Parenting sucks

I have 4 kids. I love them to death, but they drive me absolutely crazy.

 

My teens are both grounded for bad grades. The deal is, if they want to be off punishment they can't have any Fs. If they want fun and cool stuff (cell phones/computers), they have to have As and Bs. One has a trip to NYC scheduled for the spring with her Choir class, but first she has to be passing ALL of her classes. So here's the deal, this weekend she heard an add on the radio about some talent scout being in town and the first 200 callers could get an audition. So she called. She was one of the 200. Then she comes to me to ask me to talk to them. I said no. She runs off crying and I feel like a jerk. I justify it to myself that one, she's grounded and used the phone without permission; two, she called first and then asked; and three, what in the world made her think I'd say yes, when I won't even let her hang out on the porch with her friends? Grounded is grounded. I'm pretty sure I was right, even my mom told me I was right. I still feel like a jerk.

My first grader is addicted to video games. I've had to severely limit his playing. Now he can only play a couple times a week for up to an hour, but first he has to do his chores and any homework he may have.

My three yr old punched me in the face yesterday because I told her no. I don't remember what it was about, just that we were sitting on the couch, she wanted something and I said no. What a shock!

It's Monday, I was hoping with the three going back to school things would settle back down here. They haven't. Maybe I have PMS, but it seems every little thing is irritating me today. Either that or it's the fact that I'm feeling abused and taken for granted and the kids are bouncing off the walls. Where's dad? Sleeping because he didn't sleep well last night o.0

Today is almost over and hopefully tomorrow will be better.

Old and New

We made it through another term and although I only got a B on my A&PII final, I still got an A in the class so I still have my 4.0! Took a week off between classes and was just lazy around the house. Read a few novels, played the Wii a bit, played on FB a lot!  Now we're back in a new term (term 5 for me). Medical Office Management (MOM) and Diseases of the Human Body this time. Had MOM yesterday, lost audio 10 minutes into it and it never came back.  Made for an interesting class.  Diseases is today and so far it's been pretty good. Looking forward to having an awesome term in both classes.

Unit 10

Wow, it's hard to believe we're in unit 10 already. I'll admit, I was seriously dreading taking this class. The last time I took a writing class was more than ten years ago and I didn't do nearly as well. Although I won't be writing a book anytime soon, I'm now less resistant to the idea of writing. It's not something that I want to do every day, but I'm more confident in my ability to write a decent paper now. Thank you, Dr. Manning for teaching a wonderful class and giving us all such helpful feedback. You truly did make this an enjoyable class :)

Where does the time go?

Wow, I can't believe we're already in Unit 9. It seems like every term goes by faster and faster. This week has been especially hectic for me.  Not only did I have two big papers to finish, my daughters are going to their first Homecoming dance tonight. The last couple of days have been absolutely crazy. The mother of one of their friends offered to make the dresses for me, I would just have to pay for the fabric. She didn't finish them until this morning and they didn't fit :( Amber borrowed a dress from one of her friends, but Alicia couldn't find one that fit so three hours before the dance started we were at the mall. Ugh.  The good news...we found a dress, it's cute and it fits. The best news...it was 40% off! huzzah!!  Really not sure what's going on with the tights here, but my girls are a little bit funky and they had to let that come through some.

To blog or not to blog…

There are times that no matter how much I think I would like to blog, I really don't have anything to say. This week has been one of those weeks. I'm thrilled that the kids are back in school and although I still have one at home, it seems like I'm getting such a big break during the day from the constant noise and chaos!

Soooo, now that that's been said. I really don't have much else to say so I'll respond to one of this week's topics :) Change that. I'll respond to all three!

•         Discuss any issues you have had throughout the process.

•         How do you feel about the comments, or lack of comments, that have been made to your blog posts?

•         Do you plan to continue your blog even after the course?

 
1. The only issue I find I'm having with the blogging process is taking the time to actually sit and do it. I don't always feel I have something worth sharing to say and when I'm in that mood it's really hard to write. (My mom tells me I'm "shooting myself in the foot" when I talk about not thinking anyone wants to hear my thoughts or I don't think what I write is very good. Maybe someday she'll convince me.)

2. I haven't had very many comments to my blog posts. The few I've had have been nice and I think I would like to have more. It's nice to get feedback on what one has to say.

3. As long as I think of things I want to share I'll continue to blog. The last blog I had lasted for a couple of years before I stopped posting to it. Who knows how long this one will last, only time will tell. :)

Uninspired

After 33 days of rain, the sun has finally decided to bless us with it's warm, golden presence. Because it's been so beautiful outside, I have been completely uninspired to remain inside and do my school work :( Two of the kids started school this week, one starts next week, and the little one will stay home with me.  Now that I'm finally getting fewer people in the house during the day I just don't want to stay in!  Maybe this is me trying to get as much outside time in as possible before the snows come, who knows. For now, I'll just struggle through to get my schoolwork done so I can enjoy the weather while it lasts!

 First sunset I've seen in over a month, my son said it looks like heaven!

Trying something new

This is me procrastinating when I should be hard at work doing school work. It's amazing the neat little tools one can find in Word when one should be writing. I decided to open a new document and the box that pops up gives so many templates to choose from. I had no clue I could blog from Word, so here I am giving it a try! No, this is not my Unit 6 post. That one is already done. This is just me staying up late and really not getting anything important done. Two of the kids are at a sleep over, the other two are sleeping and the husband is too. The house is quiet; no radios, television, kids yelling, dishwasher or washing machine running, just the sound of the computer whirring and me typing. I really should get busy doing something productive, but I wanted to give this a try ;)

Posttraumatic Stress Disorder

While doing the research for this paper I've learned a few things. First, I'm pretty sure my dad had PTSD when I was a kid (he's a Vietnam Vet). Second, I'm almost positive my husband has it even though he's sure he doesn't (he was in Bosnia and Kosovo in the late 90s and Iraq shortly after 9/11). And third, I may have a touch of it myself. :(

According to Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition, Text Revision. (2000) PTSD is described as the development of characteristic symptoms following exposure to an extreme traumatic event which involves actual or threatened death or serious injury to oneself or others. The person then reacts with intense fear, horror, or helplessness.  After reading that I've come to recognize that seeing the immediate aftermath of the C-17 cargo jet crash a couple of weeks ago has caused me to exhibit some of the classic symptoms. Not only did it involve the death of four soldiers, I recall feeling absolutely horrified at the vision. I live on a army base that is closely attached to an air force base. From my back windows I have a clear view of the flight line and often watch the big jets take off or bank in to land.  Lately I've noticed that I'm watching to see if another one is going to crash. It's very unnerving. I look forward to not feeling this way any more.

Reference:
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition, Text Revision. (2000).  Washington, DC: American Psychiatric Association.

My personal writing style?

I can sum that up with one word - avoidance. Since elementary school I can think of only one other academic endeavor that caused me as much grief as writing and that was public speaking. Writing gives me a serious case of the willies. For most of my adult life I have avoided writing letters, filling out essay type questionnaires, even avoiding the "about me" parts of website or social network profiles. I have a hard enough time getting my thoughts across verbally without mushing the words up in my mouth, getting them onto paper (or into text) seems like such an agonizing process for me.

I'm sitting here this morning trying to get my discussion board assignment done and as I start putting my ideas on paper my mind goes crazy and I start getting all these ideas that are totally unrelated. Maybe there's just so much junk in there that I need to let it all out so I can start to make sense of it, but the process is frustrating.

I know I want to write my paper on PTSD and how the family members of the person who suffers from it suffer along with them, but then I go off on a tangent that doesn't make sense. I understand about letting the "artist" do her job while holding the "judge" back until later, but that is much easier said than done.  I think I might have to let go and give freewriting a try to get some of this garbled information out of my head and onto the paper.  It's a start. Right?

Unforgettable Images

For some unknown reason yesterday, while I was in my A&P seminar I turned and looked out the window and saw a horrible thing. A giant ball of flame surrounded by black, billowing clouds of smoke filled my vision. It was obvious it was an explosion and in my mind I figured maybe a boiler at the Single Soldier's Club had exploded.  I found out a couple hours later that a C-17 Cargo plane that just taken off to practice for Saturday's Air Show had literally dropped out of the sky just two miles off the end of the runway and exploded on impact.  There were only four people on board (3 Air Nat'l Guardsmen, and 1 was active duty Air Force) and we're all thankful that it wasn't full of troops going up for a jump, but it's heartbreaking to have born witness to the explosion and know that there are four more families out there who've just lost loved ones.

All day today I keep replaying the image of that mushroom cloud in my mind.  I just can't seem to get it to go away.  The feeling in the pit of my stomach is the same as it was the day three months after my wedding when my husband called me from base telling me to turn on the news because someone had just flown a plane into the World Trade Center. Although the tragedies are not of the same scale, people lost their life in both and watching something like that happen, or even just seeing the end of it is sickening to my heart.  My heartfelt thoughts and prayers go out to the families of the soldiers we've lost, whether in combat or training accidents. Either here or abroad. Peace be with you and ease to your hearts.

If anyone is interested in reading the local news story, here's the link: Cargo plane crash

Unit 4

The nice thing about family coming to visit after not seeing them for a year, is eventually they go home!  Last week my husband's parents, sister and her family were here from North Carolina. I needed time to rest from their vacation by the time they left!  I've seen more of this state during the time they were here than during the year I've lived here! We walked all over downtown, went to Ship Creek to see some salmon heading upriver to spawn, drove up to Hatcher's Pass, Summit Lake, and Independence Mine, they went to see Portage glacier while I had classes, and we had the unfortunate joy of going to the reindeer farm.  For those who don't know, the only difference between a reindeer and a caribou is domestication.  Here's a pic of my sister in law with her new friend!

Although it looks like she's holding it's antler, she isn't.  Something we learned while there was that when the antlers are in "velvet" they're super sensitive.  That's a fuzzy, blood vessel infused covering on their antlers and we were told that grabbing it would be like dropping a large brick on your toe...OUCH!! (By the way, I don't recommend trying to pet just any caribou or reindeer you may meet. These live on a farm, are raised around humans, and are not pregnant or in rut.) We had a great time, but I didn't spend nearly enough time studying.  This week is make up week.

It always amazes me how fast these terms go by. At this point I should be deep in the research phase for two separate papers and I'm still having problems with narrowing down my searches in the KU library.  It's frustrating to say the least. I did manage to snag a copy of the APA guidelines so I won't have to go in search every time I need to know how to cite something or how to format! It's just a shame that when it's time to do the serious writing, my brain wants to shut down...

My thoughts on online schooling...

Coming into my fourth term at Kaplan I am finding that online learning is almost ideal for me.  I say almost ideal because I still have some issues with time management, but the fact that I don't have to find someone to watch my kids and I don't have to take the time to drive to school works out for me perfectly.  The flexibility is ideal with four kids in the house (especially during their summer break from school). I find that I probably spend more time with my schoolwork now than I did when I went to traditional college and it's showing in that I've gone from having a GPA of around 2.5 to a 4.0!  Call it maturity or determination or whatever, it's working for me this time :)

I do think it would be nice to have a closer class community.  The anonymity of online classes makes it more difficult to connect with fellow students.  I have found that even connecting on a social networking site like Facebook hasn't helped, nor has connecting on AIM or exchanging emails.  This could possibly be because I don't care for chatting much whether it be online or on the phone. I'd much rather talk to someone face to face.  Maybe that's because I like to be able to read a person's body language as well as hear what they're saying to me.  It makes it so much easier to not have misunderstandings that way.

Here we go!

I can't believe I'm blogging again. My last blog post was in 2007. This blog is only for my College Comp II class so we'll see if it develops into anything beyond that. I always seem to run out of things to say or just figure that what I'm saying isn't important. Must be the gray weather we're having today, I'm feeling a bit melancholy and it seems to be coming out here. On this note, I'll stop for now.

I will say that I'm looking forward to developing some better writing skills and I'm excited to see where this class takes me!