difficult. hopefully after the first of the year we will be able to finish that up and start the 'throwing away to tear down' process. which is going to be hard. I loved my stuff. I am a sentimental fool. this I know. so having to go through the things that are not necessarily burnt but still ruined and need to be tossed is going to be hard. a lifetime (or more) of things that I have worked so hard to keep. just gone.

fire sucks.

I have had dreams throughout my life of fires. it is something that has always scared me. not only because it is so dangerous but also because everything is just gone. or ruined. or drenched or just in general jacked up. and it just sucks.

I am looking forward to moving in another direction. I am not sure where we will go and what we will do. the BFF and her family have been great. we have been staying here for the last two months. there are tons of plans on the block up for discussion. and we will just have to see.

Christmas is just around the corner and I can say it is going to be ok. I know it will. the kids have things under the tree. and we have new things all around us. it will be ok.

I do hope your holidays will be wonderful. I know that ours will.

and woot woot for having 100 posts. it took what seems like forever to get there. but I did.

we are surviving.

things have been so strange this year. after the fire Lil'K became very interested in fire. she informed us a couple weeks after the fire that she had been setting them in places around BFF's house. we had already had a very rough couple of months with her, so we headed up to a bigger city and brought her to a crisis unit.

I committed my child.

my sweet eight year old.

she stayed for 12 days. that is a long time in a crisis stabilization unit. she survived. although the first day walking away I was not sure if I would. there were lots of tears. she blamed me for leaving her. that I was not going to come back. begged and manipulated to come home. and was told no. reassured that we were doing what we had to for her to get help. it was a long 12 days. for both of us. she learned a lot of great tools and came home with new diagnosis codes. she was coded mood disorder NOS and reactive attachment disorder. they were leaning towards bi polar or schizoaffective with bipolar, but because of her age does not meet all of the requirements for a definite diagnosis. her meds have completely changed. and that has been good. her behavioral issues were addressed and it was felt that the number and strength of meds she was on had to do with parts of the erratic behavior. her mental illness had its hand in it as well as her bad behavior she made the choice to display. there are really a lot of factors in it. a good bit of it she can control. just making bad choices for one in her behavior. but there are parts she will have to learn to control. and then another part that she will never be able to control. it is going to be a work in progress her whole life.

she was in good hands while she was there. all of the staff there was amazing beyond belief. it helped me to be able to focus and not stay crazy the whole time. I stayed at the local Ronald McDonald House. THAT is an amazing place. I felt so strange hanging out with parents whose children were going through something I could never imagine. I kept to myself for a few days. BFF drove up with Big'K and Big'R and stayed for about 5 days. it was great having them there. because I almost felt guilty around the other parents I had not really talked to any of them. after meeting a few of them I understood. here I was feeling like I could never survive having a baby with scrambled eggs for a heart, or a child with a terminal illness... but after hearing our story a funny thing happened. they were all in shock. how could I live through it? it was amazing to hear these amazing strong beautiful women say that they felt the same way I did. I was speechless. it did not matter what we were going through as moms and families, we were all there struggling and praying and fighting together. for our children. it was truly one of the most amazing experiences of my life. I can tell you, if you live near one...GO. contribute. volunteer. bring your kids. cook a meal for the house residents. they are most appreciative. and your heart will definitely grow for it.

while all of this was going on Big'K had her diagnoses confirmed. definitely Asperger's, and anxiety. which we knew. they took away the depression and PTSD. but upped her OCD, saying it was much more severe than originally diagnosed at age 8. she was put on medicine and was going so much better. the counting had all but stopped. but she began to be more impatient. was more 'forceful' and assertive when normally she would shrink back and be quieter. and while visiting me at the RMH we noticed she had began picking. she would pick in her sleep and had a horrible spot about the size of a half dollar in addition to about half a dozen spots on her face. they were beginning to develop staph and were getting gnarly. we have since stopped the meds and will follow up right before Xmas to see if we can try something else. she is back to counting but the picking seems to have stopped. which is great. the forcefulness with her words is slacking off and she is doing better.

my eyes leaked for three weeks straight. not only was I not being able to mourn for my house and belongings (yes I know they are just things...but they were my things and I loved them), but here I was five hours from home having my smallest committed. needless to say it has been a rough 2013. I am so ready for 2014. and I do hope it brings better things for my little snafud world. we are doing better. no real progress on the house yet. it has been recommended that we do not bring Lil'K back to the house. but we also have to have her supervised 24/7 because of her firesetting tendencies (which thank goodness seem to have been quelled). so needless to say it is hard to have the time to get over there to work on it. very few things were salvageable so there is not too much left to get out. then the hard part. you see the structure is still standing but the inside is totally ruined. if not burnt, the heat, smoke, water and foam ruined it. so we have a lot of cleanup to do. and then have the house torn down. and then figure out where to go from there. the house was covered on insurance but not the contents. and after paying off the mortgage, the insurance money (minus depreciation), is thin to say the least. so whatever is next will have to make sense financially.  we will look at all the options and go from there. it will have to do.

I have been having horrible anxiety at night about the fire. sleeping has become hard. everything looks like fire. smells like fire. and makes me think fire. the shadows coming in the window of the branches moving in the light, the electronics that have a flashing light, any noise at all. when I do sleep I have nightmares about everything burning. add to that the fact that I am a night owl naturally and the years of weird shifts I have worked most of my life and you have typical insomnia. yay!! I get up and check Lil'K so often I cannot actually get good sleep. I am so afraid I am going to doze off and she is going to start a fire. my heart races and sleep is the furthest thing from my mind. I can take an OTC sleep aide. but most of them after two nights give me restless leg so I have to stop them. when I take something I can usually sleep but then am left with the sleep med hangover. which sucks. I will get there. I spoke to Lil'Ks therapist, he said there is a good chance the fire gave me a sort of PTSD. nice. as if I do not have enough going on as it is. oh well. I will get past it. I always do.

all in all this year has blown. but the holidays are upon us. we have had so much to be thankful for. and more positive things coming in the future. we are all under one roof for now. myself, Big'K, Lil'K, the BFF, her hubby Juice, Big'R, Lil'R and Mid'K. it has been fun to say the least. everyone is learning the ropes. and they are doing well. Lil'K has done SO much better. and we are all proud of her. it has been an adjustment to say the least. but we will all make it through. and things will get better. just today I paid it forward to a family that Big'K is friends with. I actually went to school with the mother. and the oldest son and Big'K are tight like thieves. he is a sweet kid. they are going through a hard time right now and food has been scarce. I paid forward a little bit. just something small. a grocery card. so they can eat. I know what it is like to not have food. I have struggled and been in that same predicament but was too proud to say anything. there were weeks where we lived off of oatmeal or cereal. or just plain rice. times when I would eat oatmeal and let the kids have the 'real' food. these times were not too long ago. and my heart told me to pay forward. she almost would not even take the card. I told her you can take it or I will go grocery shop for you and bring it here. eventually through tears she took it. it made my heart smile. big.

things will get better. they certainly must. I have faith in Big G. and Baby J and Blessed Mother M. in my heart I know they will. there is just that thing...that says all of these trials have been for something. just please do not let them be testing me for something bigger and worse. just let them be humbling me for something awesome and amazing.

life is but a journey. and I most certainly plan on brighter times ahead. bring it on new year. I am definitely ready for something new.

mental illness is a bitch. it has consumed my life as a mother. it affects so many people in this world. it has been stigmatized and turned into something that is seen as shameful. over the past couple of years so many beautiful strong women have spoken out about their trials and have helped to bring awareness in the hopes to erase the stigma associated with mental illness. one in particular, The Bloggess, has frequently blogged on her struggle with anxiety and depression. she is just one of my many heros. to all of those that continue to share in order to change the public view on this horrible disease...keep up the good fight. this is part of my story...

I suffered with post partum depression after my second child at the age of 29. it morphed into depression and clouded my life for the better part of six years. prior to that anger and resentment, from my mother dying when I was 15, combined with the twists and turns that followed in the next four or so years, turned me into someone I no longer recognized. this lasted for about 20 years. let that sink in. two decades. of anger, resentment and grief. it changes you. changes who you are at the core. the face that stares back at you from the bathroom mirror is that of a total stranger.

the 'new' me at thirty was ill equipped to handle motherhood. I had never really been a very maternal person to begin with. I was adopted. and although I loved my parents deeply I suffered from some type of attachment disorder. I never liked to be touched. or hugged. being held and comforted in a rocker by the age of six was really just torture. I had a hard time expressing my love in words. I loved my friends more publicly than I ever was able to love my parents. pile onto this the shock and anger at my mother passing and the PPD that hung over me like a thunderstorm and you just get one really detached human.

I had my first child, Big'K, at the age of 21. I was in the Army with a great future in front of me. Cue unplanned pregnancy. The fear of being more than a thousand miles from everyone I considered a loved one, combined with the fact that her father was on the west coast and I was heading to the upper east coast, guided my judgment and I chose to exit stage left from the military. one of the biggest regrets of my life. I came home and had her a month early. with a horrible C-section, my inability to breast feed, complete ignorance at taking care of a child and no natural maternal fairydust to guide me, we struggled through the first few months. my cousin Harley took us in and helped so much. she was a different child. much like me. was uncomfortable being held. had reflux to the Amityville Horror level. could not tolerate most formulas. she was mostly a happy baby. literally cried hard three times before the age of one. two of those times we went to the hospital because I had no idea what to do. I was being spoiled. I had the best infant ever. so adorable and sweet. went along with mostly anything. we muddled through the first few years and made it. we never really were able to bond. two people who do not like to be touched do not make a loving mother daughter commercial. I deployed when she was six. not across the world. but across this huge state I live in. she stayed half the time with the BFF and the rest with my dad and step mom. she sunk into a horrible depression. and I was destroyed. I had thought that I would have been able to handle the distance and separation. but I sucked at it. horribly. after the year I returned and we actually began to bond. it was a great time.

cue second child.

things were wrong from the beginning. the whole pregnancy was hard. I was sick. and so so tired. I had tons of scar tissue from previous surgeries and endometriosis and the entire pregnancy each time she grew something would rip. I spent the entire pregnancy wondering when one of us was going to die. obviously neither of us did. we made it to the end. the hospital stay itself is another post. motherhood is strange. I believe it gives us the ability to block certain things out. for if not no one would have more than one child. maybe because the last four years have been so rough my brain did the only thing it could do, push those baby memories to the back so that there was a good part to remember. because in my mind her babyhood was great. but it was not. she wavered between being a great happy baby to head spinning pea soup spitting demon child. it was different than with Big'K. I felt like we had bonded. at this point I figured it was just something I was doing. my support system was great. so I knew it could not just be me. for the most part though it was all ok. we moved right before she turned two. she was a baby that had been in daycare since she was 10 weeks old. and had done well. once we moved though things changed. she began acting out. biting. throwing crazy fits. I had no idea what was going on. a lot had changed. we moved. I was working one week on and one week off. eventually things lined out a little more. we moved back 'home' when she was about four. the fits had become worse. she would clench her teeth and growl like a wild animal. her eyes would be glossy and full of rage. she began kicking and hitting. either everything around her or herself. leaving a virtual fall out zone for weeks at a time. nothing made her happy. when we would figure out what made her happy it would change.

cue the beginning of the end of normal.

it becomes harder to remember the further we get from that defining moment. but I know it was close to thanksgiving. she was 'raging' in the living room. I had started doing the ignore tactic. hoping it would lessen the severity and longevity of the fits. I walked into the kitchen to wash dishes. she was on the floor in the living room kicking and growling. my kitchen and living room are open to each other so I could still see her. I would glance at her every ten to fifteen seconds just to be sure she was ok. then glancing every thirty or so seconds. I could hear her kicking and growling the whole time. she was in a direct line of sight. I looked away to put a plate in the dish rack and wash another. when I looked back up at her, she had the cord to the vacuum cleaner wrapped around her neck and was pulling with all her might. my sweet beautiful four year old was... self harming. how does that even happen? I ran over and took the cord from her hands and from around her neck. I sat on the floor and held her tight crying until she calmed down. this was the straw that broke the camels back. the next day I called our local MHMR to schedule an appointment. I did not have insurance and could not afford to pay out of pocket. so I went with what I knew. this was a horrible time. the two weeks of doing paperwork to get her qualified and then seen was excruciating. it felt like a decade. with her self harming becoming more frequent how could we continue to wait. we were qualified and did eventually get it. this started the road that we have been on for the last four, almost five, years. we have found meds that have worked. but she metabolizes meds quickly. adapts. there are frequent updoses. and med changes. the one med that has kept her stable for so long we have had to stop. it was messing with her sugar and triglycerides. and her hormones were way too high. so after over a year of mostly ok times, we are at the start again. and I feel like I did four years ago.

I am exhausted. I worry constantly. she rages. but has turned her anger towards me. she hates me. and not like 'oh yeah my daughter told me she hates me' and it is a phase that every child goes through. my daughter truly with every cell in her body hates me. if only for thirty minutes. she truly hates me. but does not know why. and it is not constant. but when it hits the destruction she leaves is almost irreparable. the first new med we tired was a no-go. it made her very self sabotaging. we are on a new med now. it seems to be working. but she is metabolizing it fast. so it is wearing off. and between that time and the next dose it is all death and dismemberment. one of her meds is a time med. it HAS to be given every 12 hours on the dot. with no more than 15 minutes each way. this is not a joke. we have found that even twenty to thirty minutes late or early changes everything. we need to add in another dose during the day of the new med, but the doctor does not agree. he thinks is would sedate her. a sledge hammer and a WWF wrestler could not sedate this child. I know the doctor has the degree and the schooling. but I am the mom. I have her 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. I see her. I know what the meds do and do not do. I am not stupid. I am educated. I have read and researched everything I can to better help her and us. he tells me I am a good parent, but gets irritated that I know the names of meds and their half-lives. did I mention I have been a lab tech since 1996? I am IN the medical field. I know things. you have a parent that is willing to read. and learn. and be proactive in their child's mental healthcare. that can understand dosages and half-life's. that should be used as a tool in helping this child. but instead I get chastised for researching and learning. it is sad. a medical community that often does not believe in childhood mental illness' because they do not understand them. tells parents they are wrong.

in the last three months we have had one of the roughest times since the thanksgiving stunt. she has tried to jump out of a moving car. asked me to drown her in the canal. set the house on fire. cut her hair off. wrote stories about not having a mom. ran away. stolen her sister's money. told me she hated me. asked to be institutionalized. waged mental warfare with everyone she loves. self harmed. she has also laughed. shared her ice cream. helped a kid with their math work. dressed up in play clothes and make up. helped cook dinner. took up for a kid being bullied. made straight A's. fixed her own bento box for lunch. played in the rain. sang at the top of her lungs in the shower. woke up and fixed her sister breakfast. and given the best hugs.

this is not normal behavior for an 8 year old.

my name is Loco YaYa. my Big'K is smarter than 96% of the population. beautiful in a natural way. empathetic. loving. nerdy. not affected by peer pressure or social expectations. strange and wonderful. she is her own person. she is determined to go to college early. she is not defined by her Asperger's or severe OCD or anxiety disorder. but if she was she would not care. she is so special. I wish everyone could do that. not worry about what others thought. and continue to push forward.

my name is Loco YaYa. my Lil'K is beautiful. can sing like an angel. highly intelligent. funny as hell. loves ice cream. is flexible like a gymnast and wants to cheer. loves being independent. wishes she was not different. hates the voices in her head. she is bi-polar. my sweet beautiful baby is bi-polar. she cycles anywhere from 8 to 20 times a day on a bad day. and will struggle the rest of her life with an invisible illness that will define her. and she cares. I worry about her future. where she will be and how she will continue forward.

mental illness needs a punch in the junk. it sucks. it makes your life hard. it begs to be hidden. well I am tired of hiding. I am tired of the stigma. I am tired of society dictating what is right and wrong. that child you see melting the fuck down in the grocery store is not always a result of bad parenting. and that mom that is gritting her teeth and holding back tears praying that her kid can hold it together long enough to get the groceries in the car is overwhelmed. she is tired. she does not need your stare of disapproval. she is doing the best she can with what she has to work with. and I guarantee she would be more than willing to give you a weekend in her shoes and watch you fail miserably. that parent that speaks more sternly or with truths that you believe are too much for a child to understand when explaining something is not being bitchy. she may just be explaining something a little more logically to a child that only sees black and white. only understands logic. and that child may have a 160 IQ and understand far more than you do. I am tired of a mental health system that studies symptoms and patterns of adults and because they do not fit to a child, thinks it is not possible. or a doctor that thinks a parent does not know as much about their child because they do not have a PhD. I call horseshit on the world for making parents of mentally ill children suffer in silence. and a big fuck you to the universe for even making it possible.

I am the mother of a mentally ill child. and I refuse to be silent...

it no longer lingers all year. no longer sits just below the surface like a nagging splinter. it is not the first thing on my mind when I wake up, although it does cross my mind the moment before sleep sometimes. I no longer count down to the date, calculating the years since that horrible day and then noticing how much the 'without' years dwarf the 'with' years. starting with a stomach ache, or unexplainable depression in the middle of summer and having it morph into a complete break in august. more importantly the anger is not all consuming. the vitriol that my brain spewed at all the others who still had their mothers. there are differences. with the time. the ache is still there... just a little different.

it comes like a gut shot at times, like when I realize Big'K is less than a week from her sophomore year. stabs like a knife when Lil'K is having a rough day and I just need some advice, or to escape. an overwhelming wave of nausea when I realize that last Saturday was the day, and I did not even realize it. that the trip to purchase bento boxes on Friday, the hanging around on Saturday, and trip to the beach on Sunday were enough to keep my mind from realizing what the date was. and that the timing this year is just eerie. two weekends and just nine days before Big'K's first day of 10th grade. when 22 years ago, it was the Saturday before my first day of 10th grade. three days before to be exact. the sick feeling this morning when I wondered why everyone kept saying I was just 'off' this weekend, and not knowing the reason for it, until this morning at work seeing the date on the calendar. yep. that was the reason. that even though I consciously did not realize the date, my body did. that was the reason for being so 'off', because my heart always knows.

it is not that I have forgotten. you never forget something like that. it is just that with time, the pain changes. I do not know anymore if I believe that time heals. I have told other people, even told myself that it does. but I am no longer sure. I do not feel as if I have been healed. I do feel that I have changed. I do know that time will change things. I know that my mini-breakdown a couple years ago helped so much. such a strange statement to make. when I read those words on paper it does not make sense. but that breakdown...it definitely fixed something. changed something. healed something.

I know I was blessed to have the years that I had with her. I wish I would have paid more attention. and learned more. I wish I could be more like her. with the patience of a saint. the smile that could light up a room. fantastic baking skills. a mother like no other. and so so much more.

grief is like a continuous circle. you are constantly in one stage or another. sometimes you stay stuck in one. I was stuck in anger for a long time. unable to move past it and continue to grieve. that is so dangerous. and destructive. it took me 20 years to get out of it. but things have been so much better since I have. I have chilled in acceptance. every once in a while though, something will hit and boom the circle will start over. but that is ok. it helps. moving through the stages can help to change your grief. mold it into something you can live with. and I am there. moving. and living. and it is way better than where I was stuck for so long.

I know it will always hurt. I know it will always make me cry. but it will not hold me hostage.

I have changed.

they are a rattlin'.

growing up we moved quite a bit. or at least it seemed that way. i really only lived in two or three different cities between kindergarten and senior year. between third and summer before eighth grade we lived in the same city. but moved about seven different times in that span. my mother stayed at home with us, most of that time; my father teetered between owning his own business and working contract work. so change was the constant.

as a human we despise change. or at least the majority of us do. but somewhere in all the chaos i developed a love hate relationship with change. my soul yearned for change but my mind fought it. i would yearn for change but then fight it when it was happening. i think that is only natural. most of that change was out of my control. and at the time was frightening, but now i look back on it and am glad it all happened. it made me who i am.

i try to teach my children to not be scared of change. to accept it and make the best of it. i have tried to teach them that this is it. the only life we get. and there is so much more to it than this corner of the best state in the world (texas for all you that were guessing). there is so much to see. and experience. even just in this great country of America. and it is important to see it. learn everything you can. why not? if this is it, why not do everything you can. and have the best life. and be the best person you can in the process.

with the changes i have made personally to who i am, and fighting to get the better parts of girl i used to be back, my nomad bones have started rattling in their cage. lately i have been struggling between my need to have my place, with my family and those i love around. and my internal need to roam. we have been planning 'the compound'. a parcel of land where three or four of my nearest and dearest will make roots. land that we can all work on. to make our place in this jacked up world. a safe haven. with gardens and animals for food. a community of sorts. protection from the outside chaos. so that in years to come my family can be safe. a place to call ours when the proverbial shit hits the fan. the plans are exciting. everyone is on board. we even have a 'shit or get off the pot' date set.

in the midst of all the planning my bones started rattling. my soul yearning to just go. not for long in the beginning. but to just get out. sometimes you have to get away to realize that you need to come back. with all the issues with Lil'K it has been near impossible. Big'K is finishing up her freshman year of high school and looking forward to the remainder of high school. as much as i would have loved for her to have been homeschooled, i think where she is now would not be a good time to uproot and explore. so i have made a truce with myself. three years. she will graduate in 2016 and head off to college. at that time Lil'K will just be heading into junior high. the BFF is a pro at homeschooling. that time would be perfect to leave. so the BFF and i have been coming up with a plan.

first off is getting the transportation. you see, we do not want to leave just to set permanent roots somewhere else. because at the end of the day, or the trip, i will always want to come 'home'. so we will RV it. she is looking right now for one. and i am doing the research. i think taking it easy in the beginning will work. her taking short trips to family with her kids during the next school year. and then eventually working in my crew as well. just summers. and not this one. next one. take off for about 6 weeks. and if that works, financially and physically, then the next summer take 10 weeks. the hardest part is financing. finding a way for me to work just during the year and then off during the summer. i have been working very hard on my finances over the last year and things are so much brighter. with a little more hard work and effort i believe i could pull off saving enough to make it through the summer while traveling.

after a couple of summers, and long enough to get Big'K through graduation from high school, we should have a true sense of whether or not it would truly work full time. taking the summer after her senior year as one last hurrah, and then hitting it full time. taking a year at a time. if at anytime we decide we want to come back then we will. and if not, we will just continue on until we decide not to.

it is a scary idea. but filled with so much wonder and excitement at the possibilities. as always this could just be another loco hairbrained idea. i tend to have those. but i think i have such elaborate ideas because my inner nomad is screaming. we are sitting still. we are becoming complacent. we are dying inside. so for right now it is an idea. one that we will thoroughly research. and plan. and hopefully put into action. and if not, it will be fun to plan and dream about.

wow. i hate when i check my last post and realize that it has been so long since i have posted. life just gets busy. and in my little snafud world busy is an understatement.

so lemme see.... where are we...

oh reader. damned Google. it still throws me off. i am slowly tracking down my favorites. but it just makes things harder. and makes me much slower to read and comment. and we all know everybody loves blog comment love.

we had a couple of birthdays. Lil'K celebrated her 8th. and in step with the 'Mother of the Year' that i am obviously winning at, i did not do my normal birthday blog for her. but i redeemed myself with getting her a bike. the birthday was great. we had tons of friends and family at the house to celebrate. cupcakes that were yummy and a pinata that held wayyyyy more candy and goodies than should be allowed by law. the only downside was that, at the time, Lil'K had fractured a bone in her lower leg and with all the running and playing it was causing a lot of pain, so she petered out a little early. and mom of the year over here didn't realize something was wrong with said leg for over two weeks.

my birthday followed a little over two weeks later and it was fun. all the big people actually went out. like out out. like big people do. i even dressed up. and wore make up. and 3" wedges. friends, family and co-workers showed up and it was great. the BFF wasn't able to make it due to not feeling well so that part sucked, but all in all it was a good birthday.

we have started having Friday Night Community Dinner at my house. it started out as a way for me to pay a neighbor/friend/inner-circle-member for keeping Lil'K a couple of afternoons after daycare until i got home. but i live in a small town so as soon as friends started seeing the cars the calls started coming in. which turned into "sure!! come on over". within two weekends we had well over 40 people at my house. i cook with the help of BFF and the inner circle mamas help with the picking up of the house on Friday after Friday morning coffee. it did get to the point that there is now a facebook private page just for the FNCD crew. we will kind of slow down during the summer as most of my friends actually do things. i have totally enjoyed the Friday nights, but after 6 months of it...it is getting to be a little much. but i love it. i get to see all of my nearest and dearest friends that i love so much at least once a month now. and that more than makes up for it. although it seems that even if the FNCD is cancelled, the inner-circle ends up still hanging out. the inner-circle is just myself, the BFF, cousin June, cousin August, cousin BigJ and The Blondes (neighbors that have become very close). so even without the full on party, there are still quite a few of us. but i enjoy it.

we have been on quite a ride with Lil'K and her meds. i cannot remember how much i have said without going back and reading older posts, and well, i am at work and not gonna do it lol. we have switched meds recently. since christmas maybe? i cannot remember exactly. but we are on lithium now. and prozac. and respirdol. it has been helpful. but we will always be on a medicine ride. until she gets a little older and can learn to self-control her moods and swings. but all in all we have had a much better last three months.

Big'K got her class ranking and GPA. she is 26th out of 165. which just makes me mad. she has a 3.7 GPA which makes me mad again. she is so smart. and she knows had she not had so many zeros she would have been way higher ranked with a better GPA. i do hope this helps to push her forward a little. her anxiety was way worse this freshman year of high school. but she is finding ways to work on it.

this coming weekend we will be heading to dallas for A-Kon. the anime convention not the singer. we are all excited. the two big girls and the BFF and i are going. so there will be a post after that. we also had a tragedy at work. so i will post about that as well.

i hope that is enough of an update for right now. and secretly the only reason i updated is because i know MOTPG would stop by.

...apparently off the face of the earth. but only the cyber earth. i am actually alive and well. just have not spent a ton of time online.

first Google  decided to kill off the Reader. which is horrible in my world. i relied on it. to read the blogs i loved the most. to let me know when there was a new post. and now....nothing. i have to go and hunt them down like 'olden times' and well seriously i was following over 260 blogs. with a good two dozen that i read weekly. finding them all is a pain. so i have been slow to comment lately. and slow to blog. i will sit down this weekend and hammer out a few posts. we celebrated a birthday, had a holiday weekend, have started Friday Night Community Dinner at my house weekly, dove back into the world of daycare, and so many other things over the last couple of months.

i have not written due to the lack of words or inspiration, it has been due to how busy we have been. both good busy and bad busy. and the fact that my children have taken over my laptop. plus we kind of instituted a 'no electronics' on the weekend rule. which is bad for me.

i will catch you all up. soon. promise.

it is no secret that i am adopted. after the birth of Lil'K i was forced to do a little thinking. health wise i was going through things that were a bit scary. things that my mother had gone through. that ultimately led to her having a hysterectomy when i was three. which led to her being on hormones. which as we all know led to her death. facing the same surgery in my near future started to worry me. it made me think long and hard about my medical past. and more importantly, my lack of knowledge about my medical past. the fact that i now had a second child, whose paternal medical past i had no knowledge of either. being adopted, and in the mid 70's at that, you can imagine that the 'passing on of information' was not quite as open as it is now in some cases. i literally knew very little. i knew the agency used. that she was musical. had brown hair. was 21. and that i was a mix of irish, dutch and indian. the tribal headdress kind, not the in the sand with camel's kind. and that the possibility i was given up was that she wanted to head to medical school. but that was the extent of what i knew.

enter Lil'K and my need for learning more skyrocketed. but how on earth could i do that? my adoption was obviously closed. my birth mother used an agency that in my area is known for their 'wayward home for expecting young mothers'. or back in the day that was the case. i started by contacting them. no help. i could pay an astronomical amount of money and send in an application that if happened to match another party would allow me to receive information. so i put my information out on a couple of adoption sites. by the time i forgot about it i received an email from an adoption search agency. in the email it only asked if the number shown was my birth certificate number. it was. the number matched a birth certificate from my birthday with only 'baby girl' listed. but with a name under mother. then the same number is shown with my name, my mother and father as well. she said it was unusual back then for the same number to be on both. they would usually give a new number to the birth certificate that went with the adoptive parents and child. so it made things easier. she was able to give me my birth mother's name. her parents names. the name of her mother. and another relative as well as his address and phone number and the fact that at one time she had lived with him. of course, i could not fathom calling that number. i just kind of sat on the information for a while. do not get me wrong, i would google the shit out of the information i had. but just could not act on it. i googled for quite a while. years even. but did not get the push i needed until early 2012 when my cousin and i started putting together our family tree. i decided to start another one on the side. you would not believe the information that can be found on those sites. so i entered my birth mother's name. i found a picture of her. from high school and nearly fell out of my chair. i could not even think. i took a picture of it on my phone and sent it to August. she immediately was like WTF is that? the resemblance was striking. i knew it was her.

i continued to search for her brother. i knew her parents were already deceased. i had found their death certificates. but the brother remained elusive. and she was just kind of in the wind. i searched and searched. but kept coming up with nothing but dead ends.

school started and the holidays hit. and the searching just kind of came to a halt. after christmas i decided to look again. and the first entry in google was... her obituary. it took my breath away. she had passed away at the age of 57 in september of 2012. i contacted the funeral home that was listed as doing the arrangements. the gentleman there was very sympathetic to my story. after playing phone tag for almost a month, i got in touch with him this morning and heard the news that i was dreading. he did not do the pick up from the hospital. it was another funeral home. it was a county case. she was cremated. no living relatives or assets. it was a friend from work that made the arrangements. they did not even know where she was born at. where her parents were from. or any other information.

the only part i heard was ... no living relatives.

it brought my everything to a halt.

every. thing.

after all my searching. and wondering. that was it. it was over. no. living. relatives.

all i can do now is try to find the woman that helped make the arrangements. and maybe talk to her. i searched all day for her brother. and the other relative. to no avail.

i just have a hard time imagining that this is the end. but i have to say my heart is very heavy. i know as an adopted child that your past is always hard to narrow down. and i love my parents. they are the only mom and dad i know. the best ever. and i do not want to belittle them. but i think being human...there is an instinct to understand your past. to know where you come from. i think that has nothing to do with being adopted. i want to know the same things about my parents. especially my mom. i knew her as my mom, but growing up without her i was not able to really understand what she was like as an adult. i only saw her as a mom. i want to know about her as much as i do my birth mom. probably even more. but with both of them gone...where do i start? how do i get to my past? what will i tell my girls? i do not want them to be my age and wonder about their pasts. i know this will be something that i will have to get past. getting past your past. sheesh i sure have been working on this lately.

ughh. just one more thing to add to my list of 'shitineedtoworkthrough'

the last two weeks have been a tad bit crazy. but i guess in a good way. i guess it starts with Christmas. the whole thing was just so weird. i do not know if the kids getting early released from school the Friday prior to Christmas, which made Christmas seem to come faster, or if it was that i took off of work the entire week of Christmas. this holiday just seemed strange from the get-go. my cousin and his wife (and adorable two year old!) were down from Colorado for a week to celebrate with us, but to also pack up their home to move permanently from here to there. we had tons of fun and cousin time. which was great. we enjoyed it so much. although it did seem like i was killing my liver a little at a time. Christmas Eve i pulled a little bender. ended up in a ditch. and i do not mean my car. i mean me. my body. in a ditch. a very cold, wet ditch. for hours. yep. yay vodka. combined with a safety meeting (long story). needless to say it was a fun night...but a little overdone on my part. here at the Casa de la Loco, we open presents on Christmas Eve morning. a tradition that was started after the birth of Lil'K. we just have too many places to go in too short a time. well the present opening came and went with very little fanfare. it did not help that Lil'K decided to bust out of bed at 2:30 in the morning. i talked her into staying in bed until a little after four. which made for a long day for mama. the big guy in the red suit only brought three presents per child. which could have been the issue. the mama decided to pay bills first and get presents second. it was a smart financial decision, but sucked for the girls. i do not regret it. at all. extra presents did come in the mail from my second mother. which was awesome. and much appreciated.

after the ditch incident later that evening, Christmas Day ended up kind of being a blur. we made it out to Papa Loco's house. and did the fat red man there. normally we would spend Christmas evening for dinner with the BFF, but she was out of town. out of state actually. which made the holidays even weirder. the first time in almost a decade that Christmas wasn't spent with my family. i actually got to visit with my aunt that i rarely see which was wonderful. it just seemed that the whole week flew by. this past week was even dumber. off on monday, work on tuesday, work on wednesday and thursday. off on friday. work on saturday. off on sunday (today) and back to work tomorrow. i guess that is what i get for taking a week off.

through all of it though my kids were like champs. they did not complain, at least not more than normal kids do. and it made me proud. they did not complain about the lack of gifts. the appreciated the fact that all of our utilities still worked. they appreciated the visit with all of the family. i am amazed by my children every day. even the bad days. i am still proud of them. and amazed that someone so loco is who made them. who has raised them. it is just amazing.

tonight Big'K said something that made me so proud. we went for burgers. it was late and i did not feel like cooking. while at the burger place i noticed a strange guy. you know the one. speaking too loudly. dressed in too many layers. dirty beard and hair. very disheveled. pacing. around the inside and then outside and back in. you could tell he was hungry. but obviously had no money. and he was crazy. not in a good way. in a schizo or bipolar way. and he was apparently not medicated. normally where we live it is pretty warm. but right now we are in the middle of our 'winter' which means it can get nippy. i was very cautious of him. as both of my children are 'special' and tend to attract the weird ones. when we were finished eating, i sent the girls with my car keys to go get in the car. and i walked up to the counter. i asked the girl if she knew if he was just drunk or was he mental. already knowing the answer. there was a good possibility he may have been drunk. but he was without a doubt mental. all i could see in my minds eye was Lil'K, my brother, or many of the countless others that i know that suffer from mental illness in that same predicament. she said she did not know. but he had been there for well over an hour. in my time there he had gone up and gotten a coffee cup. i asked her did he pay for his drink and she said no. "i think he has something wrong with him. he babbles off and on. about nothing or everything. he is obviously hungry. but i think he is homeless" she said back. in an almost whisper as to not draw his attention. i then told her the following: "in this bag are two of our three orders of fries. we did not need them. i want you to order four chicken strips. if not eaten they are easy to carry and will keep for a while. also order a small drink. when they are ready, please give the bag of fries and the chicken and drink to that man. he obviously needs it." she looked at me with eyes full of question. "my youngest daughter is mentally ill. i have many friends that suffer from mental illness as well. they could just as easily be in his predicament. and i would like to think that there are still good people in the world that would look at them and know that it is ok to be afraid, but not ok to shun or ignore them. that even just a meal could make a difference in their life." she told me thank you and that she would do it. "no need for thanks, you just find a need and pass it on." those were the words i left her with. when i got to the car Big'K was crying. not sobbing. just single tears. i had told the girls what i was going to do and that i wanted them to go to the car. because it was ok to be a little afraid. and just in case i wanted them to be safe. i backed my car up far enough that i could see the guy, i was afraid he would leave before his food was ready. he was not sitting where he had been and i was worried. then Lil'K said look mom he has the food! and there he was walking back from the drink counter with our bag of fries, a box of chicken and a HUGE smile on his face. as i drove away Big'K simply said...

"well now i know where i get that feeling inside that i want to always do for people. and pay it forward all the time. to reach out to those that are different. to be afraid but still help. i get it from you. and that makes me proud mom. it makes me proud of you and proud of me and sister that we have such a good example."

just when you think you suck at parenting a little gem like that pops out of your child's mouth. and you are instantly proud. and know you are doing something right.

2013 - the year of the pay it forward in this house has officially begun.