Nanny 911

Remember this blog entry about Family Solutions? We had our first meeting this past Monday. It was ok. A lot of paper work. It's very humbling to sit in front of a counselor and admit you need more help then you can figure out. Seriously. You don't seek counseling unless you have problems right?? Or so that's how I've felt. But as i mature (ha) I'm realizing that life is to short to struggle alone with whatever it may be. And for us right now, or should I say me, it's dealing with Miss A. I want to give her the best I can for her future and the sooner we can get on the same page the better. I don't want the parenting issues we have now go un-dealt with to only manifest itself in say an eating disorder, or whatever control thing could happen.
Lets be pro-active while we can. Dori, our counselor, said we are 'easy'. We don't have any food issues, sleep (other then the child wakes up before the chickens do), she gets a long just fine with others, she follows directions in Sunday School, etc. And she LOVES to sing.
Dori said that when she's singing that means she's happy. SO when she stops singing you need to observe what she is doing. Could we be heading towards a control issue? What happened? or what could happen? Now mind you it's not like when she stops singing she's not happy.
Hard to make this make sense via typing:) It makes sense in my head. That's all the matters right??

Then the other BIG THING is that DH and I HAVE GOT TO BE on the same page. If I say no, DH says no. If he doesn't agree with something I did, he can give me 'the look' but that's IT! We can address it later, but not in front of her. She is smart to know that if him and i start becking at one another the attention is off of her. She won!

The biggest thing for me is staying calm! The minute i raise my voice or my non verbals go she has won. That's what she wants. To do that we are staying very calm and saying 'so sad. I guess will just have to sit in our room till we are happy'. OR what we use a lot when it's time to put toys away and she doesn't' want to 'so sad. You'll have to say good bye to them' at which point I/we pick them up and that's the end of those toys.

This has been working. She loves her Bitty Baby. She threw the baby. She didn't' get the baby for 2 days. And she would tell me why she didn't get it. Or when she threw trains and almost hit C'man b/c she didn't want to pick them up. DH promptly took her upstairs. The next day she told me she threw trains and almost hit C'man. She knew!

So this is just a nutshell and I'm doing the best I can sitting here on our laptop and the stupid cursor moves where ever i left the mouse! Please help, that's SO annoying. Both kids are playing very nicely with the farm animals. In about 10 min it'll be time to pick them up. Will see how that goes.

The only thing that didn't settle good with me at our meeting was when she had us sign papers authorizing us to talk with her supervisor/mentor. She is furthering her education so she has a mentor that she must study under. She said I'll tell her 'I'm working with a family of 4. One biological and the other child adopted'. If I hadn't been in utter shock at the comment and overwhelmed with all we'd just discussed, I'd had said something. That comment will NOT come again. If it does she will be corrected. Bio or not that has nothing to do with why we are here!

i must add quickly, momma loved her flowers. she called me and thanked me and said I didn't need to spend my money on doing that.

I'm In Trouble

Thursday my mom had Caddric surgery. I went and spent the time with them. We sat in the waiting room for well over one hour. They finally called her name and Dad and I thought we'd run an errand, or two. The nurses told us to be back 1 1/2. So....we ran to two stores to get fitness equipment I had bought for our Community Center.
As we drove away Dad said we'd better be back in one hour or she'll be mad. Well...we were on track to being back in one hour when I got a call on my cell saying she was done.
The words out of both of our mouths were shit!!
We knew we'd be in trouble FOR SURE! And that we were.

I can't say I blame her. I would have been to. Then to make matters worse we couldn't find her eye drops. They fell out of the bag in the van. You should have seen my dad and I. We were about to pull apart the entire van (unload the new bike, weights, etc).

We grabbed a bite to eat, in silence. We went shopping, she came around by then. But now I just got an email from my dad saying don't call for a couple days. She's pretty ticked and hurt yet and it'll take a couple days to get over it but she'll probably never forget it.

So yeah, here I sit. I fell ROTTEN! It was all my fault. I debated about running to walmart to get paint for Miss A's room vs going all the way to get the fitness equipment. And ultimately we should have just STAYED PUT!! The thing is, it is what it is. We ran errands, I feel awful about it (as does Dad) but here we are and I'm not sure what to do next. I feel even worse for my Dad b/c he has to live with her.

I'm going to go ahead and send her a floral bouquet and pray that eases some of the tension. Any other ideas??

Family Solutions Services

Talk about an answer to prayers. The other day my mom read to me an ad she saw in there local paper for a LMSW??? well here's what it says:
Family Solutions Services: Helping families, children and individuals find better solutions. Experience in: ADHD, Attachment Issues, Working with Families, Parenting Techniques, Oppositional Defiant Disorder Options, Working With Children. ACCEPTING NEW CLIENTS!!

SIGN ME UP!!!

I called Tuesday afternoon and have us an appt for Monday. The lady was excited. She actually said I'm a smart (daaa) lady b/c i answered her questions. As in when I told her our daughter did so well away from us. What changed she said? I responded b/c she knows DH and I have different parenting techniques and she can pin us against one another. She asked her age and when I said just turned 3 she was like ' I LOVE THAT AGE!'. So yeah, her excitement level was encouraging. I felt that after hanging up I made the right decision. Now lets hope it continues. That I don't become intimidated or feel like a lousy parent for what we have done. I told her I've read lots of books, ask/talk to other parents, etc but my husband doesn't do any of it. Not that what he may do, or not do, is right or wrong, just feel like I'm the one educating myself and trying to implement what I've learned/read about, and he figures if it hasn't been tested on him it's a no go. Mind you, he was not like Miss A when he was a child, I WAS!!

I'll be sure to keep you all posted!