Chicago Fairy Tale: The Good and the Bad

On Friday, Fred was a presenter at a conference in Chicago so the girls and I tagged along with him. We thought it would be fun to have a girl's outing in the big city and so off we went!

The one-night stay was a perfect revelation on why we had to make the decision to no longer call Chicago our home and move away last year. I was reminded of why I loved it and yet, why I also hated it.

First things first. This is why I loved it!


Girls are up and ready to go!


Let's go to the 95th floor of the Hancock building and use the ladies room!


On the elevator, sitting on the floor, chewing gum, "Going Up!"

Then, a table for three at the Cheesecake Factory. "We'll take some cheesecake home to Daddy for later. Now, let's go see Madagascar II"


"Taxi!?!" Sarah's first ride in a cab. Girls gone wild, windows rolled down, screaming hello to every pedestrian and cross guard in the street.

We watched Madagascar II in the front row of the theater, walked about a mile back to our hotel in the brisk cold evening. We oo'd and awed at the Coach bags and fancy shoes in the store windows. Sienna wanted to know where the faces and heads of the women in the windows were. I told her, "They're mannequins."

She'd say, "No. They're women-iquins." We stopped to pet a horse. The horse tried eating her leopard coat. She screamed, we laughed. She took her coat off because she said it had horse slobber on it. We ran briskly to our warm hotel room. We got ready for a slumber party, Daddy came back from his conference. We snuggled while sharing the cheesecake and we...


... watched pay per view, "Kung Fu Panda," more like Kung FUN Panda. He's so cute when he says "dumplings" and "noodles."

Then, after a night of slumber, we woke up. Walked to a pancake joint just up the street if I remembered correctly. But I didn't remember correctly because it was 12 blocks away! We still walked there and Fred forgot his coat so he was freezing!!! We shared a dutch baby pancake and other yummy breakfast food, grabbed a couple of balloons and headed back to our hotel room, walking running and rushing trying to find shelter from the wind blasts blowing from the tsunami lake effect wind along the Magnificent Mile. We went through the rotating door and the girls took turns pressing the elevator buttons up to our room. We settled into our hotel room for the morning and waited for the shops and Navy Pier to open in a couple of hours.

I found myself staring and adoring the art and design elements of the metro styled interior of our hotel room.

Artwork on the wall.

More Artwork on the wall.

Design on the pillows - which I hope to 'refabricate' when I get home!

And, there is artwork that Sienna created.

Clearly, this is a butterfly resting inside a butterfly house. As soon as we plopped down, I was ready to relax for a little while. My seven year old had another mission. She asked for a Sharpie so she could draw faces on the balloons. No Sharpie, how about tape? Stapler? Glue? Crayons?

After I searched through my purse like Mary Poppins, I pulled out fantastic chewing gum wrappers. I imagined Sienna would be so thrilled to design some origami, but she looked like I just pulled a booger out of my purse, her lip curled up and her eyes rolled in the back of her head. I told her that was the best I had. Minutes later, she showed me the butterfly artwork that she created out of bathroom paper items. Inspiring.

(How come she can work on this, with zero assistance but cannot do simple things like her easy homework or brush her teeth?)

Now, this would have been the best time to drive home. Right about at this moment, we make a serious pivotal point from happiness to disaster in our journey in the city...

We then check out, go through the revolving door (I love this act just as much as my girls do! Don't ask me why, I am a city girl I guess!), hop in another cab, walk into the Navy Pier. Instantly, I hear grumbling and whining and arguing and I start nagging and people start glaring! Oh joy.

I get eye level, tell the girls that if they are both very good during this fun adventure, I will buy them the mood rings that they are oodling over right before we leave. It will help us to remember what a fun time we had. But, if they argue or whine any more, then, no ring.

We then tried to find the elevator up to the Children's Museum but got distracted by all the shops that glimmered in my eyes like jewels in a treasure chest!

I love shops.

We ventured into Build-a-Bear shop and even I was on sensory overload. Their florescent lights hummed and, in pure Dr. Suess style, I would describe the experience like this:

"The lights zimmer-zammered and bizzer-bammed in my ears."

Then this happened:

Sienna threw a tantrum in tsunami proportions.

She screamed at me, told me she was hungry. We bee-lined it to Mc'Ds. I stood in line, four people back and made sure the girls were both within eye-shot. With one eye on Sienna and the other eye on Sarah, cross-eyed I paid the lady, took a deep breath and waited for our tray of fat and carbs. Then, I lost sight of Sarah as she ran faster than a bolt of lightening to the other side of the food court so she could take shelter under the high chairs. I left my tray at the counter. As I wrestled our coats, shopping bags and stroller and tried to navigate through the crowds, I lost total sight of Sarah. I panicked and started calling out for her. I then could not find Sienna either. Imagine the chaos. All I could see were people staring at me. The room swirled around me and I felt like I was in a sinus commercial, everything went fuzzy. I was seconds close to calling for this:

When I tried asking for some help from some of the ladies working at McD's I realized that the only English they knew were Big Mac and Diet Coke. As they looked at me puzzled, from afar running out of the food court I spotted little Sienna in a rampant escape! I caught up with her, picked up the 40 pound 2 year old. Her back arched tight and stiff like a femaldahide-injected banana.

Then noticed big sis Sienna was hiding and crying nearby all the while trying to keep tabs on her little sister. I tried to ask big sis to get the tray but by the first word I muttered towards her, she shook with fear (in an autism coma as I call it) and I could tell she was not able to communicate with me. With my weak arms full of stiff banana toddler, stroller overflowing with coats, I knew I could not manage retrieving the tray. I considered leaving the tray at the counter and walking outside with both girls towards Indiana. But, I tried a more challenging approach and asked several ladies behind the McD counter to help me with my tray. I finally was able to get one lady, an African American to help me with the tray and bring it to the first booth I could find. We plumbed down, dumped our coats as the stroller fell to the floor, backwards as if to mimic my own exhaustion.

I overheard an African American gentleman mutter to the nice lady who brought us our tray of food as she put it on the table, "After Obama is president, we won't be required to do things like that anymore. Right on?" They both laughed. Although, I found no humor in their banter.

A deep breathe and a cold-fish-filet-chased-down-by-a-Diet-Coke-moment later, we relaxed in our booth. Sarah fell asleep in her stroller, now upright - symbolizing the next few minutes that awaited before us. We then, took a walk outside in the quiet coldness of the pier. Sienna, on her own terms, clutched onto my arm, fearful yet safe by her mother's side. In an attempt to absorb this moment of sheer sanity, I admired the stoic skyline. Frozen from the wind and the current stark reality, in my head I played dot-to-dot as I traced all of the positions that my career moved me from company to company and building to building through the chapters of my life:


Historic moments in my life, historic and memorable, the good and the bad. Mostly good though.

The cold air blew us indoors, we found the elevator up to the museum and paid the $4000 for admission. Sienna played and hopped from one exhibit to the next. I tried to keep Sarah resting in her stroller. Minutes later however, when she woke up, she threw an hour long tantrum. We could have started our own exhibit and called it, "Sensory Overload." With the many people watching, I could have charged admission for the freak show. The Nature Channel's narrator would whisper, "Watch as the angry mother tries to chase her wandering arm-flapping off spring... Now, what are they doing? Oh, the child is licking the floor. Why doesn't that mother do something to protect her child from the infestations of germs and infections?"

Ignoring the assumptions and judgments from the metropolitan peanut gallery, I finally forced a rain coat on her flapping and slapping arms so she could play in the water exhibit. Seconds later she realized that I was not that awful after all:

After playing with water for two hours, seriously, both girls played for two hours...

I encouraged them to try to see the other parts of the museum. They did, although, I was not the graceful mother I wanted to be. Every transition from one exhibit to another was a major feat. I wanted to be like that mother over there... the one with the tight size 4 jeans, sexy boots, turtle neck and metro beret cap, the one with four obedient children AND their play dates all going when she requested in a calm voice. The same mom who had the perfect stroller that could turn on a dime and looked like she just came fresh faced from the Sephora counter. I wanted to be a mom like this:


Instead, I was more like this mom:

... a sweating screaming tired psycho-mom who just wanted her girls to have a good time, damnit.

As my cell phone rang, I was wishing it was Fred telling me his conference got out early and he was on his way to pick us up. Instead, it was Fred just checking in. I gave him the Cliff-note version of our experience and he told me he would come pick us up in an hour.


Apparently, the fairy god mother forgot to tell us we needed to leave the city before the strike of ten or else everything would turn into a pumpkin.

And that by the three o'clock hour, the glass slippers shoes would be kicked off and fly around the museum, and the pumpkins would be more like this:


But luckily, our Prince Charming Daddy arrived right out front, drove us out of the windy city, bought us ice cream and...

... we all lived happily ever after.

The End. To Be Continued...

Good grief

You ever have an issue that keeps coming up over and over in your mind? It's like you can't have any peace or progress until you realize what it is that is at the heart of the problem, yet you aren't even sure what the problem is exactly.

Here is one of those nagging self talk scripts that I am trying to get my hands on... I think I have it figured out, but it is like that Sudoku puzzle that you know you could solve you just can't find the time, or the right pencil or even the Sudoku puzzle itself.

I've mentioned in previous posts perhaps that I have two daughters on the spectrum. My oldest, Sienna, first grader has been diagnosed with PDD-NOS with probable Asperger's. She also has mood disorder (bi-polar spectrum) and ADHD. I have been on a roller coaster with her since she was about 2 years old, feeling like a failure, like nothing I could do for her was working. She was so 'out-of-sync' and so when I found the book, "Out of Sync Child," by Carol Kranowitz a few years ago, something finally clicked with me. I started the long journey of trying to get services and diagnosis's, let alone just basic acceptance of my concerns from my own husband and family members. Finally, after three years I started getting more understanding from family members. It took a lot of tantrums at family events for people to realize that there was any merit in what I was saying about Sienna. No one wanted to believe that such a bright and blue-eyed blonde little girl had anything wrong with her. All along, my parenting skills and credibility as a mother were weakened through every step during this three year journey.

Then, after Sienna's daycare providers really encouraged me to take the matter more seriously, I finally went privately to get medical diagnoses. In the past 18 months, we have had five professional diagnoses all pretty consistent with one another: Sensory Integration, PDD-NOS, Probable Asperger's, Mood Disorders, Bi-Polar and ADHD. In addition, yet in opposition to these medical opinions, the school's psychologist has observed, assessing Sienna at the school and discovered that Sienna doesn't show any problems at all. In fact, the school professionals claim that she is a bright and cheerful girl that perhaps "her mother is in need of counseling and parenting classes."

And, here we are a year later, and I realize, I do need therapy and parenting classes, ever since the school's assessment in fact!

Every day, I fight with my thoughts and feeling about my daughter being on the spectrum. Is she? Most of the time she is fine. We've learned to adjust. We don't do any thing that will be unpredictable or pressure her socially. So, I can't tell. I am going nuts trying to figure out if something is wrong with my daughter. If so, what exactly. And, once it is determined what, then, how will I help her?

I realize that I am thick in denial. I am also so angry. I have become hardened.

And then, a light bulb went on! It was an ah-ha moment yesterday while we took a day trip by train to Chicago. Sienna was not in her normal element. And, when she isn't in her element, her quirks are more pronounced. She acts strange, says weird things, has odd gestures. She doesn't even walk normal. When she was younger, she would act like a dog as a coping mechanism. Now, she acts like a baby to cope in difficult situations for her. She talks like a baby, wants to ride in the stroller and cuddle, just like a baby. I even made a new age appropriate 'blankie' for her so she could have her blankie in times like these. Frankly, I allow it because when she was a baby, she didn't really sit still in a stroller and didn't cuddle or talk much.

I found myself growing so angry during the train ride. I was so irritable with her. I was so mad at her for acting like this. I was mad that we couldn't do any family fun activities any more. I feel so judged by strangers everywhere we go. Most of all, I was disgusted at myself.

Why do I have to be so superficial? I have been a born again Christian for about 13 years now. I was such a strong follower before having children. I was so close to God, my heart was tender for Him. Now, I am so hardened. I don't even feel comfortable going to church, partly because our children on the spectrum have so many challenges in a church setting, but also because of the condition of my heart. I am starting to cope in unhealthy ways myself. I am drawn to cocktails to relax me and other social subtleties that are not Christian-like.

And I really do want to be that caring, loving Christian woman that I once was. I don't want to be cursing at God for giving me children who are so difficult. Feeling so inadequate for this feat, I let out a yelp of a prayer and I heard God telling me that I was in His Hands. I was just going through the valley of grief. I still am in denial. I am still in the anger phases. It is difficult to have a clear journey of grief with raising children with special needs like what Sienna has because every day is different and I will not know what challenges we will face until we are face to face with each challenge.

I have to trust God even more in the daily crises of raising my kids. More than the typical family would. And, that is a blessing. At least that is how I am seeing it in this light bulb moment!