whopouredoatmealonmylaptop

2009-12-30T22:52:00.000-08:00

so we've been going to the psychologist, who thought that maybe we should see a psychiatrist, in order to get some risparidone (or something like that) to help with impulsivity issues.

he says that we are so in survival mode, that if we took the energy down a notch, maybe we could do more development work, and less putting-out-fires work.

as of now cody is on ritalin, which his teacher thinks helps, but i'm not convinced it does much of anything. when he wants to focus, he can FOCUS. and since he loves school, he does pretty well with that. home is the problem.

so we go to the psychiatrist, the first meeting is just us grownups. we tell him how cody is jealous of his sister, of how he hits, screams for no reason, can't discriminate in a story between plot and detail, etc., etc., etc.

this week we take cody with us to meeting #2. he walks in and.......is an angel, totally neurotypical. he plays tic-tac-toe, draws when asked, tells a story when asked, does EVERYTHING the psychiatrist asks... and of course the psychiatrist says, "i don't see any reason for medication."

arghghghghghg

eat your salad

2007-09-17T23:04:00.000-07:00

cody's gem of the week:

it's not important what car you have, it's important that you eat salad.

sharing a dream

2007-05-03T06:53:00.000-07:00

it was last night at bedtime.
"mom, do you know how we share a dream?" cody asked.
"nope"
"you hug me really tight and we fall asleep together, and then we'll be in the same dream."
wow.

reincarnation and favorite colors

2007-02-28T23:25:00.000-08:00

this morning's cody-gem: "when i am a baby again, i want my name to be yody, because noone knows cyan."

and i think he's got such great logic.....and then i realize that i am SO in his world, and that if he said this in kindergarten, for instance, they would have NO idea what he was talking about, and they would just think he's weird. and then i realize that i'm only PARTLY in his world, and that EVERYTHING he does makes sense somehow and that half the time i DON'T know why he does what he does.

so anyway, in cody-code, the above means that his favorite color is yellow, and therefore he wants a name that starts with Y. cody starts with C, and the colors that start with C are cyan and cobalt, but noone in the kindergarten knows those colors. So when he is reincarnated, and comes back to earth as a new baby, he wants his name to be YODY instead of cody.
makes perfect sense, no?

why did that doctor hit me with a hammer?

2007-02-18T23:34:00.000-08:00

yesterday we went to the pediatric neurologist. we've been wanting to go for a long time (ok, cody hasn't wanted to go, but i have). my secret dream is that we will find out that there is something physically wrong with cody that can be fixed with a little tweak, and that forever after he will be "normal".

not that i'd want him to lose his charm or anything, i just want him to have an easier time of getting along with the world and it's rules.

anyway, the neurologist commented on the circumference of his head, on the fact that he has little breasts, suggested possible adhd, odd, pdd...... and told me that most kids could have held it together more successfully for the full hour of the appointment.

actually i thought cody had done a pretty good job, considering that we had waited for the doctor for 45 minutes, and he had actually cooperated and built the little block towers the doctor asked him to build, and answered the questions, like "how many fingers do you have" with great thought- "i lost one, it fell off." (cody decided, around the time that his tooth fell out, that his finger must have also fallen out, since there's a space between his index finger and his thumb.)

it was when the doctor hit him on the knee with a hammer that all hell broke loose.
"why did he hit me?"

i dunno, seems like a pretty normal reaction to me......i must be starting to live in cody's world.

(so we're off to do hearing tests, vision tests, eeg, sleep deprivation tests, cti...........)

the great baking cookies race

2007-02-14T23:08:00.000-08:00

baking cookies with cody is not anything like the dreamy visions i had of baking with my kids, before i had real live ones. it's more like a race, in which the finish line is unburnt cookies cooling on a plate. no, maybe more like a timed obstacle course.

2 seconds after i agree to the baking cookies thing, and..... he's off. and he's an unstoppable whirling dervish.
he's in the cabinets, pulling out pots and bowls and sifters. he's trying to eat the sugar, licking the spoon that he's using to mix the batter which has already dropped on the floor, pouring the milk straight into the batter without measuring it while i've turned my back for one second to write "buy more vanilla" on the refrigerator shopping list. he's feeding raw batter to the dog, deciding the cookies need jimmies (or sprinkles, depending on where you're from), climbing up to GET the jimmies, spilling them all over the kitchen floor, turning the light on and off on the oven, breaking the eggshells into teeny tiny pieces and ....

this has been great for my diet, since i get a lot of exercise running after cody all over the kitchen, and when it's all over i really don't want to eat any cookies.

rorschach inkblots and where you can stick 'em

2007-02-12T22:51:00.000-08:00

yesterday we did the rorschach inkblot tests!!! who knew those things were still being used.? seems a little bit voodoo to me. cody took one look at it, had no idea what this guy wanted from him, and decided to write the alphabet instead. backwards. starting with Z, ending with A, in perfect order. that'll show this guy who's in charge here.

it's a one way street, because i said so

2007-02-10T10:16:00.000-08:00

i never really expect the world to go according to my plan. that's one of the differences between cody and me. he totally does.
today he decided that our street should be a one way street. so he had me help him make a wood sign and pound it into the grass, next to the road. then he took a magic marker and wrote
ONE WAY
on it. actually, i think he wrote YAW ENO
anyway, then he sat on a rock and waited for cars to come. the first couple came the way he wanted......
and then one came...... THE WRONG WAY.
he was devastated.
his thinking just blows me away.

one more mcdonalds story and that's it

2007-02-07T22:28:00.000-08:00

right. so there we are at mcdonalds, and there are three old men sitting at the table next to us. i see them looking at us.
"excuse me, do you mind my asking, are you his babysitter?"
we get this on occasion, because..... cody is black and i am white.
"no, i'm his mom."
"oh. is his father the same color as him?"
"no, his father is white. he's adopted."
my guess is that cody is not going to like this type of thing when he is older. on the multiracial listserv i belong to i see a lot of older black kids hate this kind of prying. (maybe because i grew up white), i have the patience for it, i find it amusing and i don't mind educating the public-at-large. i guess i will play along until my kid starts hating it, at which point i will respect his wishes on this one.
"well, good for you."
he turns back to his friends.
and then a minute later....
"can my friend give your son a piece of candy?"

teasing 101

2007-02-05T22:38:00.000-08:00

yes, so we went to mcdonalds. little sister tyler was just a touch jealous of her brother, who got to go to mcdonalds when she didn't.
later in the day, we had to go pick husband up from work. little sister tyler fell asleep in the car, as she tends to do. when we arrived at home we woke her up.
and cody says to her, "tyler, while you were asleep we ate dinner at mcdonalds, and you missed it."
which kind of blew me away. ok, it was mean, and we explained that to him.
but he is a born joker, and he didn't really mean to be mean, he just thought it was funny.
and the thought process that went into coming up with that is much more sophisticated than i would have given him credit for.
another one of those "should-we-punish-or-praise" moments.

chez mcdonalds

2007-02-05T12:02:00.000-08:00

we are being evaluated by a center for child development, which is great, (i hope). it's supposed to give us a diagnosis and a plan for us and for cody. it's a never ending bunch of tests, though. today the psychologist showed cody a picture of a cartoon peter pan. cody didn't know who it was. ok, he has seen the old peter pan movie with mary martin, but he has never seen the cartoon. didn't know who snow white was either, or charlie chaplin- "that's you!" he said to the psychologist.
the only ones he knew were winnie-the-pooh and mickey mouse- with some prompting. i told the psychologist this was a culturally biased test, and we moved on. (this was not the first time we have seen this particular test, by the way, and the last psychologist who administered it was OUTRAGED that my kids have not seen a cartoon peter pan movie or a snow white movie).

anyway, after the torture, i took cody to mcdonalds. i also had to stop in at a tax office (don't ask) but i figured that we'd take the food, and that would keep him busy. my bad. he cried the whole time in the office, because he wanted to eat AT the mcdonalds, it wasn't just the food he needed, it was the mcdonalds je ne sais quois. anyway, the people at the tax office were very nice, and they let me jump to the front of the line, and i got my business done in two minutes flat. (hmmm, maybe i should take him every time) then we went back to mcdonalds and soaked up the ambience to cody's heart's content.

but it's a great place to hide, mom

2007-02-03T10:34:00.000-08:00

after one of those mornings where we were both on the edge,
i thought we'd get back into our groove with a few rounds of cody's favorite game,
hide-and-seek.
it was during round number three, when i honestly could not find him. i searched and searched,
and finally yelled, "cody, i can't find you."

i hear a little voice say, "i'm in the tunnel."

and i instantly realize where he is.

quick, get me the handbook!
should i yell at him, or calmly explain?
as my blood pressure rockets up into space at the speed of light,
i opt for the yell.
"cody, get out of that washing machine this instant!"
so much for the groove.

cody designs a pillow

2007-02-02T11:14:00.000-08:00

today cody decided to continue his secret-code-artwork, and wrote letters on every surface he could find. i caught him writing on the floor, and sent him outside, figuring he wouldn't ruin anything out there.
i had forgotten that i had left a pillow to air out on the front porch.

the pillow now looks like the picture.
nice writing, cody.
sometimes i don't know whether to punish or praise him.

who made god

2007-01-31T22:46:00.000-08:00

i think i know how god was created.
there was a little kid whose mother was trying to cook dinner.
the kid came up to her and asked,
mom, why is the sky blue?
why does that kid next door hit me?"
why are stop signs red?
why don't my ears fall off?
why don't lemons taste good?
and that mother invented god.
god did it.
god did it.
god did it.
god did it.
god did it.
it just seemed like an easy out.
what that mother did not foresee was....
mom, why does god make that kid hit me?
why did god make the stop signs red?
why did god not make my ears fall off?............

mom, did god make god?
(i swear, cody really asked me that)

a weird piece of art

2007-01-30T11:39:00.000-08:00

this is cody's latest piece of art. i can't decide whether to take it at face value- nice piece-
or whether to show it to the psychologist. or the graphologist. or the kabbalist. or maybe to those guys on that show where the mathematician solves murders. is there a code? maybe i should read every other letter?
indigo child? autism spectrum issue? another planet?
hmmmmm.

martin luther king returns

2007-01-29T04:58:00.000-08:00

cody woke up this morning, and the first thing he said was,
"i have a dream".
wow.
so maybe that's it. maybe he's a reincarnation of martin luther king. maybe......

"i ate candy".

oh. he had a dream about candy. he got those pesky tenses mixed up again.

in my next life i'm going to be a girl

2007-01-27T05:05:00.000-08:00

i may have hinted about reincarnation once or twice to my kids, when they asked about death.
not because i'm sure i believe in other lives, but because i'd like to. i find the idea comforting. i'm never sure whether cody is listening to me or understanding when i tell him stuff. or if there's someone else feeding him ideas.
anyway, the other day cody informed us that he is going to get big and die and then he will be a girl baby named jessie.

pass the eucalyptus leaves, please

2007-01-25T22:48:00.000-08:00

we were having my family over for dinner last night, and cody decided he wanted to cook the dinner.
i had decided on lasagna,
he had another menu planned.

we went out to the community garden to pick some fresh lettuce.
he picked some eucalyptus leaves. came back in.
i washed my lettuce leaves, he washed his eucalyptus leaves, put them in a bowl, set them out on the table.
then he went into the fridge, took out the plain pasta (leftovers) that was there, added an entire jar of pesto, and then sprinkled some cinnamon in it.. he put it out on the table. then he poured a bowl of cheerios, and took some rice cakes and smeared them with peanut butter. and put it all out on the table.

so we had lasagna, salad, garlic bread, peas, eucalyptus leaves, rice cakes with peanut butter, pasta with pesto and cinnamon.
yum.

in my defense, i'll just say that i was glad that he was using his powers for good, not evil.
(and at least i got MY menu done, which i would not have if he had decided to spend his time throwing pineapple chunks at the dog).

of course, later when the family came over, they all felt that when he passed the eucalyptus leaves, they had to eat some.

are both ears still there?

2007-01-24T22:16:00.000-08:00

ok, one more post about the tooth thing, and then i promise i'll stop. (i think.)

so cody wakes up this morning, and shows me his hand. "look, there's a finger missing!" he points to the space between his index finger and his thumb.

i tell him that no, there was no finger there before, and if he counts them, he'll see that he still has ten fingers. he does, and is calmed, for the time being.

i realize that according to cody-logic, it totally makes sense that if his teeth could fall out, why not his fingers? i tell him 20 times throughout the day, that nothing else is going to fall off. just his teeth.

later i catch him touching both ears, making sure they're both still attached.

can we put that tooth back in, please?

2007-01-23T22:31:00.000-08:00

so the tooth fell out
while cody was trying to bite me
because i wouldn't buy him a second ice cream cone.
(i don't think he'll try to bite me again.)
he immediately started crying,"i'm broken, i'm broken."
i didn't know whether to laugh or to cry.
"hey, cody, now the tooth fairy will come and bring you a present!
let's go home and call grandma."
once again, i'm thinking in terms of the family in the
"how to raise kids" handbook. (which is not us.)
cody was having none of it. "why isn't god nice to me?"
he DID get excited about getting a car under his pillow this morning.
but then he wanted his tooth back.
at first i thought it was because he wanted to put it under his pillow again,
kind of a 2 for one deal.
then i realized it was because he wanted to put the tooth back in his mouth, to make himself fixed.

lemme take a look at that handbook again.

lock the doors, the toothfairy's coming

2007-01-22T23:30:00.000-08:00

cody's tooth is loose! wow, our little baby. he's almost 6. right on time, by the handbook. this is SO exciting!!

"why doesn't god like me?" was our first hint that this experience was NOT going to go exactly according to the handbook.
"why is god breaking me?"
cody starts to wail. "i'm breaking!"

we pull out our best we-know-just-what-to-say faces, and explain all about teeth, and how he will get new big ones, and how the toothfairy will come to our house and put a present under his pillow.......and...and...

he starts to calm down
"will she bring me a jeep?"
we tell him a jeep won't fit under the pillow.
"well," he says. "she could just leave the keys under the pillow, and the jeep could be outside"............

at which point (little sister) tyler pipes up, "whaddaya mean some lady is flying into our room in the middle of the night?"
and then SHE starts wailing. and won't go to sleep in her room.

where is that handbook?

runner-up names for this blog

2007-01-22T03:57:00.000-08:00

whodrewonthesofa

itwasntmethedogdidit

arewethereyet

shoesinthefishtank

didnotdidtoodidnotdidtoo

it's a blog about my son cody. who i love to death.
whoever can figure him out gets a million dollars. ok, i don't have a million dollars.