Wednesday Open Letters

[macmars45]

PDQ

Dear H,

I know work has been utter shit for months on end and stupidness is delaying your lateral move to a different department. Please do reach out to your someday boss and let him know if this lateral move doesn't happen asap you are moving on to a new company. Maybe he can light a fire under big boss' ass.

Also, as we discussed & you agreed to; please go back to counseling. Prioritize yourself. I know you feel like there's no time. We will make time for your mental health.

Love you so much,

your favorite wife and biggest supporter

Dear parents of the elementary students I teach,

Oh, this is a RED area of my red city. The amount you must be talking up trump around your kids is seeping in fast. I cannot talk politics with your kids... but I wish I could. They don't even know what a democracy is but apparently that's ok because you as parents are good to go with a dictatorship.

Just over here trying to teach your kids reading fluency and comprehension,

macmars

PDQ

[waverly]

Dear WP,

I have the Girl Scout camp out this weekend. I am solely doing this for my daughter. The last one was absolutely terrible. I was bossed where to put my stuff. My "friend" ignored me the whole time and hid down the path to make exclusive plans. No one slept much, and they limited our coffee.

This year, we are NOT staying over due to our terrible experience. If anyone has any tips for me for the day part- let me know!

The women in general are nice women, but I only remember 3 of them having a nice conversation with me the whole time. Part of that was because they incredibly overscheduled the activities.  We didn't even have time to chat because we were busy the whole time and some of it was busy work rather than camp out stuff.  

DD is quitting Girl Scouts and this is her last camp out which is the only reason we are going.  

Signed,

Waverly

[twinmomma]

Dear DH,
You are truly my hero when it comes to handling all the house and kid stuff! You pick up the girls from after school activities so often, which saves me and them a ton of hassle with coordinating after school care. I hope you know how much I appreciate that we are a team and you are able to support my crazy busy career because you are a part time stay at home parent. I love you!
Signed,
Eternally grateful to have an actual partner

Dear work trip,
Let's do this! I hate this lull before the storm feeling. I just want to rip off the bandaid and make it happen now. I leave Sunday to go prep before the group arrives and cannot wait! Fingers crossed we have no drama this year.
Signed,
Ready to go!

[186momx]

Dear DH
How are you sick again?
Please keep your germs to yourself
Wife & DD

Dear today
I blocked off the entire afternoon to have a quiet work time. I need some quiet time. Please phones be quiet and no random walk-in people.
Back logged tax lady

twinmomma, are your girls feeling better?
waverly, bite your tongue and just keep reminding yourself it is your last girl scout event.

[waverly]

186momx , Yup this year is basically our last of everything, so that has been nice to aknowledge like hey it's out last cookie booth, last time selling cookies, last time bridging, last field trip. It's been great, but it's been 6 years. We are so ready to be done; only 3 months left.

[twinmomma]

186momx, They've both bounced back! They went back to school on Monday with just lingering coughs but no other issues. They're both hard to make relax, but they spent 3 days straight in bed and I think it made a big difference in letting their bodies actually heal.

[rere]

Dear lab,

You people made me wait 1.75 hrs and had to stick me 4 times. I didn't get coffee or food until 11. I spent the entire day thinking I'm pre diabetic. Now you call me and tell me the blood work got screwed up. And I have to do it all again tomorrow? You better get me right back first thing and put your best person on it or the entire building is going to hear it.

Signed. I'm done

[k3am]

Mar 6, 2024 21:23:22 GMT -5 rere said:

Dear lab,

You people made me wait 1.75 hrs and had to stick me 4 times. I didn't get coffee or food until 11. I spent the entire day thinking I'm pre diabetic. Now you call me and tell me the blood work got screwed up. And I have to do it all again tomorrow? You better get me right back first thing and put your best person on it or the entire building is going to hear it.

Signed. I'm done

At least they didn’t say you have leukemia. That was a way worse bloodwork mistake. 🤦🏻‍♀️

[dglvrk2]

@macmars45 I cannot imagine being in a red area right now. So rough Hugs
waverly, Does your daughter *want* to go on this trip? I'd back out if she's not 100% excited about it. I'm involved in Girl Scouts and have never done an official overnight because the sound too crazy for me.

Dear DD1,
Fingers crossed!! You rock!
Mom

Dear state and county,
THANK YOU for finally plowing our roads. I know you have bigger fish to fry. Driving on plowed roads....well it felt so good after driving on the snow ruts for the last three days!
Your willing tax payer,
dglvrk2

[mommyatty]

Dear DS’s new school,

I’m so happy overall with how things are going, but also very confused. DS says he had a good first day, so thank you! And you said he had a good first day other than being overwhelmed by noise in PE so someone gave him headphones, so thank you and yay! But then… DS said he couldn’t really do anything because he didn’t have a computer, he read an entire Diary of a Wimpy Kid book during school today, and said he was reading his book before math class started and… he didn’t notice class started because he was lost in his book. So, um, I’m not sure he’s starting on the right foot.

Also, he has no idea what you did in math. Not sure if that’s because he wasn’t paying attention or just didn’t know how to do what you were doing. But in any event, yikes.

Signed,
Really hoping tomorrow is better and he learns something

PS He really doesn’t like his last teacher of the day and said she yelled a lot. So I am hoping she was just having a rough day today too.

[mae0111]

Dear WPs -

Tonight was rough and I just need a place to put this.

DD1 had a terrible 2.5 hour meltdown over missing 5 minutes of a fun school event for PT. TERRIBLE. It was too late to cancel by the time we realized the issue. But by the end she was just a mess and I was not OK and DH had a 2 hour call for a huge client so he had to leave.

So now I can’t sleep and feel terrible.

Ugh

[dglvrk2]

mae0111, I'm so sorry! Can you have a glass of your favorite beverage or watch a mindless show on TV since you can't sleep?

Hugs!

[macmars45]

(hugs) mae0111

Nothing but empathy from me. Helping DS through his meltdowns drain me physically, mentally and emotionally.

[waverly]

dglvrk2 , it's too late to back out. Most likely it will be better than I expected. Last time I expected good things, and was disappointed. This time, I'm expecting it to be terrible and most likely it will be middling.

We are also not spending the night this time because we both need sleep.

[mommyatty]

Dear mae0111,

Have you looked at stuff for helping minimize meltdowns for autistic kids? I follow a Facebook page called Mindful as a Mother by two neurodivergent therapists raising neurodivergent kids. I’ve found some of it helpful, especially the idea of remembering neurodivergent kids have less capacity (think of it as spoons) than neurotypical kids, so they talk about removing a lot of the “must do” things that aren’t really must dos.

Is DD overwhelmed? With her life, I would be. I know she wants to do all the things, but could you limit her outside activities and her must do things at home? An example they give for little kids is eating at the table. Why is this a rule at home? What if you just let them get up and wander during meals? In the morning, what can you do to cut down on the must do stuff?

I would just stop every non-school activity until she calms the F down and gets some sense of regulation. It must be exhausting for her to be in a constant state of dysregulation too. Then add them back one by one as she earns them and shows she’s ready for them, but back off and stop when she’s back to dysregulation. Same for DD2 since she’s starting ramping up. I know they need physical activity, but not every day and not multiple teams/sports/activities. I can imagine you are exhausted and defeated and sad and overwhelmed. You deserve a break too.

All the hugs. Raising neurodivergent kids is not for the faint of heart.

Another Mom Dealt a Shitty Hand

[mae0111]

dglvrk2, macmars45, thank you for the thoughts... I finally fell asleep around 2am, up at 6. It's going to be a long day.

mommyatty, I will look up Mindful as a Mother - thanks!

It's possible that she's overwhelmed? But she's actually in a bit of a lull right now. She has no sports yet. We stopped piano lessons because she refused to learn or do anything that the teacher suggested - the teacher would literally just sit there and watch her play whatever she wanted. We explained our expectations, and if she did not want to follow that, we would stop lessons and piano would just become an enjoyable hobby where she could tinker. So she has physical therapy and emotional therapy. In between sports seasons, they have clubs after school - she's in a card game club that she misses here and there for PT - very low pressure. School softball starts in a few weeks, town softball won't start for over a month. She is signed up for town but I could always pull that.

I do think that the social piece continues to be very difficult for her, and that could be causing her some stress. But I don't know - she seems very happy and almost blissfully ignorant to the social difficulties.

I ended up canceling her PT today and I will be charged a hefty fee for it. I just couldn't do it. dglvrk2,