Overwhelm 12.9.22

It’s been a minute since I last wrote. Covid did a number on a lot of us; students and adults alike. It created a state of overwhelm, for some, far deeper than they’ve experienced before. So let’s talk about overwhelm and how it affects us.

People can be overwhelmed by many different and differing factors. Everything from being alone too much (hello, at home learning/working, creating social anxieties and isolation) to being in a crowd (noise, lights, physical jostling, creating sensory issues in body and mind) to too much school work, to social and interpersonal discomforts and more. These states can initiate over-excitablity and overwhelm leading to a gap between abilities and output.

Unfortunately, it’s often difficult for people to recognize they’re entering a state of overwhelm until flight, fight, freeze, or fawn takes over. By then, there’s no logic on earth that can calm the nervous system. At that point, we need to take a step back to make sure we, and our children, are safe. Discussions need to be paused until more regulated heads prevail. This can take a few minutes to a few months depending on the depths of overwhelm. And, the months can become difficult as we hope we can find center again.

Some expressions of overwhelm are surprising and too often it’s called problematic behavior. Kids are labeled defiant or lazy. And it’s these visible behaviors that often get in the way of others being supportive. Often what is seen as oppositional or non-compliant is really a person in a state of overwhelm doing their best to protect themselves from whatever is overwhelming them; anxiety, depression, skill deficits.

And what’s more, these behaviors can trigger emotions making others in the room enter their own state of overwhelm, which can devolve a situation quickly. This is why it’s so important we understand our own feelings and needs, while communicating clearly, calmly and without judgement.

Empowering our children and ourselves to learn deeply about possible triggers, individual limits, how to say no, how to ask for help, respecting each other’s needs and recognizing abilities will lead to fewer outbursts and an easier de-escalation.

So often adults believe children *should* be able to do something, especially something they’ve done before. However, our children, like us, have good days and bad. They have skills sets that are not complete and sometimes inconsistent. And, some have lost trust that their adults will give them the space to make mistakes. We need to honor where they are, not where we’d like them to be.

The question then, often leads us to how to set boundaries with people who are already in a state of overwhelm.

We all carry heavy burdens and have plenty of hard days and moments. Remember to allow yourself some grace and when things get hard, take a moment to process your emotions. Sit with them and have an inner conversation to try to find some peace. Especially as we enter this holiday season.

If you’d like to learn more about how to help yourself and your children get through those rough days, please reach out. Parenting is tough. I’m here to support you.

Trust Your Gut 05.05.18

I was reading a book the other day that discussed trusting your gut. As babies, we trust our gut - we laugh, cry and wiggle as our bodies need it and moms allow it, they trust their guts. 

As toddlers, we trust our gut - we crawl, touch things, eat until we’re full and start making noises without fear of reprisal and moms allow it, they trust their guts. 

Somewhere between toddlerhood and preschool, we moms stop trusting our children’s guts and start correcting their behaviors. We start teaching kids not to trust their own need to move, vocalize and eat just the right amount. I remember my mom telling me I had to clean the plate - no matter that the foods bothered me (I’m pretty sure I have sensory processing issues and was diagnosed with Crohns in my 20s - I think my food preferences as a child reflected my body’s need to trust my gut). 

What are we telling our kids about who they are when we’re constantly trying to fix their behavior. What is normal? Our school psychologist wanted us to tell our son, every time he acted like his energetic self, “that’s unusual.” In my naïveté, I did. And man do I feel badly about it. It is not my priority to make him “fit in” but rather to learn skills. I wish I’d realized this much earlier. Maybe his behavior was unusual to her but it was hardly a bad thing. If the reproach is about a behavior, you won’t have their trust. What are we doing wrong? Can we change the way we are teaching this? Let’s change our attitude!

While, yes, I know we need to teach our children how society works and what is expected of them in social and academic settings, don’t you think it’s fair to say, “trust your gut?” My son started showing signs of hyperactivity and intelligence as a baby. He never sat still. He spoke his first words at four months and read his first word (Crest, as in toothpaste) at eight months. He crawled at 5 months and walked at 11 months. He climbed and jumped without fear and when he got to pre-school at 2.5, he was regularly reprimanded for not wanting to sit still in circle time or for using critical thinking and playing with things “differently.” I knew it was wrong in my gut and moved him to another school but I fell prey to the idea of norms. And somewhere along the way, I tried to change the way he behaved despite that being how he was wired. That was a mistake! He is who he is. 

So now that he is in high school, we are trying to find an environment better suited toward his body’s need for movement while also challenging him academically and supporting his learning differences. We want to see him fly, and we know he can with appropriate accommodations. 

As a parent, I have to remind myself to not only trust my gut but trust my kids’ guts. Their behaviors are trying to communicate with me what they can’t verbalize themselves. As teens now, they can tell me some things but they have been told for so long they’re “unusual,” they don’t know what they do they know.  

Don’t wait until high school. Demand it at an early age from friends, family, school, sports coaches and religious clergy. Educate them on your differently wired child’s needs, because that’s what they are, needs. And then make sure your child knows that you support them, no matter what. Keep teaching them about societal norms while learning to accept your child’s differences. Help your child find a way to live within society without denying their own need to trust their guts. It may take some nerves, you may step outside of your comfort zone, but it will be worth it.

You are the only you. Your child is the only one of them. As Deepak Chopra once said, “The Universe needs what only you have to offer

Thoughts Are 01.14.18

As my children get older, I am finding I have a lot of time on my hands. They don’t need me during the day. They don’t need me to come to school to be a room mom or drop off forgotten lunches. Heck, they don’t even need me after school to get them to activities much anymore; they walk themselves or figure out rides with their friends. Sometimes I am called upon to be the bus driver but it is fleeting time spent together as we pick up the gaggle of kids they’re headed out with. And, next year, the oldest will get his driver’s license, then what?

I find myself trying to figure out who I am and what I should be doing with this newfound freedom. I am definitely not the same girl I was as a teen, nor the same woman I became as I entered the workforce after college. Parenthood has changed me. For better or worse, I have new things on my mind, new information in my head, and new worries that crowd my thoughts. I find myself sitting here looking at the multiple rough drafts I’ve written in my head about who I will be, what I will become, and how I will affect the world – do I even want to affect the world or do I want to affect a smaller sphere?

I’ve been trying to reclaim the things that make me happy. Over the last 14 years, my happiness was tied up with, or rather, tangled up with, my children’s happiness. Now, I find myself in a predicament, I can’t remember what made ME happy. Was it dancing to music or reading a book? Was it designing rooms and collaborating with people? I remember enjoying feeling needed, both professionally and parentally. How can I bring that into the newest draft of myself? Thoughts are “what we tell ourselves, and how we narrate the story of our own lives” (Dan Siegel and Tina Payne Bryson, The Whole-Brain Child). Funny I just read that today considering I’ve owned the book for at least five years but never finished it and now I have a blog entitled Rough Drafts. It is time for me to change the story, not just the thoughts I have about myself and my abilities, but rather, what I’ve learned, the person I’ve become and how I’ve changed over time so I can develop a new story of self.

I hope you all join me on this journey as we discover ourselves, our newest, latest drafts of our selves.

Best,

Mira

Pig Tales from a 2E Mom: Draft 09.05.17

I don't buy organic fruit but I buy organic gummy bears (they taste better). 

I shop at Whole Foods, but only for our junk food. 

I vaccinate my kids. 

I won't allow my kids to eat artificial colors, artificial flavors, nor artificial preservatives. 

I expect my kids will climb high, sometimes fall, and even break a bone (I didn't take my 8 year old in for his broken toe for two months telling him all the while to, "walk normally, it's fine" only to find out it was broken at the growth plate - I know, Best Mom Award!

I am full of contradictions. My kids are too. That's what makes them so cool. They are 2E. They're exceptional. And not in just two ways but in many more. 

Pick a side. I hated that when I was a kid. I never understood why everyone couldn't just get along, find a compromise or, better yet, see the other's side or just agree to disagree. I'm tired now, as an adult, of being accosted by people in various arenas of my world wanting me to take their side. Because, taking their side means I can't see the other side, I'm not allowed to see more than one side according to others. And if I do see it and acknowledge it, I am a traitor to their cause. 

Why does everything need a cause? Since when did parenting have finite rules? The best advice I ever received when I was pregnant for the first time was from my elders. Simply stated, "listen to everyone's advice and do what is best for your family." After all, you are the only one walking in your shoes. Who’s to say what works for one will definitively work for another?

I thought I understood that when I gave birth to my son. His babyhood was uneventful. He was fairly easy compared to what I heard from some of my friends about their babies' sleepless nights, colicky cries and terrible twos. He was so easy that we got pregnant quickly and surprisingly I gave birth to our daughter exactly 362 days later. Her due date was April Fool's Day, appropriately. But, in her race with her Irish twin, she was born on St. Patty's Day. 

Somewhere around age two and a half, we were told by the preschool teacher our son was different. He couldn't sit still at circle time. Really? Are any two and a half year olds willing to sit for circle time? I didn't know. I was a first time parent. What is “normal?” Apparently the majority of two and half year olds are able to sit still for at least five minutes. And, worse (in their eyes), he refused to put the train tracks together in a circle. He insisted on a curvy, swervey track with a dead end at either end. Is it so wrong that at that age he wanted to pave his own way, show his creativity and be an energetic boy? We changed preschools. That was the first time I was told he was defiant and different than other kids, but not the last.

There are so many reasons we started to look into what was going on with our son. No one had answers. In preschool I started asking everyone I could think of; school professionals, social workers, gifted educators, friends, what was with my son. There was nothing wrong with him but still, something was very different about him. As so, I started my journey. Testing. Told by the Director of Special Education that, “every mom thinks their kid is gifted.” More testing. Therapists. Who was right, which observations mattered? More therapists, more testing. Finally, we thought we had it figured out only to find out that though we know so much, it is always a moving target. It? What’s it anyway? We’ve learned our family’s story will not be the same as anyone else’s. And, we have learned that is ok.  We will be ok, no matter where our story takes us.

Grit, Resilience, and a Whole Lot of WTF: Draft 08.09.17

Much has been written about the kids of today needing to learn grit and resilience. I believe in these ideas wholeheartedly. I let my kids cry it out when they were babies. I did not run to them when they scraped their knees as toddlers. I do not do their projects so they look slick for school.

However, having twice-exceptional children means I cannot look at the world wearing neuro-typical rose colored glasses. I must take each article and book I read, each lesson I learn, and revamp it for the gifted children I have. And then, I must rewrite it again in my head to accommodate for their vulnerabilities. This is not an easy task. It takes practice, knowledge, and a whole lot of patience. It also means I must cut myself some slack as our kids are very complex.

I’ve learned I need to take a step back and think about things more deeply. I make mistakes, I apologize often, and then I try again. A standard tantrum from a tired six year old is not standard in my family. I used to ask the standards; “Is he hungry, is she tired?” Then I learned, there is so much more going on.

Now I stop and think, “What sounds are setting him off, is there sensory overload happening here?” “Is he not getting the in-depth answers from the clerk he expected?” “Is it not specific enough an answer?” “Did the teacher offer wait time?” "Did she just outsmart her teacher?" “Did they explain it in different ways so she could understand better?” And, then, “How do I handle this?”  

I come home and think and talk and think and talk. I spend the night researching what he was asking about so I can provide him answers. My husband and I go over how we could have handled the situation differently. We discuss with our kids how they could have handled the situation differently. It’s not about what they “should” have done differently, it’s what they “could” have done differently. It’s hard for them to come up with ideas since they see nothing wrong with their curt behavior or their standing alone on the sidelines. And, is that ok? Social cues are not their forte.

Emotional IQ is the newest buzz word, what does that mean for my hard working, highly intelligent children who end up annoying people with their curiosity and “too many questions,” taking too much time to think about things, having too much knowledge or too much energy? He works so hard to understand the world around him. She tries so hard to be confident. They’ll get there. Of that, I am sure. It just may not be in the standard time frame.

I am now letting the kids learn that Mom and Dad cannot, and will not, fix everything. We will help them work through their issues when they want advice but they need to find their own grit and resilience, we cannot force it upon them. They need to learn their own EQ. Today we’ve learned that to help our kids is to teach them about themselves and things will develop in time.