Good morning folks, It was my full intention to post yesterday, but life got in the way, or should I say the Science Project got in the way! lol. This is exactly what I’m talking about when I decided to start a blog for people in recovery who are bringing up children. As a grandmother raising a little boy, it becomes a little more challenging for me in his digital world and new codes of conduct. So, here’s the deal, the project is due… tomorrow! Yes, we should have started sooner, but for some reason the whole science project is due by the 20th did not sink into to my head. I only really heard about it at a parent teacher conference and was given the info on it. Then, we switched the boys class room, he was in a very loud, crazy – no learning getting done class and we switched him to a much calmer class. He has been much more mellow and happier in the calmer class, children of chaos do thrive on the chaos…. to a point, but as I told the principal, it’s like going to Chuckie Cheese everyday, all day long! That’s a little much for anybody, he may like it for the first hour or so, but after a while, even a child of chaos wants a little peace in their crazy life. And so be it, he is in a much calmer class with a great teacher. 🙂
Now, back to the project: So last week his oldest sister who lives in a big city about 75 miles away called and ask if he could come spend the week-end with her and her boyfriend. My oldest grand-daughter, his big sister has suffered some of the pain and trauma of dealing with addicts parents and displacement from her siblings. At this point, she has worked through a lot of the pain and fears by going to the gym, doing healthy and positive things for herself. At this time she is in college and works at the college as well. She has an awesome boyfriend who has an awesome family. She has latched onto to them somewhat and it was her boyfriends mom who took my little grandson shopping Saturday and spent some time and money on him, which I thought was super nice of her. I haven’t met her but I’ve heard a lot about her, she was a teacher and is now a vice principal. I’m so happy for my grand daughter to be associated with these people. And because they have come to love and care for her, they wanted to also care for her little brother who is still too little to have lost his parents to their active addiction. They are alive, but not present ( more on that later about my son who is trying to stay clean one more time right now). And so, our little Bubba went to spend the week-end with his sister, and because she is a photographer I ask her to help with his science project and take him to a park near her home and let him take pictures of nature. She did. But getting them sent to me and printed out yesterday was a big ol deal, all I can say is now I know how to download, select and send pictures to the local Walmart for one hour processing. lol.
Meanwhile, I had thrown my back out again and could barely function yesterday, so I ask my husband if he’d go get them and he did. Then last night I got our boy started on his project, as any of you who have children that you’ve helped with science project know… this is no easy task. However, it can be fun, enjoyable a great learning and bonding time. I had become stressed and aggravated until I caught myself, and chilled back down. Sometimes I see it, sometimes I don’t. All I know is, I do not want to add to this little boys feelings of low self-worth or not feeling good enough. I never want to contribute to those feelings for him, I try to do just the opposite, I try to build him up, teach him, give him time to work through his issues and guide him. I’m not always the best at this, it slips from me in an instance before I realize it, but I can stop and bring it back around. I even tell him, as I did last night, “I need to stop for a minute and chill”. he said “OK”, he gets it. And so I did and then we got back to it.
My question for the week is… How do you handle it when you find yourself getting aggravated with your child while trying to help them?
