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Plainville, CT, United States
Having achieved my goal of becoming a published author, I contribute it to the fact that I have been writing since the age of 9. My boys were the inspiration for my children's stories and my life is the inspiration for my autobiography. I have a tendency to write about whatever I feel, relevant, interesting or not. I welcome any comments you may have, positive or constructive. Thank you so much for visiting and following my blog, My life.

Monday, May 17, 2010

I never imagined i would do it again.......

Wow. Here i am, two children - 20 and 22 and I have a 19 month old in the house. I'm 42 and my husband is 45. Never in this lifetime did we imagine that we would be raising a baby at our age. Even though it has been a year, it is still "sinking in".
Let me tell you the story........
My husband and I like to snowmobile, go on the boat, 4-wheeling, etc. Well, up until June of 2008, we had my son Erik in the house. He has Aspergers Syndrome which is high functioning Autism. He really took a toll on us because all his disability is social, daily living skills, etc. For example, If I did not tell him to shower every morning, he would not because his brain does not process the "necessity" to shower. He is 6' 3", about 280lbs but wouldn't hurt a fly. He is just a gentle giant plain and simple.
Well, when i divorced his father, my oldest son went to live with my ex and Erik stayed with me. (thats a totally different story for another day). Always asking to go live with "daddy", i told him that he could not until he graduated from high school. Well the day came and i certainly couldn't go back on my word so July 1st, he went to live with his father.
Although we didn't like the idea of Erik living with his father (he doesn't know how to assist an Autistic person, nor does he want to make the time), we were liking the fact that we could come and go as we please. All we had to worry about now was who was going to take care of our pets if we left them home. (They are our kids so they pretty much go everywhere with us unless we have to fly somewhere)
Then, on May 9th i think it was, my grandson, then 6 months old, became part of our lives. No more coming and going as we pleased. No more "its all about us now". We had this little person in our lives that depended on us for his very survival....whether we liked it or not, we were raising a baby.
that in itself is a long story. One that i would rathar not get into for personal reasons. Lets just say that my son and his wife were total flipping morons, were only thinking of themselves, got into a bit of trouble and were not able to take care of their son. Well, to keep him out of state custody, we stepped in.
BOY did our lives change. Now i know why they give children to young people lol. Its been a long time since i was changing diapers, buying baby food, soothing a tooth-cutting baby. Took me a little bit but i got back into the swing of things.
Poor little thing. When he was brought to us at 6 months old, he was just so confused. My heart broke when i saw his eyes. Its a good thing i was there not too long ago - he smiled when he saw me so i know that he recognized me. good thing because i would hate to think what would have happened had he not. Just the dazed look in his eyes - after all, the poor kid was taken from his mommy and daddy, brought to me by my stepmother (whom he had only seen once). Yanked from his stability and didn't know what the hell was going on.
It took quite a while for him to look as though he was ok. After all, i wasn't his mommy. I don't care what anyone says, a baby knows who its mother is. I would give Jennifer updates on him and I really tried to visit them as much as i could with the baby - it was hard though. They lived in Virginia and i was in CT. We were talking about a 9 hour drive, one way. It wasn't something that i could do too often unfortunately.
At this point he is a very well adjusted little boy. He is now a year and a half, starting to talk, climbing all over everything like a little monkey, eats like a little piggy and is just a super happy kid. (despite going through the terrible twos and becoming a beast child :) )We try to take videos and pictures when we can so that my son and his wife will have some type of memories, since they are missing out on alot. I know its not the same, but i also know that they will appreciate anything of that nature when it comes to their son.
Do I have any regrets? Only that my son and his wife were stupid enough to get themselves into that type of situation to begin with, having a small child to think about.
How long will we have him? Not sure. Obviously the kids want him back as quickly as possible. They did give us custody of him as they cannot support him right now, but we all agreed that when the time came, we would reverse the custody and give it back to them. When is that going to happen?
Not sure. My grandson doesnt really know his parents. He is "familiar" enough with them that as long as my husband and I are there, he will play with them and sit with them, etc. If we leave, thats when he gets nervous and starts looking for us.
I know that it is a difficult situation for them. I can't even IMAGINE what they feel not having their son with them. All i know, (and they certainly don't want to hear it) is that they need to focus on getting THEIR lives straightened out. If they aren't right, Their son will not be right with them. We are fully prepared to be in this for the long haul. This little guy is the most important thing right now.
I do have to say that he has been a blessing. We are so glad that we were there to help the kids. They are trying to get their lives back in order, and we are raising their son and hoping that one day, they will be in a position to resume the role as his primary caregivers. They have a long way to go both in maturity and just their overall situation, but we are here to support them and help them the whole way.