How About Some Cheese with that Whine?

Okay, for a change, today’s post is all about ME.

The situation from the weekend is no better. Jane still mopes around with a sad face like we killed her dog – or in her case, took away her laptop, which I think would bother her more.

I however, have not been doing so well.

Christmas is five weeks from today. Five weeks. Might as well be five months for all it means to me right now.

The kids –at least as it stands now – are going to be in SSM with their mother for the holidays.

Now I know just I wrote that but in all fairness, just because plans are put into place doesn’t mean they’ll actually happen. My friends know how often I’ve made plans but have had to cancel them at the last minute due to a change in plans that were not of my control. So even though right now, as of this writing the kids are going to SSM, so much can happen between now and then. Boyfriend’s parents might change their mind about making the long drive to go up. They may change their mind about taking up Marvin and Jane with them (who are not blood kin to them). Any number of things can happen in five weeks.

Just two short weeks ago – less, actually – I told my husband that I wanted us to reconnect as a family over the holidays. I wanted to be Clark W. Griswold and have a Griswold Family Christmas. The baking. The decorating. The shopping. The cooking. The wrapping. Cutting down the tree at a tree farm. The presents on Christmas morning. Dinner on Christmas Eve. Christmas movies and Christmas carols.

I wanted it to be about us as a family – not just about the presents. I wanted to take this last year of shit and somehow turn it into something good.

But then Mom comes first, right? I don't mean anything to them - I’m just their maid, cook and chauffer. My feelings don't matter. They (well, mostly Jane) want to see their mother.

To quote Jane, “it’s not fair”.

So I know the holidays aren’t all about me. I’m not the most important person in their life.

I KNOW that, okay?

But dammit, after all the shit I put up with around the house, I wanted one day – ONE FUCKING DAY- of family harmony.

Peace on Earth my ass.

Drag Me To Hell

First, let me apologize. This is a long post.

No, this post isn’t about one of the new horror movies available on DVD – it’s about another horror-filled family weekend.

As I wrote last week, Jane and Marvin’s mother was in the area over the weekend. By in the area I mean they were in B-ville, about an hour or so away. Much closer than the 13 hour drive of SSM.

As I also wrote, that after much deliberation, my husband decided not to allow the kids to see her, given that Jane has now been sick for 10 days (no fever today so back to school for her tomorrow).

This wasn’t a decision my husband made lightly. He works in the ICU of a major hospital so he sees up front what can happen with this flu. He was taking no chances.

Jane of course was heartbroken. Marvin was… well… Marvin was Marvin. Indifferent. He’s very indifferent when it comes to his mother. He was more interested in seeing his old friends in B-ville than in spending time with his mother.

On Friday, Jane changed her Facebook status to the following: 'I realy miss you..and you can't even bother to come see me :('

Good for her – she finally said what she means. Now I doubt that her mom would have even seen that because it’s not as if she had a ton of time to sit at a computer and check her Facebook profile.

On Saturday morning at 11:55 AM she changed her Facebook status to: 'what i said hurt you but i cant take it backk but i can say im sorry and mean it'

Hmmmm. Maybe Mom did read her status. She didn’t call though – the phone never rang on Saturday morning. Maybe Jane was just getting an attack of the guilts.

Mom finally did call around 4 PM after she was finished at the baby shower she had to attend. Personally, I would have sent my gift with someone else, borrowed a car and driven to see my kids for a couple of hours instead of attending a baby shower.

But that’s just me.

Hubby wakes up from his sleep after coming off another 12-hour night shift. I have a nice dinner prepared of ribs, mashed potatoes and vegetables. I am working in the kitchen when I hear Jane say to her dad, “Mom said we can take the train to go see her at Christmas if you can take us to B-ville.”

I said Pardon?

The weird thing about this is that on Friday, I had investigated the cost of the kids taking the train to SSM from Ottawa, to see how much it would cost. I felt bad that Jane didn’t get to see her mother so, being the nice person that I am, looked at the cost of taking the train to SSM, leaving a couple of days after Christmas. The price I found was over $200 per kid, and the major problem is that THE TRAIN DOESN’T EVEN GO TO SSM DIRECTLY. The closest train station is 4 hours away, in Sudbury.

Dad looked up the info himself and told Jane that no, they would not be taking the train to see their Mom at Christmas, for a variety of reasons: there’s no direct train to SSM, and the closest train station is over 4 hours away; they’d have to change trains in Toronto; it’s a 13-hour trip just to Sudbury, which is 4 hours from SSM. Too many things can go wrong and they are too young to go by themselves. It’s not like putting them on the train here in Ottawa and them being picked up in Toronto. A direct train from Ottawa to Toronto is one thing. Changing trains – and a 13 hour trip- is a different matter altogether.

So once again, Dad is the bad guy. Jane pouted. She cried. She flipped attitude.

You know - the same old song and dance.

He got frustrated with her. He’s tired of always being the bad guy when her Mother can do no wrong. So he told her once again that she should pack her stuff and go live with her mother.

Which caused her to cry harder.

Why? I really don’t understand this child. She complains incessantly about living with us, but she has been given the option many times to go and live with her mom but she won’t go. For whatever reason, she won’t say the magic words: yes, I want to live with my mother.

And I for one can’t figure out why. I’ve pondered this question in cyberspace and in reality, and I just don’t get it.

My husband was very upset by the situation. He had Jane call her mother. Then he spoke with her about this whole train thing and guess what? Turns out, taking the train is NOT what Mom had said at all. She said that boyfriend’s parents are going to SSM for the holidays. They have offered to take up Jane and Marvin if we take them to B-ville.

How that translated into them taking the train to SSM we’ll never know.

At my suggestion, my husband also told her, “the next time you want to make plans for the kids to visit, can you please talk to me first, before you talk to the kids about it? Then we can avoid these misunderstandings.”

Jane was completely undone, bawling uncontrollably when she took the phone to speak with her mother. Her father had told her mother about the attitude he had been getting from Jane. She took the phone into her room and slammed the door. I could hear her crying through the door.

So, what? It’s worse for your mom to know you are being a bitch to your dad than it is to be a bitch to your dad, who loves you and protects you and takes care of you on a daily basis??

Just another lovely Saturday night in our house.

My husband was so upset he couldn’t even finish his meal. He had to leave for work in 20 minutes and he was really upset. After Jane got off the phone with her mother he called her out for another chat.

He told her how he’s tired of always being the bad guy when it comes to her mother. He reminded Jane that when her mother first mentioned moving so far away HE was the one who said that this type of stuff would happen. He was against mom moving so far away but she did anyway – it’s not like she really had a choice.

He told her how much her nasty attitude hurts him. He is physically ill from all the conflict going on in our house all the time.

He also told her how much it hurts him when Jane can apologize via Facebook for making a completely valid comment to her mother, but never apologizes to her father. She NEVER says I’m sorry to him.

Even now, two days later, she still has not said ‘I’m sorry’ for getting mad at him about the train situation. Even though she had her information totally wrong, she never uttered the words ‘I’m sorry’.

She changed her Facebook profile photo to a picture of her and her father taken at a New Year’s party a couple of years ago, and that’s her way of sucking up. Why she can’t say those two words is something I will never understand. I know – at least according to Chicago – it’s hard to say I’m sorry.

But instead, she spent all day Sunday in her room with the door closed. Never came out except to eat and pee. She even found the chocolate bar I had gotten for her on Saturday morning but did I ever hear her utter a word of thanks about it? Nope. Just took it into her room and again closed her door.

My friends who have been privy to this situation for months now don’t understand why my husband won’t just send Jane to live with her mom. Don’t give her the option – just send her. At dinner, while Jane was bawling in her room, I suggested that when she goes to see her mom at Christmas, she just stay there. Let Mom enroll her in school there and be done with it. The conflict is making our household a living hell. Poor Marvin and I are caught in the middle.

But I know my husband, and no matter what, he will not send Jane to live with her mom. As a step-parent, it’s easy for me to say, “send her away!”, and “ship her off!”.

But to my friends – if this were your child, could YOU send them away so easily?

From the beginning, Jane’s always been a handful. In October 2007 – a mere 4 months after moving in with us – she got busted by me for giving her father the finger as she stormed into her room because he told her to go find something to do in her room, and she didn't want to. I was in the room across from hers and happened to catch her flipping him the bird behind the wall.

And it’s literally been downhill ever since.

Jane will NEVER utter the words “I want to go live with mom.”

And my husband will NEVER force her to live with her mom.

It’s like we are living in some sort of limbo. There’s always conflict. There’s always anger. There’s always unhappiness. What Jane needs to realize is that if she makes the smart decision to go live with her mom –say, after Christmas this year – her father will still love her. She will still be welcome in our home during the summer and on vacations. That, I think, is what she is afraid of. That if she chooses her mother over her father he will ‘disown’ her.

On Sunday, when my husband woke up, he asked Jane to come out of her room. He asked her if mom had called that day.

"No" she mumbled, incoherently.

"Why don't you call her?" he asked.

"Why?" she mumbled again.

"Because Mom is leaving soon and it would be nice to say goodbye to her, wish her a nice trip," he said, ever so patiently.

Jane shrugs. Mumbles again. Twice she had to repeat it. She spoke to him as if he had grounded her - or at least, killed her puppy. (Neither of which happened. Jane just likes playing the wounded victim.)

Two minutes later, we hear her dialing the phone. Then we hear her talking to her mother.

Surprise, surprise! Chatty Cathy had returned. We could hear her talking and laughing in her room.

Why do we get sullen, sulky Jane, and Mom gets happy, oh I love you Jane????

To steal a line from one of my favourite movies: “ I'd rather not see you and have you think good things about me than have you see me and hate me.”

Right now, I’d love to be thinking good things about Jane.

But that ain’t happening.

Life Is So Not Fair

It’s been both a good week and a bad week.

Last weekend, I went out of town with my peeps for a weekend away. From Friday at noon to Sunday at three all I had to worry about was ME. I cooked my meals just for me. I talked with my girlfriends, I scrapbooked, I watched movies.

I loved it.

It was so nice to get away… and a little sad to come home. Two days just wasn’t enough.

Jane’s had a rough week. She’s been sick for 8 days as of today. She has a fever that won’t go down except with Tylenol and she has a pretty bad cough. She’s missed a whole week of school, but I don’t think she minds that at all. While I was away, her father was home on his six-days off taking care of her. Personally? I think she loved the attention. Marvin was home as well that weekend but he wasn’t getting the attention that Jane was. She’s not faking it – her fever goes up and down daily, almost hourly - but she still loved the attention from her dad.

Yesterday was a different story. Their mother arrived in B-ville from SSM. See, the kids were supposed to be heading to B-ville to spend the weekend with her since today is a PD day for them. But there is no way we are letting Jane go, considering A) she is still sick with a fever and pretty bad cough and B) her mom is sick and her three younger brothers are sick. So because everyone around him is sick, we won’t let Marvin go see his mom either. No, he isn’t sick (yet), but he’s been cooped up with Jane for a week. If he is carrying whatever she has, why would we let him go be around a bunch of sick people? He also planned to go and visit his former best friend while in B-ville, which we told him he won’t be doing even if he does go to see his mom. See, Mom has this weekend with her kids planned but oh, wait! She has to go to a baby shower or bridal shower for her boyfriend’s cousin or something like that on Saturday afternoon. She planned to take Jane with her, but what about Marvin? Oh, she was going to let him go to see his other friend S.

Is it just me, or is this situation totally fucked up? Marvin doesn’t care about going to see his brothers and his mom; he just really wants to see his friend S. Which is fine, on any other weekend. We’ll gladly arrange for him to spend a weekend with his friend S but not when he is supposed to see his mother, whom he hasn’t seen in over three months.

The point is this: Jane is sick. Very sick. Marvin is not sick yet, but more than likely is carrying the bug. It would be reckless of us to let him go to S’s house and spread whatever he might be carrying into their home, potentially making them all sick. Just because he is not running a fever YET doesn’t mean he’s in the clear.

Mom of course was NOT happy when she called and my husband told her that the kids would not be seeing her this weekend. Her kids are sick – and she is sick - but she still travelled with them. Do they have a fever? Who knows? The woman doesn’t own a thermometer!

I'm just sitting here shaking my head.

My husband even suggested that she come down to Ottawa on her own, just her, on Saturday morning or Saturday night to see her kids. She can load them in her van, go through the drive-through at Tim’s to get hot chocolate for them, and sit in the van and talk. (Although again, if she did that the woman would just go into Tim’s and sit there with Jane coughing all over everything so what’s the point?)

But nope – Mom won’t do that. See, it’s up to US to bring the kids to where she is. My husband is expecting the grandparents (well, Grandma to be specific) to call him today and try to convince him to let Marvin go, but he’s not going to budge on this. It’s not a game he’s playing here. It’s not a control thing – it’s a health thing. He’s being a good parent, and even though I would LOVE another weekend without the kids, I agree with him on this point. Why tempt the fates?

So Jane is really upset by the situation and I don’t blame her. It’s not her fault she is sick – but it is her mother’s fault for not driving an hour to come see her kids. Even if just for two hours. I think part of the reason Jane is so upset is that Mom had promised to bring her birthday gift with her – a gift card for the movies so she can go and see New Moon which opens in a week.

No matter the reason, it does suck for her to be sick AND not to see her Mom. Poor kid.

Now, onto the good of the week: Marvin got his mid-term report card and he’s doing really well in 3 out of 4 of his classes. All we ask is that the kids make the class average or higher and he did that for three classes. He’s not doing well in English though – class average was around 75 and he got a 68. We know that he needs to read more but how can you force him to read? We take away his computer and iPod and then remove the dvd player and he’ll still find something to do that doesn’t involve reading. I’ve taken him to the library, given him some of my favourite Stephen King books that we thought he’d like (The Long Walk in particular would be a great one for him to read) but he’ll start a page or two then he’s done.

It’s a fine line, because he got an 87 in science, and the class average was 80.

An 87 in science. Mavin.

Amazing.

We are really very proud of him.

Now, if we could only get him to take out the trash without complaining about it….

Being Right All the Time Sucks

Sometimes I hate when I’m right. It puts me in a bad position. Recently, being right hurt someone I care a lot about.

As predicted in last week’s post, I busted Jane for being on Facebook chat the minute her father and I left for work yesterday. Her father had grounded her less than a week ago from all things internet for a month. I caught her in her brother’s room two days later – she jumped from the side of his room with the computer on it to the side with the tv and DVD player as I was coming down the stairs. She tried to sit on the couch very nonchalantly but I’m not stupid. I know what she was up to, but I let it go.

But yesterday morning I checked her Facebook account and there it was: she had left a message box open in which she was begging one of her friends to talk to her. Time? 6:47 AM. (We had left for work at 6:30 AM).

I sent an email note to my hubby with the conversation copied. Just in case she tried to bullshit her way out of it, I even sent him a screenshot of the message left open.

Her actions don’t surprise me anymore. They really don’t. She doesn’t give a flying f*ck about anything her father says to her. Punishments mean nothing to her. As previously mentioned, she always finds a way to get around them.

But on Saturday I found something that I wish I hadn’t. I found a school assignment on her bed, unfinished. A speech she wrote on ‘who I admire the most’.

Guess who she admires the most?

That’s right, friends and neighbours: her mother.

Then I made a really bad decision. I showed the assignment to her father.

In the speech, Jane writes about what little she knows of her mom’s life, the schools she attended but never graduated from, the name of the restaurant where she now works as a waitress, the names of her four brothers and of her mom’s boyfriend.

But really - the reason she admires her mom the most? Because (and I am quoting here) “when I was sick in the hospital she came to see me as much as she could even though she had four other children at home”.

Um…. Excuse me? What fucking planet do you live on, kid?

The back story is this: when Jane was 7 or 8 (I wasn’t around so pardon me if the timing is off a bit) she developed an abscess on her leg. It was incredibly serious. Her father – who has a medical and nursing background - insisted that she be transferred from the local hospital in Bville to the children’s hospital here. As soon as she was admitted he was with her. FOR THE ENTIRE TWO WEEKS SHE WAS IN THE HOSPITAL. He never left. Even though he was self-employed at the time, and lost two full week’s pay, he did not leave her. He was with her during all her tests, needles and treatments. He fought with the nurses when he disagreed with what they were doing, and provided support to Jane when she was scared of the needles. He slept in her room on a cot. I think he went to his apartment twice in those two weeks.

Jane’s mom? Visited from Bville twice. Twice in two weeks. And for a while, the situation with Jane was critical – I think she was even in a coma at one point. Again, not having been there, I can’t be certain of all the details.

Oh, and there weren’t four other kids at home at the time this happened – there were only three. The youngest wasn’t even conceived yet.

But I digress….

Reading this assignment hurt my husband. A lot. More, I think, than he admitted to me. He was hurt that the person Jane admires most is her mother, whom he considers to be a very weak person.

But I understand why Jane chose her mother: Jane doesn’t really know anyone else. She would never say she admires her father or me the most because, let’s face it – we’re mean. She used to write in her journal how much she hated me. ‘I hate Heather’ was written all over her journal. Why? Because I usually do 90% of the child care in the house because of my husband’s work schedule so the punishing and grounding (and policing) fell to me. She would NEVER write that she hated her father, so I was the scapegoat.

She doesn’t get along well enough with her grandmother (they both have bitchy attitudes and are exactly alike so they spark off each other). Jane has one aunt that is stay-at-home with three kids of her own. She doesn’t know her aunt very well.

So then – who else would she write about? Since she’s lived with us, her mother has been the shining star. No matter what terrible things she has done lately (moving 12 hours away, not returning phone calls, no contact for weeks, etc.) it doesn’t matter. Jane is smitten with her mother.

It makes sense when you think about it. Her mother doesn’t punish her. Her mother doesn’t make her write apology notes to her French teacher. Her mother doesn’t take away her hair straightener or the internet or her phone privileges. Her mother doesn’t tell her that she’s too young to have a boyfriend. In fact, I hear Jane telling her mother all about her boyfriend troubles when she’s on the phone with her. So it’s only natural that Dad is now the ‘bad guy’.

And he told me last night, after his talk with Jane about the Facebook thing, that he’s done dealing with her. He told her to make a choice – live here by his rules or she can go live with her mother.

He didn’t say it meanly, of course. Those of you who know my husband may be shocked to realize that he is a rational man when it comes to serious discussions. He doesn’t yell. He doesn’t raise his voice. He speaks calmly and clearly. And, as a woman, it’s really annoying to fight with someone who speaks so rationally and calmly all the time.

As I only heard the conversation from his point of view – and parts of it - I can’t report everything that was said. I do know that tears were shed. But there was no anger in his voice.

Only disappointment.

He got Jane’s standard ‘I don’t know” answer to why she was doing stuff once again that she had been told not to do. It’s really nothing new.

So he told her – calmly, nicely – that perhaps she would be happier living with her mother and her brothers. Perhaps since she admires her mom so much she should be with her. He told her to take her time and make a decision if she wants to go live with her – even so far as to ask her to call her mom and talk to her about it.

Of course more tears ensued. But fellow readers - you know, and I know – she won’t say to her father that she wants to go live with her mother. Even if she really, really wants to.

Because she’s scared.

She’s scared that her father will never let her come back to visit if she decides to go live with her mother, which is ridiculous. She’s scared because she will have to transfer schools and will have to make new friends in a new city. Which she had to do when she moved with us two and a half years ago.

She’s scared, because she will feel rejected by her father. Which I don’t understand at all, because she seems to be rejecting him every chance she gets.

Between you and me, I want her to go live with her mother. Send her there at Christmas and have her switch schools then. It’s not because I dislike her – although she does everything in her power to try to make that happen. It’s because I really do think she would be happier there. Happier to be with her mom. Happier to be with her younger brothers. Happier to not have two dogs. Happier to be once again the only girl in a house full of boys. Happier to share confidences with her mom that she won’t share with her father – or with me, for that matter.

Sure, she’ll miss her friends. She might even miss her brother. Maybe even her dad, once things settle down.

But she’ll make new friends. She did it when she moved with us two and a half years ago, so she can do it again.

But she won’t make that decision. She’ll say she wants to live here, her dad will talk again to her about her attitude and stuff but nothing will change. The cycle will start all over again.

I think my husband needs to just send her to live with her mom – to take the choice away from Jane. It seems as though she is doing everything she can to push herself away from him. I think – and you know how I am a great armchair shrink – that she wants to go live with her mom badly but is afraid of the ramifications of making that decision. So she constantly acts out with bad behaviour so that her father will make her go live with her mom, making HIM the bad guy. Jane will get the ‘poor me’ story of how her father sent her to live with her mother because he doesn’t love her and oh isn’t that terrible.

A few of my friends have told me they can’t believe how much of a bitch Jane is all the time. Really though, she’s not.

She’s just a scared little girl, who doesn’t know who she is. There’s not a doubt in my mind that if we went back in time two and a half years, and gave the kids the choice of where to live, Jane would have chosen to stay with her mom instead of coming to live with us.

She’s just too scared right now to say those words to her father. So I say make the choice for her. Make plans and arrangements for her to go live with her mom. Not as a punishment, but because it really is the best thing for everything right now.

But you know and I know that will never happen. My husband won’t send her to live with her mother, and Jane isn’t going to suddenly change her sneaky ways.

So the big question I send out to cyberspace is….

Now what?

Happy Halloween!

Halloween is tomorrow night, and even though the kids have been talking about it for weeks now, there seems to be no excitement left in them.

It’s the night before and neither kid has a costume prepared.

Personally, I think that Marvin is too old, at 14, to be trick-or-treating. Sorry, but if you are shaving – even if only your sideburns every four days – then you are too old to still trick-or-treat.

Jane is just plain lazy. As previously posted, hubby has restricted her internet access and friend access for one month due to her recent behaviour. He is, on my advice (I’m Not The Wicked Stepmother, remember?), allowing both kids who are grounded this weekend to go out trick-or-treating, provided they go with friends in the neighbourhood (I suggested their punishment be that they had to go out trick or treating TOGETHER. We had a good chuckle over that but then decided it was actually too cruel.) Going out in the neighbourhood is no problem for Marvin, but pisses Jane off because not many of her friends live near us. This is exactly why we put that rule in place, since her so-called BFFs have been the bad influence on her behaviour lately.

“Well I guess I can’t go out then,” she stated, “because I have no one to go with around here.”

Complain, complain, and complain. NOTHING ever pleases her. From the kitchen I piped up, “gee, thanks Dad for letting me go out trick-or-treating even though I’m grounded”.

Marvin, smart boy that he is, parroted, “thanks Dad.” See? He gets it.

But Jane remained silent. Until the talk about costumes came up.

“I’m going to go as Barbie” she stated.

Sure, I thought, that fits you to a “T”.

Both kids though, expect us to go to the store and buy a costume for them, and this is where I put my foot down.

Do you remember being a kid? Do you remember how your moms and grandmas used to work for weeks on your Halloween costume? Even now, as an adult, I won’t buy myself a costume. I’ve had a bunch of great costumes as an adult, and am sad to report that I don’t have photos from some of the parties I attended while wearing them. I recycled my prom dress, bought a brown wig and a big straw hat and went as Scarlett O’Hara once. One year – during my red hair days – I wore one of my old ‘80s dresses and went as Dorothy. Four years ago I did the ‘Slutty Schoolgirl’ thing, (to an adult-only party) but only because I happened to have all the stuff for it at home (please don’t ask why). Two years ago I went as CSI Catherine Willows, and I have to say, that was one of the easiest –and best – costumes I’ve ever put together. I even came in second place in a Best Costume contest but lost out to a half-naked Xena the Warrior Princess. Come on, NO ONE can beat a half-naked warrior princess!

This year I’ll be wearing a God-awful hippie outfit that I put together from pieces I bought at a second hand store years ago for a Murder Mystery party. Jane even wore that outfit four years ago – although her Dad shortened the pants so that the she didn’t trip over herself.

Now, the kids expect us to just go to the store and buy them a costume, which we won’t do. Half the fun is putting the costume together with stuff you find at the house. We’ve given them tons of suggestions – Hobo, Doctor (wearing Dad’s scrubs and a mask), Scarecrow, Dead Prom Queen, Zombie…but nothing is good enough.

They’ve got 24 hours to come up with something, so I’m sure the panic will be on, especially since I also told them that I’ll get them a wig or some makeup to complete their outfits, but I am not going to any Halloween stores after 10 AM tomorrow. The crowds will be insane.

I’ll post some photos of me from Halloweens past, if I can find any, and photos of the kids if they end up figuring out their costumes.

‘Til next time…. Happy Halloween!

Take a Breath

I work in a hospital library, and lately the information swirling on the internet and in the news about H1N1 has gone through the roof. There are tons of articles in the newspapers about the dangers of vaccinations, and a lot of unnecessary panic is going on, in my opinion.

This is not directed to any one person, so if what I am about to write offends you, I apologize in advance. No, I am not a medical professional, nor do I play one on TV. I do not have any inside scoop on the ‘pandemic’, nor am I giving any advice. What you are about to read is strictly my own personal opinion. Read at your own risk.

People, take a breath and calm the fuck down.

Yes, two previously healthy children have died recently from H1N1. This is tragic and I can’t imagine what their families are going through right now. But worrying and stressing about H1N1 isn’t going to make the situation any better for you or for your family.

Yes, the schools are reporting a higher than average absentee rate. But think for a minute. Why are these kids absent? What ages are they? Are they really sick, or are they teenagers who know that their parents are panicking so they are using this situation to fake illness to get a couple of extra days off school? “Mom, Billy is home with H1N1 and I don’t feel well, cough, cough..” I’m sure that accounts for a couple of absent kids per class per day. What about the parents who are completely freaked out by the whole situation and have taken their healthy kids out of school “just in case”? I’m sure that accounts for another couple of kids per class per day. What about the kids who have a sniffle – just a sniffle – and maybe a fever. Yes, fever is a terrible thing for young children to have. They may have the flu – they may have the cold. As a precaution, their parents have taken them out of school, so that if they are sick – even just a cold – they are not spreading it to otherwise healthy kids. (Bravo to these parents.)

Take all of this into account when you hear that 20- 25% of kids are absent from school.

Hospitals are not even testing for H1N1 anymore unless the person/child requires hospitalization. Parents are rushing their kids to the Emergency Department when they start running a slight fever. Why? All that will happen is that you will wait for hours and hours for someone to tell you to go home, rest and drink lots of liquids.

From what I have read (again: this is MY opinion, not medical advice) the main differential between H1N1 and the regular old flu is respiratory distress. Shortness of breath. If someone has a fever, and aches and coughing but otherwise can breathe normally than they do not have H1N1. (I repeat: my opinion only. I am not referencing anything.)

I have a secret to share with you all: my husband, who works directly with patients in another hospital, had H1N1 last month.

Did we panic? No. We didn’t even tell the kids. For all they knew, their dad was just sick. (All we needed was for them to tell all their friends at school that their dad had H1N1 and start a mass panic in their classrooms. It worked – they had no idea and never mentioned it.) We thought it was just a regular cold ourselves until the fifth day when my husband, who has asthma issues on occasion, was having trouble breathing. I could see that even while he was just sitting on the couch next to me watching TV he sometimes couldn’t catch his breath. So he called his Occupational Health department at the hospital where he works, and after a very long list of questions they determined that he had H1N1. They told him to stay off work until 24 hours after his last fever or symptom, which in his case was 8 days in total.

That was it. No trip to the doctor, no test. Just stay home and rest. If he was having severe breathing problems we would have taken him to the hospital but with rest and fluids it cleared up, even with his pre-existing asthma problems.

Neither myself, nor the kids caught anything. We washed our hands. We used Purell. My husband did the same. We’re all fine now. I plan to get the kids vaccinated, and I will get vaccinated here at work later this week.

André Picard is an award winning health journalist at the Globe and Mail. He wrote a great article about what’s going on regarding H1N1. Take a moment to read it if you have time.

All I am saying is stop and calm down. Relax. Panicking and stressing will not prevent you or your family from getting sick.

Being properly informed, however… just might.

New Day, Old Problems

Last week Jane brought home a ‘Letter of Concern’ from her French teacher. This letter is intended to inform parents when a student is struggling to achieve results academically and the teacher cares enough to talk to the parents about the situation.

According to Jane, her teacher, Mrs. W “hates” her.

My husband received the letter and took it with a grain of salt, because the main concern the teacher had was with Jane’s attitude. Which, as we all know from reading this blog, is a concern to us all. He wasn’t convinced that Jane’s attitude was as bad as the teacher was making it out to be. Jane only got one letter from one teacher out of five. So, he thought, maybe it was just a bad mix of Jane and Mrs. W.

He thought that, until he spoke to Mrs.W this morning.

Apparently Jane’s attitude in French class is worse than it is at home. She walks by the teacher’s desk and says to Mrs. W sarcastically, “you’re my favourite teacher”, then laughs hysterically with her friends.

And no, before Jane can say that Mrs. W “is out to get” her, she’s not. Mrs. W actually stuck up for Jane, telling my husband that it’s not Jane who is really the culprit, it’s one of her friends who puts her up to it. And Jane, of course, is a follower. She always has been. So Jane’s “friend” K giggles with Jane in class and together they are a bad combination.

Last Thursday there was much drama in our house. A girl that Jane isn’t friends with spread a rumour on MSN and at school that Jane was pregnant. Personally, I didn’t think it was such a big deal as it’s obviously not true, but I am also not a 12 year old girl. So this girl, L was called into the school office and Jane went to see the counselor about it. Dad was contacted, and he went to the school on Friday to see how the school was going to handle the situation.

Now because there was no “proof” that L was the one who actually started the rumour, there isn’t a lot they can do. And honestly, between you and me, although she complained about it, I think Jane loved the attention. I was on her Facebook page on Thursday after this happened and she was chatting away with people about it. She didn’t seem to be upset by the whole thing, especially when her friends said were going to ‘go take care of L” for her. I think she was loving being the centre of attention, and that my friends, is what worries me the most out of this situation. She was on the phone, on MSN, on Facebook… even though she had strict instructions to NOT speak to anyone about the situation, Jane was milking it with her friends.

How this is all connected to the Letter of Concern (bear with me, I’m getting to it) is that Jane claimed that one of her friends still had the MSN conversation where L first mentioned the pregnancy rumour. Yesterday, Jane brought the printout home, and it’s not really clear who said what to whom. But one thing my husband noticed is that this K girl from French class was part of that conversation. So now my husband is wondering if in fact the K girl was being a shit disturber in the whole fiasco and not just the innocent bystander Jane thinks she is.

Jane is well-known for making bad friend choices. The friends of hers that we like, she doesn’t hang out with. Instead she chooses kids that we get “bad” feelings about. Not that the kids are in any way misbehaving when we see them, it’s more a gut feeling that things aren’t what they seem. And, as it turns out, we’ve been right on numerous occasions.

But that doesn’t matter to Jane. She’s not a bad kid. Really she isn’t. She just doesn’t know yet what friendship means and is too easily swayed by peer pressure.

Her dad is once again taking away her internet privileges. Personally I don’t know why he bothers. He’ll take it away tonight but I guarantee tomorrow when we leave for work at she’ll be downstairs on her brother’s computer at 7:15 AM checking her email and Facebook. We simply can’t control this kid. No matter what we take away from her, she always finds a way to do anyway. We simply aren’t home enough to keep an eye on her 24/7.

My suggestion is instead of taking away her internet, which we can’t control when we aren’t home, is to take away things that matter more to her. Halloween is on Saturday. Sorry – no parties or trick-or-treating for you. You love having straight hair? Bye-bye hair straighteners (and I know some good hiding places so she can’t find them, even if she looks).

Deep down, the sad thing is that none of these punishments or lectures is going to change a single thing. Jane will always be a follower. She follows whoever is cool, whoever is popular, regardless of the consequences.

Just think: next year, she’s in high school. F*ck.

Are there still any convents around?