cross-country
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Back in the saddle
Our first full week of school is sandwiched between a two day week and a three day week. It used to drive my crazy–this short start, full start, short start schedule. Why couldn’t we just start the school year after Labour Day, like our friends across the river in Minnesota? When J was younger, the spotty school days at the beginning of the year would mess with his poor little routine-seeking autism/anxiety nervous brain. Having just a taste of the new routine only for it to be taken away again for a few days, only then to have a full week, and then a short week when transitions were hard…
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One year later
This is where we are, one year later. J is into the first five minutes into his first XC race for the season. He’s in a good mood. Minutes before the race I remind him that he needs to run as fast as he can (which I know he doesn’t know what that is yet) to keep up with the pack. Because we all know it’s no fun to start a race from behind. And although he’s near the back of the pack, seconds after the gun goes off, he’s not trailing the pack like he has done every other race he’s run. He sticks with the pack, and as…
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Your best is the best
When we came back from our family trip back in July, J was struggling to get back into his running grove. It wasn’t that J didn’t want to run. The runs were just hard. Some of those summer running practices near the end of July were rough. J’s body was physically fine. His legs were strong, his lungs were strong, and he wasn’t battling any injuries. But running is one of those things that if you miss too many workouts it takes a few workouts until you feel like you’re back to where you were, and being inconsistent (and even missing) morning runs on our two week holiday set J…
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The 10K Gamble and Learning to Trust J
The Fargo Marathon is a pretty big deal around here. It’s a Boston Qualifier, and a really appealing one at that (Fargo is a really REALLY flat course and the weather is usually decent). There are races all week long for whatever floats your boat: dog runs, kid runs, the 5K and then marathon day which includes the 10K, half marathon, marathon relay, and marathon. The city gets really into it. The neighbourhoods do too–live bands play music to help rally the runners, people bring out orange slices to you, there are posters everywhere and hundreds of perfect strangers are cheering you on. It’s a really cool experience. This year my…
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J can do something most kids can’t
There are very few things that J can do that most kids can’t. In fact, there’s only really two things I can think of off the top of my head: the ability to remember the most obscure information and retain that information (like squaring and cubing numbers into the 10,000s, remembering dates and obscure facts of presidents of the United States, and remembering every exit number in ever state from North Dakota to Kansas). The other? running long distance. The party trick memory is fun for a little bit, but it’s really hard to engage with someone when all you can do is spew random facts at them. And it…
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A little Christmas story
Hope you all had a Merry Christmas and are enjoying a lovely holiday season! I just thought I’d take a moment and post one of my favourite little stories of kindness we’ve experienced in the week or two leading up to the holiday. J has been a champ when it comes to his first season of winter running. Most of December has been pretty cold, and despite the wind, snow, and sometimes single digit temps (or below -15C), J’s done a good job sticking through it all. I’ve said this before–running is one of the greatest life lessons out there, and one of those lessons i that you keep running…
- autism, creativity, cross-country, exercise, home strategies, learning strategies, reading comprehension, strategies
Rehabilitation–or just “habilitation”
Sometimes I feel like J has been in rehab almost every day of his life, except that instead of relearning skills he once had, J has never had the skills. Like all the skills. Sometimes I feel like it’s just one big, impossible task. NOTHING is intuitive with J. There are some days where I feel like I am literally programming a human like I would be programming a computer. Every little skill, every little nuance has to be first modeled before he can learn it. Which makes it feel like the biggest task on the planet. It’s also why I feel really, really grateful for the people who send me little…
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The unexpected things
Monday night I found myself in negotiations with J over something in a million years I never thought I’d be negotiating over. Two weeks ago, I had plans to drive up to Winnipeg and go to lunch with a friend from high school, but we had to change plans last second so we decided try again for Tuesday. Steve and I had it all planned out–he was going to be on call for the kids all day and take care of W’s piano lesson, morning/after school pickup, and homework so I could leave around 9 am and come back whenever I wanted to later that night. I really needed to…
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Where do we go from here?
J can’t handle the load he’s got right now. He comes home with hours of homework. He gets home at 6pm after XC and we plug at the homework until 9:30, sometimes even close to 10pm at night. A quick supper. No breaks. No downtime. He’s defiant. He cries. His attention span is shot (remember, the kid already has ADHD). He is beyond exhausted (and I am too). His internal clock gets him up at 6:00 am no matter what time he got to bed. Then he goes to school and refuses to work. The past few weeks have been full of rough, defiant behavior. Then he comes home with…
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XC boys are the best
J’s paras have a theory about short weeks. Short weeks mean trouble. The kids had no school Friday because it was a teacher development day and sure enough, it’s been a rough week. This meds change/no XC/short school week/who knows what else is up complications have been hard. The kind of week where Steve had to make a trip up to the school to help J sort out his behavioural issues. The last few weeks of XC have been hard too—not in the behavioural issue way, but J gets frustrated that he can’t run. I know he knows on some level that he needs it to make him feel even-keel.…
