Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 131 Comments

Halloween 1 – Scary things

Dad tell me the Top 5 things that scare the pants off you. I bet they are different to mine.

So here goes then.

  1. Donald Trump and Boris Johnson running countries.
  2. Dentists
  3. Wasps
  4. Bono’s singing
  5. Heights

But Dad you are supposed to be a climber.

I’m fine as long as I don’t look down. I would climb in really dark sunglasses so I couldn’t see very far. Ok son what’s your 5 things that scare the pants off you.

  1. Death
  2. Climate change
  3. Trump being within a few feet of the nuclear button
  4. Beetroot
  5. Giraffes

So that’s our scary pants 5. What’s yours then?

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 65 Comments

Come on it’s Friday

So like the weather we crash into the weekend. This photo was taken minutes before the heavy rain rushed in. It’s time to batten down the hatches for 24 hours.

For 10 brief minutes a delightful dry run in sublime autumnal colours. What followed was a long and protracted slog through a mud bath and driving rain. One step forward and two back. Seriously doubting if I could make the climbs which had been done countless times before. Soul destroying. No fun anymore just hard labour. Frigid isolation in this hostile environment. Doubting my sanity. What am I doing here.

It’s been a perfect microcosm of this week.

A week which has rapidly gone downhill. A long hard slog giving my soul a good kicking. Leaving my mojo and my confidence in tatters. Almost complete social isolation. Never ending pain from dental work. Failure to find solutions to home, school and work problems. Error strewn days. The house is filled with echoes of the past. Even blogging has been harder than usual. The words seem to be failing me. Three draft posts on Aspergers and one on Dyslexia deleted. Just not good enough. Not sure I trust myself enough to venture there. But then life interrupts my meltdown.

We have crashed into Friday. It’s also the start of the half term week holidays. It’s Halloween week. Remember the number one priority. The only one that matters in the end.

Give son the best childhood possible.

So it’s time to put my game face on. Work can wait until son has gone to bed. Halloween gives endless scope for creative fun. My problems will be pushed into the background by boundless youthful energy released by the school gates closing. I’m sure they will be back but just not this week. That’s not allowed.

Only one possible song to leave you with. Mr Alice Cooper and Schools Out.

Schools Out – Live

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 84 Comments

Ducks

It’s been several years since we fed the ducks. It’s back to a time before our world changed. A family of 3. Every Sunday we would go to the lake armed with food left overs from the week. Often our son would be surrounded by hundreds of ducks and swans. He would carefully try to ensure all those impatiently waiting received a share of the food parcel. Then we would go to the local cafe for a freshly baked cheese scone. So many great moments sadly stopped one August three years ago.

Maybe this weekend will be a good time to rectify our absence. It wasn’t the birds fault that the bad stuff happened. Maybe we can rekindle some of those feelings. Maybe we will create new feelings. We won’t know until we try. I suspect the ducks won’t mind us trying.

So I’ve started filling a large bucket with out of date oats, some cheap tinned sweet corn, seed and of course a little bit of bread. Even ducks need a balanced diet.

While trying to find the old duck feed bucket I came across a couple of old concert T-shirt’s and ticket stubs. Days of hair, tight trousers and Thunderbird Cider. Looking at the names on the shirts it was very sobering. Many of those I went to see are sadly not with us anymore. So while I worked this afternoon I listened to a music from these fallen heroes. I tried to recall seeing that person on stage – in their prime. How they should be remembered. The roll call included

Cozy Powell

Richard Wright

Lemmy

Rory Gallagher

Ronnie James Dio

John Lord

Gary Moore

Lou Reed

Kirsty MacColl

David Bowie

The more I think about it the more heroes I can add to the list. That’s really sobering. As you get older more and more of your heroes depart. But they have left so many lasting memories for us to enjoy. They left a positive mark on this world. That’s a life well lived. I will leave the last words to Lemmy.

“Death is an inevitability, isn’t it? You become more aware of that when you get to my age. I don’t worry about it. I’m ready for it. When I go, I want to go doing what I do best. If I died tomorrow, I couldn’t complain. It’s been good“

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 99 Comments

Fear

Sometimes the path leads to the light. The direction is clear. Other times the path takes you unerringly into darkness and uncertainty. Into fear.

Over the last few days my spirit and my mojo has dropped alarmingly. Today life is a struggle. I’m tired. I’m making too many mistakes. The smile is a little too forced. Confidence is a rare commodity. I feel old and worn out. The direction seems uncertain. Even the written word seems increasingly wooden. A few paths maybe have run their course. Maybe too many paths are now just covering old ground. Life focuses on don’ts rather than do’s. Where abstinence from the likes of caffeine moves from health enabling to puritanical punishment. Life doesn’t flow it requires back breaking effort.

It’s times like this that LOSS hits home the hardest. You realise what has been lost. That reassuring presence is just not there. The rooms seem empty and echo with sad thoughts. Isolation is all consuming. My bones feel fear. Yes fear.

“No one ever told me that grief felt so like fear” – C.S.Lewis

The track in the photograph – eventually it bends to the left and takes you out of the eerie dark. On the other side of the hill the track opens out and runs through a beautiful little moor. Just need to have the courage to keep on going.

So tonight let’s just get through what’s left of this lifeless day. Then in the morning – reset and go again. Find that path. Maybe it’s a new path with old ones closed down. Have the courage to continue down it.

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 54 Comments

ADHD and Aspergers

Beckies Mental Mess this week has been doing a great job of raising awareness about (ADHD) Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder. I’ve just read Rory’s words which explain so well what it’s like to live with ADHD.

From here in this quiet part of Yorkshire ADHD is very much part of our life. It’s now officially part of our sons diagnosis. But it feels very much like a junior version. During the long and ever so frustrating diagnostic process which he went through ADHD was an after thought. It was missed. Never mentioned. Everything was lumped into Aspergers and Dyspraxia.

Then our Paediatrician changed. In his first meeting with our Son he genuinely seemed surprised that he could find no mention of ADHD on the records. A few weeks later it was added to the diagnosis. Why was it missed?

We where made aware that Aspergers in most cases goes hand in hand with other conditions. Everything seems to merge together to give a unique set of symptoms and personality traits. It is often difficult to unpick the individual conditions. Generally Aspergers and Autism are just used as overriding terms to cover a wide and complex set of interrelated issues. In our sons case ADHD was just missed. A specialist went through the original symptoms list. Of the 16 original listed symptoms which were defined as Aspergers related 7 were later changed to ADHD.

As soon as ADHD was on the medical record we were offered medication. Interestingly although our Sons the symptoms had not changed at all suddenly the addition of four letters prompted the option of drugs. We declined. Or should I say Son declined. In his words

ADHD hasn’t changed me. I’m still the same person with Aspergers. It’s just who I am.

Since we declined medication ADHD has never been specifically mentioned again by our Doctors. They have continued to offer behavioural therapy to try and ease the young Aspergers kid into this strange old world. Due to Government cut backs the therapy is becoming increasingly sporadic. Once someone gets past a certain age the health support basically dries up. But at least something happened. From an Education point of view basically no school interventions have occurred. No assessment of educational impact has been carried out. It’s the standard education package for all regardless of any specific needs. It’s so much easier to bracket individual kids as low attainment.

This is the shocking fact in education today. Certainly here in England. Specific educational help to those with a learning disability – some prefer to call it a learning disadvantage – is denied to too many kids in our society. Effectively they are seen as an expensive drain on resources. So much easier to write them off. How do we explain that to our kids. How as a society have we got education so wrong. We need to keep shouting as one day those in charge will listen.

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 51 Comments

Red Sky in the morning….

Red Sky at night …. fisherman’s delight. Red Sky in the morning …. fisherman’s warning.

Yes it works.

A routine dental appointment ended with me trying to stem blood from the mouth for 4 hours. That’s a good start. Especially as I’m one of those odd souls who is fine with blood as long as it’s not mine….

Then school struck again….

Son had been looking forward to getting his school award from the celebration evening. That’s all changed now.

I don’t want to go. I REALLY don’t want to go. Turns out it’s not a party after all. Everyone getting an award has to go on stage and then give a little speech to the crowd. Going to be at least 100 parents sat in the audience. We have to practice the speech tomorrow. When I told the teacher about my Aspergers she said ‘it would be good for me'”

So we have gone from a boost to self confidence to meltdown. Doesn’t help when the kids have been told that they are representing the school so they need to be in full uniform and speak with a loud clear voice. Speaking to a large audience is a challenge for anyone. For a kid with Aspergers it’s a nightmare. Room full of strangers, no where to hide, all those eyes on you. One final twist is that the kids can take notes on stage to read from – well that’s bloody helpful when your dyslexic. It’s just not right. AGAIN.

So we have agreed that son will ask if he can get his award without going to the event. If he has to go then he is going to decline the award. If that’s the case then I’m sure a Dad , Son, Cat, Dog and Gerbils can come up with our own FUN awards night. The magic word being FUN.

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 50 Comments

Dumbo meets Braveheart

Everyday more red bursts through to bring life to Yorkshire In Autumn. No creative license required here. Last night son asked to watched the Mel Gibson movie Braveheart. He quietly watched the movie in one sitting. When it had finished he had one of those looks. The Paddington Hard Stare.

“Where do I start. I gave up making a note of the historical inaccuracies when I got past 30. I think they were averaging one a minute. I hope people don’t think it happened like that. As a piece of pure make believe it was ok. As an accurate record of real history I’d rather trust the new Dumbo movie”

I have to say the new Dumbo is great. But it’s one of the THOSE movies which would have been much easier to watch if it had come out before our world changed. Movies with the death of a mum are still very raw. For both of us.

Dumbo also touched on the idea that sometimes we are not prepared for what may face us a parent and as a human. Don’t want to give any real spoilers away so I can’t say too much about the movie.

I wasn’t prepared in the slightest way for being a single parent. For being a widow. For having that awful conversation with your son. For picking up the pieces of a life which had been based purely on three of us. But to be fair as a couple we were not prepared for the loss of one of us. Our lifestyle was based on two parents. Financially it only worked with two of us. After we became a family our careers only continued to work because we could share the load. We only continued to have a bit of a social life because the other partner was there.

So when you suddenly take one partner away …. it all comes tumbling down. Three years later we are still trying to rebuild our life’s. Watching another autumn and another set of red leaves makes you appreciate life goes on – even after a death.

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 35 Comments

The view opens up

One of my Running trail runs is tough. It’s a muddy slog through increasingly thick woods. It’s a slow claggy run climbing through undergrowth that sees only glimpses of the sun. It’s very claustrophobic. Your on your own. A little voice keeps telling you to just stop. Why am I doing this. One step forward, two back.

But with patience and effort the going becomes easier. The ground levels out. The cover starts to thin and the distant view begins to reveal itself.

Then your out. The openness is initially disorientating but it’s been so worth the struggle.

Then a reluctance. A moment of doubt. Need to turn your back on the openness and head back into the dark. The way is back through the woods.

This trail run reminds me of our life these days. I head into the working week with trepidation. Too much to do and not enough time. Self doubt is king. Often so little direction and so much frustration. It feels like you are against the world. Battling uphill through mud. Our Son heads into 5 days of mainstream school. So little help. Fighting on his own. Not sure why he is doing this. It’s an alien world. You just have to keep plodding on but then Friday comes. Our hopes and spirits build. Then you arrive at the weekend. For two sweet days life improves. The week’s slog and struggles are forgotten. But so quickly it’s late Sunday and you face the trepidation of the upcoming week and the return to the darkness.

So we move on. The week calls and maybe so does the woodland trail. That’s our life cycle.

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 58 Comments

Where are the cobwebs

Autumn is definitely here. The flowers have gone. Many of the trees are bare. The leaves that remain have increasingly turned vivid red. My partner loved this time. She would find any excuse to spend time outside. Just looking at the colours. Today looking at the reds in the garden I have purpose. These eyes are looking for her as well. I try to spend an extra minute. Spending as much time as she would.

Before the world changed my partner would be fixated on the colours but I would have other things on my mind. Cobwebs. I love Autumn for the intricate and beautiful cobwebs which begin to take over our world. The young spiders have had all summer to grow. It’s also a time when spiders are out looking for mates. AND the weather and the dampness are perfect for adding to the cobwebs drama.

The weather is perfect but for some reason the cobwebs are largely missing. Still no abundant arachnid display. Maybe next week. Then we can be both happy. But at least this weekend we did get one cobweb. Hopefully it’s the start of Autumn becoming complete.

Posted on by bereavedandbeingasingleparent · 56 Comments

The First Swiss Sunday

It’s Sunday. We are still clinging to our mad old planet. So it’s time to breathe and visit a place seemingly immune to the growing madness. A place of peace and beauty. It’s Switzerland.

I’ve been so fortunate to visit this wonderful country on a number of occasions. So many stunning locations. But I have a soft spot for one mountain. It’s called The First.

It’s not that big. It’s classed as a minor summit of the Schwarzhorn. But it would be massive if it was in the UK. It’s all relative.

The trip starts with a beautiful train journey to Grindelwald.

The First is special to me. It was the first Swiss Mountain I went up. It’s the one I’ve been on top the most. It’s the one I stood on top in a T-shirt and shorts in the middle of a massive snow drift. In fact it was the first adventure I ever had in this great country. On a Sunday 17 years ago.

So forgive me. Lots of photos.

Once in Grindelwald you take a small cable car to the top. The views are epic.

And they just keep on coming.

The higher you get The Alps slowly reveal themselves.

How can a country be this beautiful.

Eventually you arrive at the top of The First.

Next week the adventure will continue.