Could This Be A Test – Part 1

muslimahintraining — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 21:56:15 +0000

I have spoken about how much trouble I have sleeping at night. Usually I can get my sleeping habits under control after a few tries but lately no such luck. I am sleeping at night and into the morning and afternoon. I fall into a deep sleep where my dreams seem real and I can’t shake my drowsiness. I know I am very depressed but I never thought sleeping so much could be a sign of depression. I’m starting to wonder if I could be pregnant! That would be the last thing I need in my life. I never wanted kids but ended up being pregnant with my only child just from lack of being responsible. I can’t afford another child at this moment but later on this year or next I could. But emotionally I can’t afford another at all! The things that I am going through with my first one are too much to handle for me now. I sleep all day while my child gets out of their bed when they are supposed to be asleep with me. But how can I even think a child would sleep all day just because I am unable to move out of the bed. My sleeping is only getting worse but so has my child. When I am able to get out of the bed the house looks like a tornado has been through it. It isn’t the normal bad child stuff either. It’s weird things I wake up to find. Like pencil shavings all over the floor and in my shoes, scratched dvds, torn paper everywhere, all the icing licked out of the oreos with the cookies leftover and crushed, all the contacts in my cell phone erased, text message after message sent that say nothing but jibberish, my new contacts taken out of the boxes and packaging stacked on top of one after the other dried out to a crisp, and more. I used to find toothpaste spread all over the restroom but after so many time-outs and spankings it finally stopped. What is wrong with my child!? I can’t bring my child anywhere without fussing the entire time while there. I could never sit down in Chuck E. Cheese while my child played like other children. I have to follow my child around the place because they can not function like other children. My child can’t bathe, dress, or go to the restroom on their own. They constantly ask to go to the restroom even though they are at home and not at school. Even though they had been asking before they even started school. Why has this happened to me? My only child that I make sure is clean, fed, and safe when there are parents that have four and five kids that are always dirty and keep having kids they can’t care for at all. Why were they allowed to be normal and my only one has so many problems and has been misdiagnosed. When I finally get a diagnosis it’s worse then the first wrong one and there is no cure or chance for them to get better. I was also told with my child’s I.Q. scores they would never lead an independent life and would always have to have someone care for them. I don’t think I can be a mother anymore. I have been losing my temper and saying things I shouldn’t towards my child. They should be with someone who can handle what is going on with them. I am thinking about putting them in a home for special needs. I feel like all the therapy and treatments I have tried have been a complete waste of time. First they told me Autism which with treatment and therapy some kids get better. But now they tell me there is no Autism my child is just mentally disabled, slow, retarded, whatever you want to call it. There is no getting better now or recovering! What can I do when all the dreams I had for my child have not only been destroyed but set on fire and buried! I have no one to help me so I never get a break just for myself or to do things with my husband alone. How can such a beautiful child have so many problems and to just look at them you would assume they were normal. I can’t see anything on television, magazines, or on the internet about children without crying. I don’t want to send my child away but right now I can not do right by them. I feel that parents who do this are pathetic. I have no relationship with my child as an individual, only a parent to child relationship. I have never had a conversation with my child because they can not hold a conversation. They can talk but it’s just words that sometimes put together can make sense but for the most part they do not. The most I get are a sentence or two but that’s it. Asking for something like food or toys are as complex as it gets. I have no children with my husband and he also says he doesn’t want any. When I married him none of this stuff with my child was going on but as my child’s second birthday rolled around he wasn’t communicating like other children. My husband said something was wrong but I didn’t want to believe it. At about 2 1/2 while filling out the developmental checklist I noticed that my child wasn’t doing anything that other kids my child’s age was doing. The doctor gave me a prescription for Speech and Physical Therapy. The physical therapy because my child was extremely clumsy always running into things even if they were in plain view. My child’s P.T(Physical Therapist) mentioned the word Autism to me before anyone because she had a family member with the same signs and she was also on the board at the local Autism chapter. That then started my year long studying and trying different treatments. I also got a script for my child to start Occupational Therapy. All my child’s therapists agreed that it was Autism and would say my child was very smart but just had social issues and a language development delay. Even though my child would just stare at me sometimes when I would say things and I would have to repeat them three or four times. This lead me to get my child’s hearing examined and B(my child’s initial) passed and B also had an eye exam later which they passed. B also couldn’t put their jacket on, bathe, or clean on their own after going to the restroom. I have went out and bought just about every toy B therapists use to try to make them better. I have spent so much money on vitamins, books, conferences about Autism, anything I could read about to help B recover. Now B doesn’t even have Autism what do I do now? Where do I start? There is no cure for the mentally disabled. I was just hoping next year B would be going to a regular kindergarten class. Now the money I was saving to decorate B’s room has to go for a specialist in New Orleans to run more I.Q. and developmental tests. This is just the beginning of problems that doesn’t include the asthma, allergies, behavioral problems, and ADHD my child has.

to be continued…

Muslimah In Training? » Could This Be A Test

Could This Be A Test – Part 1