Tragic Sandwich

Category: Family and Friends

  • It Could–Would–Have Been So Much Worse

    Another writing prompt from Ginger at Ramble Ramble: Tell us a story from ninth grade.

    Okay.

    Just before ninth grade, my family moved from Maryland to Texas. As far as I was concerned, it was two years too late. All my life, I’ve had a Five Year Move Clock in my head, and I always felt like we stayed places too long.

    So while some kids might have found this to be a horrible time to move, I was ready. Sure, I was going to miss the friends I’d grown up with. But I was more than ready for new sights and sounds and people.

    Texas provided plenty of all of those. For a girl from the outskirts of D.C., it took some getting used to. Fortunately, I had some help.

    First, there was the library. I didn’t know many people for the first semester, so I went to the school library a lot. And by “a lot,” I mean three times a day. I’d go before school and check out a book to read between classes. I’d return it at lunch and get another book, which I’d read between classes. And I’d go back at the end of the day to return that book.

    (I am a very fast reader.)

    Second, and more importantly, there were Beth and Kelly. Those are not their real names, because on this blog, no one has a real name. Unless I tell a story about a celebrity. I’m not sure if I’ve done that. But if I do, I’ll probably use the celebrity’s name.

    Beth and Kelly were friends from middle school. They, like me, had decided to join Pep Squad. I don’t know their rationales, but I joined Pep Squad because my mother thought it would be a great way for me to know people on the first day of school, and I thought it would be a great way to get out of P.E.

    Pep Squad had a week of summer training for new members, and when I arrived, I knew no one. But Beth and Kelly took me under their wing (wings?) and made me part of their group. While we didn’t do all of the drills together, we did meet for lunch every day and exchange stories. Kelly invited me to her birthday party (where I discovered MTV). They welcomed me into their existing circle of friends. We had classes together. They gave me people to stand with at the bus stop at the end of the day.

    And while each of them later moved and changed schools, and we lost touch, I know that they made my freshman year of school bearable. They made it possible for me to decipher a new community and find my way.

    Later, I found out why all of this happened. It turned out that, before camp started, they decided that they were going to find someone who looked like she had no friends, and be her friend.

    They picked me.

    They were 13 years old, and they decided to make someone an insider instead of an outsider. They chose to be inclusive instead of exclusive.

    We hear a lot about bullying. Maybe there would be less of it–and maybe it would be easier to endure–if we tried to get our children to think more like Beth and Kelly.

    It’s not that I had no problems in high school. Of course I did. We all did. But those problems were made easier because I had a place in that school. And Beth and Kelly helped me find it, by making a conscious choice. At age 13.

    Three Friends

    Photo by Xiaozhuli, via Flickr. Creative Commons.

  • Bert and Telly Have Been in a Standoff for Days Now

    HPIM4202

    HPIM4206

    They seem pretty friendly about it, though.

  • “Happy Birthday, Daddy”

    That’s what Baguette whispered to Mr. Sandwich this morning.

    Autism Awareness bike jersey

    Here’s how he’s spending the day.

  • What Doesn’t Kill You

    Ginger of Ramble, Ramble has more writing prompts this week. I couldn’t choose, and they seem to go together, so here you are:

    Prompt 1: What are your sick day must haves? Do you want certain foods, shows, clothes, drinks? What makes you feel better when you feel crummy?

    Couch, pillows, TV, fleece blankets, PJs, Wicket. Basically, all the soft things.

    I don't know about you, but I feel better just looking at her.
    I don’t know about you, but I feel better just looking at her.

    Prompt 2: What’s the sickest you’ve ever been?

    Nearly every story about the sickest I’ve ever been includes vomit. Lots of vomit. So I think we should skip those stories, and I think you will agree.

    The obvious exceptions are the time I had pneumonia (at an out-of-town conference! that required plane travel!) and the time I had swine flu. Ah, swine flu. Good times.

    One Friday in late February 2009,* I had a D&C for my second miscarriage, which (like miscarriages 1, 3, and 4) did not happen without some help. On Sunday, I was supposed to get together with a couple of friends to watch the Oscars. Because of my surgery, they kindly came to my house and brought all the food.

    We snarked the Red Carpet so viciously that at one point Mr. Sandwich had to come inside to see what we were shrieking about (one of the hosts had done something so unfortunate to her face that she was trying not to appear on camera, but since she was the host, she kind of had to). The ceremony began. The snarking continued.

    After a couple of hours, I started to feel under the weather. I thought, “What I really want to do is go lie down, but if I do that, my friends will feel that they have to leave. And I’m totally fine with them staying, I just need to lie down.”

    But since I didn’t want them to go, I stayed put in the recliner.

    After another hour, I thought, “What is this? I’m so sore and achy. Wait. Is this the flu? It’s been a while, but I think this is what the flu feels like.”

    By the time the show was over and everybody went home, I felt as if the inside of my skin was being sanded. This is not a good feeling.

    The next day I had a follow-up appointment with my OB-GYN; from his office, we went to our primary care doctor. As the morning progressed, Mr. Sandwich started to feel achy.

    The primary care physician prescribed antivirals for both of us, and we headed off to the drug store.

    Which could only fill one prescription of antivirals.

    Back home, we swathed the couch in microfleece throws (because the perfectly fine upholstery was too rough for feverish skin) and settled in.

    Oh, and while this was going on? I was borderline hemorraghing from the D&C. (You do not want to know.)

    Both the flu and the bleeding went on for most of the week. We spent much of it on the couch, looking sadly at each other and saying, “I’m really sorry I can’t take care of you, but I feel so sick.” And the other one would say, “Please don’t worry about it, because I feel that sick, too.”

    We also learned that, even with the blinds closed, the afternoon sun cast so much glare on our TV screen that we couldn’t really see it. And since TV was the only form of distraction we could manage (books are so heavy), we kind of needed to see it.

    Mr. Sandwich draped the windows in more microfleece throws. Fortunately, we have a lot of them.

    And those antivirals? We felt no different at all for taking them. They didn’t seem to help in the slightest. The fever, aches, chills, and clamminess persisted in spite of the drugs. (We still got the second prescription, and we each took all of them that we were supposed to. In case you were wondering.)

    But on the other hand, we didn’t die. So there’s that. Because people do die of swine flu.

    And after we were well, we replaced the window coverings with wooden blinds.

    So I guess you could say that we were so sick, we redecorated.

    See those blinds behind Wicket? Those blinds.
    See those blinds behind Wicket? Those blinds.

    *Sources say that the first reported U.S. cases were in late March. But given the severity of our symptoms and the speed of their onset, we are pretty sure that we ran into it at the hospital, before doctors knew about the outbreak.

  • Swimming to Mommy

    I love the water. My mother loved the water. And, as it turns out, Baguette loves the water. We started taking her to swimming lessons last fall.

    When she turned 3, the Y would have had her switch from a parent-child class to an instructor-led class, with no parents in the water. Baguette would not have done that. So we took a break until the city pool opened, and we started going there. Baguette loved it. And, we quickly realized, the joy of the pool made her want to talk. She talked more, and more clearly, and more enthusiastically on the days when she went to the pool.

    Mr. Sandwich started taking her every day. And she put it all together.

    DCIM100SPORT

    DCIM100SPORT

    DCIM100SPORT

    DCIM100SPORT

    DCIM111SPORT

    DCIM111SPORT

    DCIM111SPORT

    DCIM100SPORT

    She can kick, she can reach, she can hold her breath for about 15 feet. She smiles and claps underwater as she swims. And after each pass, she’ll tell us what she’s going to do next: “Swimming to Mommy!” “Swimming to Daddy!” “Swimming to steps!”

    Our girl has found her element.

    All photos by Mr. Sandwich.

  • Fine Dining at Bargain Prices

    You know that thing? The one where the people you love make your eyes roll extra hard?

    Yesterday afternoon, my father-in-law calls to ask if we want to join them for dinner. “It’s too hot to eat here,” he says, “So we can go out.”

    To Burger King.

    Because they have coupons.

    Mr. Sandwich’s family is made up entirely of fitness nuts. His dad will comment on someone’s BMI and speculate on their resultant health at the drop of a hat. He once told me that he likes to offer ice cream bars as dessert, because a guest is less likely to ask for seconds.

    At the same time, a coupon is a coupon. As Mr. Sandwich says, “My father has always had an appetite for a deal.”

    Since we in fact have nothing planned for dinner, we take Baguette to the pool and then head across town (Again, we have been invited across town. To Burger King.) I call to let them know we’re en route, and Mr. Sandwich’s mother is delighted. She calls to Mr. Sandwich’s father to get out from under the car, which he is fixing.

    Also, she hangs up just as I say, “We’ll meet you there.” So I call her back a few minutes later, and that turns out to be a good move, because she is startled that we are not coming by the house and then all driving over together.

    I do not want to get Baguette in and out of the car an additional time. We say we will meet them at Burger King, and she tells me the intersection and says, “It’s next to the Subway and across from the McDonald’s.”

    She also instructs me, “Don’t order until we get there. We have the coupons.”

    McDonald’s is about two miles from their house, and is where they get “Senior Coffee” after their morning run. (My in-laws are in their late 70s and win their age divisions in races, so of course they run to McDonald’s).

    McDonald’s is also home to the Big ‘n’ Tasty, which, as my father-in-law is fond of saying, is “just as good as In-n-Out.”

    NO. NO, IT IS NOT.

    We pull into the parking lot, and agree that while we may be waiting to order, we are not waiting to order for Baguette, who is the most likely of us to start screaming when she gets hungry. She screams, “Fash! Faaaaaash!” This means “hungry,” except for when it means something else, and I don’t know why either of those things is the case.

    So we order chicken nuggets, fries, and milk for Baguette, who in short order bumps her milk and spills it on her fries, but thankfully is not upset by this turn of events, possibly because there are chicken nuggets to be had.

    The woman at the counter says, “Is that all?” I answer, “We’re waiting for my in-laws” and think better of adding, “They have coupons!” because the woman at the counter seems very nice, and it’s not her fault that my in-laws are, um, extra quirky. So while I probably had a completely insane expression on my face, at least I didn’t say anything that went along with that.

    I feel even better about it when my in-laws arrive, and it turns out that they are regulars at this Burger King. Apparently there is more than one place to go for Senior Coffee, and they come here so often that the staff gives them gifts.

    Fortunately my father-in-law realizes that he cannot reasonably require us to confine our choices to the remaining unused coupons in his coupon book, and we order food that we suppose we’ll be okay with, because neither of us particularly likes Burger King, with or without coupons.

    And it was, just as we anticipated, totally mediocre. It wasn’t bad–although I didn’t feel good afterward–it was just meh.

    But it did remind me that I never wrote the final post about my Cheeseburger Challenge. So let me just skip to the end: Burger King has an edible small cheeseburger. Del Taco, a late entrant, turns out to do reasonably well (although theirs is priced a little higher). The winner, such as it is–and just as I thought it would be–is Wendy’s.

    Based on how icky I felt after last night’s meal, though (and not just last night’s, but the last several fast-food meals), I think my next fast-food adventures will focus on a Salad Challenge.

    I just need to come up with a better name for it.

  • Mom-Friendly Meals: Steel-Cut Oats

    I leave before 7 a.m. for daycare dropoff and work, which means that I eat breakfast after I’m at my desk. There’s a deli on the ground floor of my building, so I’m able to buy breakfast and lunch there, but that adds up quickly.

    In an effort to keep the complex mornings as simple as possible–and to keep costs down–I’ve started making a big batch of steel-cut oats and reheating a serving once I’m at work. I also take a small container of walnuts, brown sugar, and cinnamon to mix in.

    Steel Cut Oats To Go

    For a while, I was making the oats in the slow cooker, but I found that they wound up mushy. If you like mushy oats, then that technique will work well for you; I’m having better luck with the following method:

    • Stovetop
    • Saucepan
    • 3 parts unsweetened almond milk
    • 1 part steel cut oats

    Put all of those together and bring to a boil; reduce heat to a low simmer and cook for 25 minutes, stirring several times. Cool and refrigerate.

    If I start this process early enough, I set aside a portion for the next day. If I don’t, I do that in the morning. Once at the office, I transfer it to a microwave-friendly dish, heat it up, and stir in the toppings.

    Someone will tell me I shouldn’t be boiling the almond milk. You can also use water.

  • Little Talks

    Mr. Sandwich wrote this on Monday, and we both wanted to share it here.

    Last week we got the news we had been both expecting and dreading. Baguette was formally diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder. This was not a complete surprise, we had been looking at symptoms and ‘benchmarks’ to one degree or another for at least a year. There was speech therapy, there were visits with the principal at daycare about her behavior and class integration issues, of potty training, and the need for her to have further help. To the friends I’ve talked about it with, I have likened it to a punch that you can see coming. You can brace for it, but you’re still going to feel it.

    So now we have a doctor’s diagnosis. We have a downloaded packet of steps to follow and paths to pursue. As I read my packet I see that I can expect to go through the stages of grief, which I don’t know if I am, or I don’t know if I started months ago when it became so clear that Baguette was different from her peers. I’ve talked with friends whose children are affected too. I’ve felt at alternating times that I am dizzy and steady, even keeled and bowled over. Today Baguette bowled me over, and I haven’t quite gotten up yet.

    I picked her up from daycare late and was rushing to the pool. We’ve noticed how she seems to respond positively to the water, both with speech and behavior and for the past several weeks I’ve been trying to get her into the pool every day. When I buckled her into the carseat she asked for her Sesame Street CD like she always does, but that was in the other car, so all I could do was turn on the radio for the 3-minute drive to the park pool. Of Monsters and Men’s “Little Talks” was playing on the radio and we heard most of that by the time we hit the parking lot. I was running late, and we would only have 12 minutes worth of swimming so I was hustling as fast as I could. As I scooped up Baguette, she was reciting to me. She frequently recites, she doesn’t speak directly, she reiterates whole passages, whole verses of books and songs she knows and keeps as her friends and repeats them to me and Mommy and the World. While I was initially distracted as I fast-marched through the parking lot, she reached out and grabbed my face to turn me towards her and I heard clearly what she was reciting.

    “Listen word I say. Hey. Scream sound same. Hey. Truth vary. Ship carry. Safe shore.”

    She was repeating to me the lyrics she had heard on the radio just moments before. She’s heard that song played before, but not recently, and even if she did I’m not sure I’d expect any three-year-old to mimic lyrics like that. For a brief moment I was struck dumbfounded in the parking lot, trapped between wanting to laugh and congratulate her on her razor-sharp retention and cry over the fact that she couldn’t tell me things other little girls can. The fact that the lyrics are about a woman whose mind is at war with her and the man who still loves her despite this is just the brass wrapped around these particular knuckles. I didn’t have time to process the moment completely. She had started singing “The Farmer in the Dell” and time was ticking away. We only had a few minutes to get in the pool and that was the reason why we were there, for her benefit, not mine.

    Hours have passed now and I can’t shake that refrain she recited to me. I can’t help but think that she was trying to tell me how the wheels in her mind were turning, how she needed me to communicate to her, how she hears the world. “Don’t listen to a word I say. (Hey) The screams all sound the same. (Hey) Though the Truth may vary, this ship will carry our bodies safe to shore.” That song will never be the same for me. Nothing will ever be the same.

  • Diagnosis: Person

    A hundred years ago–okay, in January–I wrote about our efforts to help Baguette with her speech delay. I was going to write more. I didn’t, really.

    It’s not that I was avoiding the subject, it’s that I didn’t really know what to say about it.

    Since January, we’ve eliminated the idea of thrice-weekly occupational therapy appointments; while she does have some sensory-seeking characteristics, we don’t see indicators of the Sensory Processing Disorder that the therapist suspected.

    We’ve tried–and failed–to get Baguette’s hearing tested (she would not cooperate with the protocol). We’ve also determined that if Baguette really had a hearing problem, she wouldn’t hear as well as she does, and she wouldn’t be able to memorize what she hears as well as she does. So we’ll probably try the testing again at some point, but we don’t think it’s a priority.

    We had an in-network evaluation with a speech therapist, who recommended twice-weekly sessions that were denied by the insurance company. This is both infuriating and not a big deal, because we were happy with our speech therapist and could not have gotten Baguette to the location that the insurance company would have insisted on.

    We’ve continued–mostly, Mr. Sandwich has continued–her twice-weekly speech therapy and music therapy sessions. Once a week the speech therapist comes to school, and once a week Baguette goes to the therapist’s office.

    We’ve hired a “shadow,” who helps Baguette with classroom activities, encourages her to look at and speak to her classmates, reinforces the activities introduces by the speech therapist, and tries and tries and tries to help her with potty training.

    And we went to a developmental pediatrician. He talked to us and observed Baguette for an hour, and sent us home with a form for us and a form for the teacher and a request to take video of Baguette in class, to see how she interacts with other children.

    At the first meeting, he said that he couldn’t yet diagnose her with Autism Spectrum Disorder, but he saw things that might indicate it. At the second meeting–last week–he did issue that diagnosis.

    This is not a surprise to me. My reading to date has been admittedly spotty, but it seems to fit. And there are a lot of things that now connect–the sleep challenges, the picky eating, etc.

    But at the same time, I recognize that a lot of those things are also simply Baguette. She is a happy, funny, intense, independent, adventurous, STUBBORN little girl who chooses whether to comply. And she has autism.

    How much is autism, and how much is her personality? I’m not sure they can really be separated. But I do know that autism is not the only thing that makes her who she is. It is part of who she is, just as many things are.

    So as we now embark on the process of setting up an Applied Behavioral Analysis program for her, I want to pay close attention to what we’re actually working on: helping her develop skills that will give her greater flexibility in the world and throughout her life.

    But I also think she’s perfect just as she is, and I want her to be the Baguettiest Baguette she can possibly be.

  • Mom-Friendly Meals

    Recently, some of my friends have said, “You really seem to have this meal-planning thing down. What’s your secret?”

    I do not have the meal-planning thing down. My secret is that I have a child who is slightly older than their child.

    I think there are a lot of us in this boat. We think, “That person over there is doing this much better than I am.” And the truth is, they’re just working with different circumstances.

    One of my college friends has a daughter about two months older than Baguette. She also has an older child and a stepchild. And when her daughter was a baby, every night this friend would post on Facebook about some amazing meal she was making her family for dinner.

    Now, I know her. She wasn’t doing this to brag about how much better she was at parenting. She was doing it to show that it could be done–that often when you feel overwhelmed, it’s in your head. She wasn’t boasting, she was demonstrating.

    But what I couldn’t figure out was this: how was she managing it? Like me, she had a full-time job outside of the home. Like me, she had an infant. Unlike me, she had two other children. So how was she pulling off this amazing feat?

    As it turns out, she has a shorter commute. Like, a lot shorter. Mine is an hour each way. Hers is more like 15 minutes.

    See what I mean? Different circumstances.

    And my own circumstances have changed. Looking back, I’m not really sure what I ate when Baguette was a baby. I cooked for her, but I don’t remember what I made for myself. After a while, I found that I could use the crock pot on the weekends to make a big batch of something. That counted as cooking.

    slow cooker
    I no longer use the slow cooker for oatmeal, though.

    More recently, I’ve been able to use the stove a little. Last night I made shrimp with bell peppers and zucchini in Red Thai Curry Sauce, served over quinoa. I’m having leftovers for lunch.

    I have no idea what’s for dinner tonight.

    Again, I think there are a lot of us in this boat. So I’m starting an occasional series called “Mom-Friendly Meals.” I’m going to write about what I cook, how I choose recipes, what tools I use, how I find ingredients, and anything else that comes to mind. You can follow me on Twitter at @tragicsandwich; I’ll be using the hashtag #momfriendlymeals for these posts.

    One thing to keep in mind: These are mom-friendly recipes. At our house, we all eat different things. Baguette is going through a picky stage, and while we’re trying to move her through that, I’m not going to pretend that she ate the Thai curry with me. And Mr. Sandwich has his own palate, and tends to do his own cooking. So our kitchen is very busy, but we’ve finally started eating together as a family.

    Now we just have to clean off the rest of the kitchen table.