Dad chuckled. “That boy,” he said, “talked nonstop the entire time he was in the tractor, up until he fell asleep.”

I nodded. “That’s my life every day. It’s exhausting! Mentally exhausting, I mean.”

He nodded thoughtfully in turn. “Yes, it is. You could just let him talk…but the problem is, he expects a response!”

To get an idea of what Nicholas is like, the best illustration I can think of is that 1990s Mel Gibson movie Conspiracy Theory. “Jerry” is a cab driver in New York who talks nonstop all day, even as his voice grows more and more hoarse, until by the end of the day he can barely talk at all.

Nicholas talks even when he has a sore throat. He talks whether or not he has anything to say. If he runs out of words, he simply hums or says nonsense syllables. And he virtually always expects a response.

I reiterate something from yesterday’s post: the word “noise” comes from the word “nausea.” This is what noise does to me. It unsettles me, sets me on edge, which is why I seek out stillness, and why I hardly ever play music around the house even though I have two higher degrees in music. So you can imagine the soul-growth my third child requires of me. Some time I should count how many times a day I say some variation of “Be quiet!” to him. Frequently I have to remind myself he’s not actually doing anything wrong.

He’s singleminded as only a three-year-old can be. For example:

N: “I want a movie.”

Me: “Finish your lunch.”

N: “I want a movie, Mommy.”

Me: “Finish your lunch first.”

N: “I want a movie, Mommy!”

Me: “Finish your broccoli right now, and then we’ll talk about it.”

N: “I want a movie!”

Me: “Look at me. What did I say?”

N: (A beat, then): “I want a movie?”

Julianna doesn’t talk much. Remind me why we’re pushing so hard for her to speak? …

(That’s a joke. Chill. )

When Christian saw this picture, he shook his head and said, “I’m telling you, we’re gonna have trouble with that one.”

That was a year ago. When Nicholas was barely two years old. Now just imagine what life is like with this child at three.

“Mommy, I a goofball,” he says to me as I’m putting him down for nap, his eyes dancing. It makes me want to chew him to pieces, which frankly is a much nicer desire than the desire to pull my hair out, which follows me around most days as he refuses to eat and turns everything into a battle with me and with Julianna.

In the post-baby fog, we got to a point of running through rote prayers without catechesis or depth, and just this week, I’ve taken a deep breath and stopped settling for “good enough.” So we’ve been taking time to do petitions and thanks this week. Nicholas doesn’t quite get it. “I pway for Awex and Juweanna and Michael and Mommy and Daddy and the pwaygwound,” he says, pointing around the room.

“You want to pray for the playground?”

“Yeah!”

“Okay, what do you want to say thank you for?”

“I want say thank you for my ear infection.”

(Um, kiddo, I don’t think you’ve quite got that distinction clear.)

And then, the Mischief Eyes come out. “And…I want say thank you for PICKLE!”

Christian, who is flopped face-down on the bed, raises his head and looks at me as if he’s not sure he really just heard what he thinks he heard. And then starts laughing.

Perhaps I need to explain. I’m sure everyone is familiar with this book:

Front cover (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The last page, with the list of all the junk food he ate? It takes us five minutes to finish that page, because the kids point at every food, sometimes in order, sometimes not, while I say them over and over. And I always yell “PICKLE!” because it makes them laugh.

Yup, that’s my son, turning bedtime prayers into an opportunity for clowning around.

I have to echo my husband. We’re gonna have trouble with this one.

Related articles

• Nicholas Is A Comic Strip Waiting To Be Written (a 7QT post) (kathleenbasi.com)
• The Very Hungry Caterpillar (cakesbycathy.wordpress.com)

To keep the expense and inconvenience factor low, we planned to send him to the early childhood special ed center in our neighborhood as a peer mentor next year. A peer mentor is a typically-developing child who models appropriate behavior and skills for the kids with special needs. We had Alex screened when he was four, but eventually decided his entire toddlerhood had revolved around Julianna, and he needed something just for him. That’s not the case with Nicholas, so I called up the school district a while back to schedule the “DIAL” screening. And this week, we went. I came out with my ears smoking.

One: not family friendly.

The cover letter for the paperwork (which I didn’t get till I got there) included this: Please bring only the child to be evaluated, in order to avoid distraction. I understand that, but what are my options? Hire a babysitter? I don’t think so! This is the next in a long line of un-family-friendly policies that smack me in the face on a daily basis…such as the concert that would have made me buy a ticket for my three week old baby. If you want people to bring up a new generation of concert goers, don’t make it so hard for them to come!

But I digress.

Two: the paperwork annoyance.

On the phone I was told I had to fill out “a couple of pages.” Which means four.

Three: none of your business.

As part of the health form, I had to tell the school district whether he rides in a car seat and whether he wears a helmet while riding a bike. While I appreciate the safety concerns (of course he rides in a car seat. Duh, it’s the law!), the answers to those questions have no bearing on the school district. It is simply none of their business. This is part of that “mission creep,” for lack of a better word, that makes medical professionals try to be developmental experts (i.e. the questions they ask at well child visits. I know I’m in the minority in this, but eh bien, that’s my opinion).

Four: not family friendly, part two

On the forms, I was required to provide names and birth dates for all other children living in the household. They left me two blanks. Imagine me hissing with (overdone, I admit it) righteous anger as I had to write Michael in the blank space beneath.

Five: the guilt complex

When it was all over, Nicholas scored in the 60th and 80th percentile on cognition and communication, but only the high 40s on physical skills. Which makes him marginal for acceptance into Title 1 preschool. Because…are you ready? He can’t cut with a scissors, and he can’t hop on one leg. I thought, Are you KIDDING me? Give this kid a scissors and he’ll learn to use it in three minutes. After he shreds my couch.

Six: the bait and switch

And after all this annoyance, it turns out that they “generally don’t accept peer mentors until age four.” I wanted to say, “Well, sure, that makes sense, but don’t you think somebody could have told me that BEFORE I waited six weeks till you decided he was old enough to make the appointment, and BEFORE we waited three more weeks for the appointment, and BEFORE we spent an hour and a half that we could have all spent doing more productive things?”

Seven: the up side

But at least now I’m looking for other preschool opportunities for him. And those are opportunities that may be better in the long run, anyway.

Have a great weekend!

• He adores his baby brother, even though said brother has usurped his place in the world. He giggles every time Michael’s wildly-flailing fists contact any part of his body.
• The cute speech-isms of new speaker are fast fading. This week I realized that “too-ie” has now become “cookie,” and “the nail has a tail” (the snail has a tail–sounds rather Dr. Suessish, doesn’t it?) has now become “the sail has a tail.” He drives Alex crazy by repeating everything he says. A few days ago we spent Michael’s morning nursing going back and forth on the word “harmonica.” He tried it five times, and three of them came out as “formica,” “Mo-hannah” and “har-monta.”
• He’s getting to be a whiz at puzzles; this part of the age of three I do love, because I love doing puzzles. He’s working a 100-piece Thomas puzzle and a 30-piece fire station puzzle all by himself. Welll, mostly all by himself.
• He loves to paint.
• His conversations with Julianna are adorable. They trade off big sibling status; they bicker over toys three dozen times a day, but in between, they crack each other up. They like to hold hands, and he takes the lead in this matter all the time.
• He instinctively understands that he has to ask Julianna yes or no questions, so they can converse quite fluently despite Julianna’s limited and still barely intelligible vocabulary. In fact, they converse much better with each other than Julianna does with any of the rest of us.
• We have never had a conversation with him about Down syndrome, and thus he’s growing up with a much more organic picture of what it means to be Julianna’s brother than Alex has. It will be interesting to see how he and Alex process the subject when they get older.
• He’s so ready to go to school. In two weeks, he’ll be screened as a peer mentor for next fall, and we plan to send him to preschool at Early Childhood Special Ed. Every day, he tells someone that “Juweeanna wides the ye-ow bus, and I wide the bwue one.” (That would be a city bus…but he’s never been on one, except in his dreams.)
• He’s been dry at night several times, with help. We’ve undertaken a new project, you see, tired of quadruple diapering at night, and we’re getting the kids up at our bedtime and in the middle of the night when Michael nurses. Trying to train little bodies to wake up when bladders get full.
• And yesterday, Hallelujah Lord, he reached for the open compartment on the printer….and then, remembering how many times he’s been scolded not to touch it , he stopped, looked at me and said meekly, “Do you need that closed, Mommy?” As a reward for asking, I let him close it. And then I gave him a big hug and told him how proud of him I was.

And–how appropriate–he just came over and said, “Mommy, I need you.” Translated: I want to sit on your lap. So here he sits, asking where O is and what the camera is, and did I push the “i”? and “N starts with me!” (Meaning, his name starts with N.) Another day in the life begins.

Image via Wikipedia

It was one of those days.To wit:

Michael would not consent to be laid down…all day. Imagine. Every time I tried to make lunch, use the bathroom, or aid another child in a self-care task, I had to endure heartbreaking wails.

Nicholas kept whimpering pathetically, “I want you, Mommy!” (translated: I want to sit on your lap.) Refer to my last.

Nicholas and Julianna bickered, took toys from and pushed each other, causing periodic eruptions of screaming.

I returned to the computer after, I don’t know, changing a diaper, to find a screen display completely rearranged and a mouse on its maximum sensitivity. The screen was just tiled like a triptych–not a big deal–the point was that Nicholas has been handling, moving and breaking everything in sight lately, and he had no reason to be messing with the computer at all. I yelled at him to JUST STOP TOUCHING THINGS, and he stuck his lower lip out and pouted (this kid’s got the guilt routine down, I’m telling you) and whimpered, “I get my twuck.”

“Yes, play with your truck,” I said, clutching the shredded remains of my composure around me like a too-small robe. He got down on all fours under the computer desk…and turned off the computer power strip.

I don’t exactly remember what came out of my mouth before I clamped my lips shut on it, but you might imagine it wasn’t pretty. Not…pretty…at…all. (Stop laughing! I need several months before I can laugh at this story!)

Deep breath, missy. In…..out….in…out.

At the end of this long, hard day, I wanted nothing more than to be left alone. Alex sat down to finish Return of the Jedi. This is a new thing for him, and he’s pursuing it with his usual enthusiasm, running headlong through all three of the oldies in the span of a week. But there are some pretty intense scenes in Jedi–you know, lightning bolt torture–and I needed to tell him when to hide his eyes. So I breezed back and forth from kitchen to office to living room, narrating to Alex what was happening (because let’s be honest, a lot of it’s still over his head).

And as I watched Luke battle his darker nature, as the twin Darths pushed his buttons and dismantled his hope one block at a time, maneuvering him into an emotional corner, I suddenly recognized myself: trying–trying so hard–not to lose it. Knowing the stakes: “Once you start, forever will it dominate your destiny” (what did we ever do for wisdom before Yoda?) Trying to be serene in the face of a repeated bombardment of frustration and desperation. To focus on the choice to love, instead of giving in to my own Dark Side.

Luke finally had enough; the lightsabers came out, and he began his journey toward Ultimate Bad Guy status. But then…then he recognized what was happening. He put the brakes on, threw the weapon away, decided he’d rather die the man he wanted to be than live as everything he’d fought against.

There’s a lesson in there for me. I haven’t worked it all out yet, but I think it has something to do with choosing, time and time again, to get up after I face plant along the Mommy Road.

Like I couldn’t have worked that out for myself. Right?

(Speaking of Star Wars…we just really need some Cello Wars today.)

I knew what she was asking: transition. “Actually,” I said, “it hasn’t been a big deal this time, as far as the kids go. Everybody’s handling it really well.” But even as she spoke, I recognized something I hadn’t processed until that moment: Nicholas’s increasing behavior problems. Maybe this has just been the grace period, I thought.

As if determined to prove that point, Nicholas spiraled downward into clinginess, acting out, bossiness and refusal to do any “big boy” stuff…overnight. The child who had been proud of his ability to dress himself, wash himself, and brush his teeth suddenly needed everything done for him. He took to repeating sentences and observations over and over…and over…and over. He began demanding to sit on my lap and snuggle, regardless of what else was going on–i.e., even if the baby was nursing. He started dropping whatever he was doing and screeching “I want that!” if someone picked up a toy he’d abandoned. (Or hadn’t noticed until they picked it up.) And he started wetting himself again.

The interesting thing about all this is that it is completely unrelated to his feelings for the baby. Everyone in this house adores Baby Michael unreservedly. The kids even think it’s funny when he cries, and when I come home from grocery shopping or meetings, Nicholas comes running and shrieks, “Da baby is home! Da baby is home!” Not Mommy–the baby. The trouble is not resentment, but insecurity.

Recognizing that his place in the world has been usurped, I have tried to be patient with him, to give him that physical and mental reassurance as much as I can. I vaguely remember Alex going through a similar process when Julianna came along. Not so much with Julianna when Nicholas came along, but then, raising Julianna is another ball game entirely, with entirely different problems to solve.

So I take time to draw him onto my lap and hold him at the computer or on the couch, or whenever he asks…if I can. The problem is, I have to make the boundaries clear. One day we had a pitched battle over the rocking chair in the basement. Michael was freaking out, demanding to nurse while I was trying to teach a voice lesson, so I’d put my student on the “away” side and was working with her on Italian pronunciation while I used the rocker as a footstool to help position Michael for nursing. As soon as Nicholas saw I was splitting my attention between two people, neither of them him, he just had to have the rocker.

Later that afternoon, another friend and mother of four advised that I find something that really means something to him–like a big boy glass–and tie that privilege to him doing what he’s supposed to be doing. At first, I didn’t think it would work, but then he unexpectedly developed an affinity for using the same plates and glass glasses that Alex gets to use. So we’ve been using that lately, and following through on “big boy glass” vs. “little boy glass.” And I tell him he’s the chewiest of my children…which is the truth; his proportion of soft skin to baby fat is absolutely perfect. And I can only pray for patience while he searches for his new stride as a middle child instead of the baby of the family.

(Note: any lack of clarity in this post, I must add, is due to Nicholas putting a hand on my shoulder and speaking loudly into my ear while I write. Just to illustrate the point.)

It’s almost Lent, folks! I know, I’m ahead of the game, but I have a good reason: I am hosting a giveaway for my new book, Bring Lent To Life. If you’re a Catholic mother with young (or youngish) children, click over and leave a comment for a chance to win a signed copy!

Okay, now that I’ve done my shameless self-promo…moving on.

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I was poking around online, doing magazine market research yesterday, and an ad for “Molexit” caught my eye. Considering the helpless rage with which I am consumed every time I walk across my big lawn, my ankle twisting on the maze of mole hills, you can imagine I clicked. A little browsing led me to THIS. All I have to say is: These are people after my own heart.

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I teach flute and voice lessons in my basement, which you might imagine can be a bit of an adventure with three small children and, uh, a nursing baby. Alex used to be very quiet over in the corner, humming vocal warmups along with the students while he bent over a Lego creation or a rescue hero. (Precursor to the autopilot humming he does All.The.Time now.) But Julianna? Julianna takes it to a whole new level. This week in lessons, she turned her back to us, planted her feet shoulder-width apart, and sang to the sunny window with arms out Broadway-finale style, “Eee-AAAAAAAHHHHaaaaah!”

Ah, how I love that girl, despite her selective deafeness to anything she doesn’t feel like hearing…

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Speaking of Julianna, or rather, Julianna and Michael…my baby is 8 weeks old already. I cannot believe it. I’ve been anxiously watching for his first smile, and we got it this week–a few, fleeting, absolutely adorable smiles. But incredibly hard to catch. I spent twenty minutes making a complete, blithering fool of myself while the dish water got cold one night. Once–once–I hit the button at exactly the right moment….and the camera turned off. I had my finger on the power instead of the shutter. Sigh. In the end, this was the best I got:

While Julianna, who torments him ceaselessly, turning him sideways in his bouncy, soundlessly and sneakily rolling him over onto his tummy (and here I thought I was making a big joke when I said she was destined to be a superspy), dragging him by one arm when my back is turned, lying on top of him…what, you think I’m kidding? Look at this! Caught in the act!

Julianna is the one Michael smiles for most often. What is this, some freaky variant on Stockholm syndrome???????

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Smiles aside, Michael adores all his big siblings. He can’t smile with his mouth yet, but his whole face smiles. Moms, you know that look, right? Heart-meltingly bright eyes, arms and legs kicking, face alight? He does that often for us. And it makes me happy to see how much Nicholas loves him. I was worried about Nicholas, because he’s such a drama king, and so needy. I was afraid we’d be in for all manner of resentment and tantrums. But the transition has been remarkably smooth, and he absolutely adores his baby brother, asking to hold him at all times of the day. Of course, he lasts about ten seconds, but hey. He’s a boy.

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Alex was home from school two days this week. And now we have piles of homework to catch up on. Actually, he did most of it while I was teaching yesterday, but it’s a wakeup call, reminding me that whew, we are entering a new phase of parenthood!

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Well, I’m officially back to that phase of my life: the obsessed with sleep stage. It’s cyclical, and varies in cause and style. Right now it’s the “how many times did he get up last night?” strain. The Shangri-la of sleep for me right now would be getting to that stage where the baby wakes up around two and then sleeps till five or six. My babysitter keeps asking, “Is he sleeping through the night yet?” I’m like, uh…no. Is he supposed to? I wouldn’t know. I’ve never had a child who slept through the night until he or she was three years old.

Whatever, dude. Sleep is for wimps.

But that makes me wonder–how many of you actually have kids who slept through the night consistently? And at what age?

Enough from me. Don’t forget to enter my giveaway!

Julianna’s the ringleader of this little comic group, and her repertoire of jokes consists of one: She signs “eat” and points to random objects–the baby’s nose, the pillow, the wall, my jeans, the phone–and giggles hysterically.

The first time, I admit, I was slow on the uptake (as I often am with jokes). “You’re gonna eat the phone?” I said blankly, and she fell on the pillow, overcome by mirth. Now that was funny. You poor people out there in the e-verse have no way of comprehending how magical Julianna’s laugh is. I was powerless against it. The first time, anyway.

Nicholas found it so hysterical, he couldn’t even sit up. Instantly, he adopted the joke as his own, wholly forgetting that he can talk.

Although–and I hope you’ll permit me the tangent; my story’s finished anyway–Julianna actually is talking now. She almost always asks for “milk please” and names a whole bunch of colors, as well as counting one to ten. You have to know the context; you wouldn’t just recognize the words automatically–but she is saying them. Yesterday her big speech therapy task was to learn to say “go home.” I’m so proud of my little girl. Except when she’s sitting motionless, pretending she can’t hear me issuing instructions, that is. That girl can use her disability to play stupid when she doesn’t want to do something. We really have to stay on our toes to try not to get manipulated. I know she’s winning some of the battles…like the chores battle. Nicholas is way farther than she is on the “complies with instructions” continuum. I know I have to fight that battle eventually, but I don’t have the time and emotional energy to deal with them simultaneously. Let’s just hope I manage to do it before Michael gets old enough to need the lesson!

(By the way–I’m well aware that today is Wednesday, not Thursday, but I have a special post prepared that requires editorial approval, so I’m doing Motherhood Moment a day early today to make room for it! Stay tuned!)

Last night was one of those nights when I think we really ARE as crazy as people think we are for having four children. Nicholas (AKA drama king) is sick, and you know what that means. If you don’t, let me enlighten you: it means he got up SIX TIMES between ten-thirty and six a.m. Add two nursings and one scream from Julianna, who was convinced that there was a thunderstorm outside her window, and you can imagine I am one seriously cranky mommy this morning.

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Cranky mama status is especially troublesome as I intended to focus this post on my cute kids. They’re not looking so cute to me today.

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Which means, since my attitude shapes my reality, it’s even more important today than it would have been otherwise. So why don’t I focus mostly on Nicholas, the bane of my nights light of my life, the perpetual “why”-asker and camera ham? Now, when I say camera ham, don’t think I’m overstating. In the home videos from his babyhood he couldn’t seem to do anything but pose and give silly, goofy giggles. Now he says, “Mommy, wi you take pi-euh of me?” It’s hard not to oblige when he gives me pictures like this one:

(Those eyes are murder. Murder, I’m telling you. High school girls, beware.)

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 Or this one:

The moment I snapped this picture my heart almost stopped, because I realized I was looking at a teenage Nicholas. I know now exactly how he will look.

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 He’s also the klutz of the family. Wednesday night he tripped and smacked his head on the metal base of a schoolroom desk while we were at choir practice, and now sports a knot you can see from across the street. Thursday morning he hit his head six times between getting up and breakfast time. I’ve known for a long time that he was going to be his mother’s child in that regard. I was the one in our family who had to have stitches, who broke her arm, the only one who had to have surgery…there’s gotta be one in every family, and in mine Nicholas is it. You know what? That doesn’t jive well with drama king status. Ugh.

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 You haven’t seen much of Michael lately. How about one of him? Better yet, how about one of him and his brand-new cousin?Except you can’t really see Michael’s face, can you? How about this one?

Power to the people, man!

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Julianna got her own post and pictures yesterday, so let’s leave off with a picture of Alex doing what Alex does best these days: being an awesome big brother.

Now, how can I be a cranky mom after those pictures??????

(I’m sure I’ll find a way. Just give me time.)

EXHIBIT A:

EXHIBIT B:

EXHIBIT C:

Well, what do you say? Willing to take a stab at it?