The Unadventures of Tracie

We’ve been working with Kids on the Move for about a year now. We took Morgan in for a well-baby visit when he was 18ish months old. His pediatrician gave us a questionnaire to fill out, which Morgan “failed.” They recommended we call Kids on the Move, which we did. He got evaluated and qualified for sensory and speech and development services. I blogged about finding out Morgan is a sensory seeker here . For the past year Morgan has had an occupational therapist, a development specialist, and speech therapist each visit us once a month.  Now that Morgan is turning 3, he is aging out of Kids on the Move. So we needed to meet with the school district for a formal assessment. We just did this assessment this week. I’m glad that they prepared us for what to expect and that the environment would be difficult for Morgan. It was a small room (very small) and Morgan was expected to do adult-directed tasks in a very specific way. Morgan is more of an “I’ll do it on my own time, in my...

Do you ever have days where you feel like you’re doing everything wrong? That despite your best intentions, you’re just a massive screw-up? I’ve been feeling that way lately. Feeling like I pretty much despise myself. Feeling like I do everything wrong, say everything wrong, that I’m just wrong, wrong, WRONG in every way, shape, and form. I like to say that I don’t care what people think of me. But it’s a lie. A complete and utter lie. I want to be liked, to be loved, to be understood. The thought of someone thinking poorly of me destroys me. So I have this overwhelming urge to be perfect. Be such a great and wonderful person that no one ever thinks badly of me. That they’re never angry with me, never disappointed, never hurt, never frustrated. Guess how that’s been working out? I know I shouldn’t be upset that I’m flawed. We all are. But I am upset. I hate that I’m selfish sometimes, that I can be lazy, unreliable, incompetent, jealous, or mean. I hate that despite my best inte...

In high school I wrote the following poem: Achieving Perfection Always too much to do Never enough time Placed in a box by well-meaning family and friends-- trying to help, only making it worse-- Walls closing in Suffocating Trapped This still encapsulates how I feel today. There are many themes in this short poem that apply to me and my life. But the part I want to focus on is "placed in a box by well-meaning family and friends." I think there is something about human nature that wants everything to be neatly labeled. Things are black and white. You are a Blue. This is evil. This is good. I am right. You are wrong. In a blog comment on one of the blogs I read, a commenter said on the topic of discussion (which is irrelevant to this post): "We all love simple answers. We all want guarantees. But maybe there are none." And I agree. Life is not black and white but rather multitudes and meritudes of shades of gray. And within these shades of gray are darker tones...