One More for the Road

It's been a crazy week between trying to wrap up work and making pre-Disney lists (packing, shopping, and pre-departure to-dos like laundry, plant watering, etc.).  Both kids were home and battling all week.  I was in and out of the office for meetings while trying to minimize the kids' alone time.  We still had things to work out with Jacob's new school situation, including a personal tour since he's missing orientation, and as a result we just got his schedule and his school supplies had yet to be bought.  Suitcases came upstairs but were not packed.  Laundry was partly done.  And, oh, Craig left for Canada on Thursday for a work thing and will have barely 12 hours at home before we leave.  Of course, it finally started raining earlier in the week for the first time in forever, which meant we had to add in a round of yard care this week on top of everything else.  

Monday was extra rainy, and in the evening I noticed the sun shining even though it was pouring.  I was expectantly watching for a rainbow because it seemed to be perfect conditions and I honestly needed that kind of spiritual boost this week--the "it's going to be okay" reminder that rainbows usually bring me.  I spotted a super faint, tiny section of one for probably a half hour as it continued to pour with bright setting sun, but then suddenly I looked up to find this:

It wasn't quite the full-sky beauty I was expecting, but at least that one little section was bright and there was a faint half arch beyond that.  I guess it was a reminder that God's always hiding there somewhere but doesn't always do things the way we're expecting! 

Speaking of outside, the flowers in my yard are losing a little bit of their luster these days so most of my joy is with my violet!  I repotted it a while back and added some Miracle-Gro soil to the pot, which made the leaves extra green and lush.  But it still didn't bloom so I pinched off a bunch of leaves a few weeks ago to make more space to water it, and BOOM...buds everywhere!  They're still blooming and I already took off the first spent blossom the other day.  It's incredible--though I'm sorry I'll miss the peak while we're gone!

Jacob wanted to go to the Y Friday night to shoot so of course Carter wanted to hit up a playground while we waited.  I found a few new ones within five minutes of the Y and figured we might be able to hit up two of them.  One was an elementary school in Gates which I figured might be similar to another one we did earlier this spring, but that one was good so I figured this one was worth a shot.  It was different (despite the schools looking nearly identical), but it was pretty cool.  One section was a ship setup similar to the playground near Seabreeze, but for littler kids.  But Carter liked doing the "king of the world" thing from the front of the ship!

It was a fun little setup, and it was surrounded by a little track!  Carter loved running around the track.  

Across the way was a bigger kid playground with a bunch of climbing things, a slide, and some swings.  On the left there were a couple sets of monkey bars, some wobbly "vines", as Carter called them, chain ladder, a rock wall, and lots of other things to cross and climb.  It also had two things (far left of the apparatus) that looked like slides but seemed to be more for climbing as they did not have a "channel" like most slides--they were convex instead of concave, if that makes sense.
  

Carter liked the actual slide--it was pretty fast and steep!

This doesn't really do it justice...it felt much taller!

We had fun climbing on the big web.  I found this one a little easier to maneuver through than others.  I had to take a pic up top...

...and a selfie down below...

...and one from below when Carter was up top!
 

Carter loves being dramatic and this one turned out cool!

We had about 20 minutes before we had to pick up Jacob so I suggested we try another one five minutes away.  It turned out to not be the most exciting one and there was a party there with a lot of kids, but we made the best of it (and it was fine since we only had about 10 minutes anyway).  There were a couple different things I haven't seen elsewhere--one where you sit almost like you're going to do a shoulder press and move the bar to bounce yourself, and another where you stand on a little pedestal and bounce yourself.  There were a couple good slides and a big rock wall, which Carter climbed all the way around and then once over.  

Peeking over!

Then it was time to pick Jacob up, but it was nice to get to a couple more playgrounds before heading out on vacation (and coming back to the unofficial end of summer...sigh).  

The rest of the weekend has pretty much been just stress and endless checklists.  Carter and I shopped for school supplies while Jacob was at basketball Saturday, so it was good to check that off.  I managed to get Carter packed on Friday when his laundry was done, and packed my clothes while I was stuck on the phone for something super random on Saturday.  Saturday night I had to run to Walmart to pick up two last school supplies, a couple other random things, ponchos and--most interestingly--my new Apple Watch.  It's my birthday gift to myself (offset by some gift cards) and I wanted it mostly for a couple health tracking things.  I am far from having figured it out, but it will be fun to track steps at the parks!  Sunday involved more prep--setting up my plants to self-water with watering bulbs and old plastic bottles, cleaning up some things around the house, setting up light timers, tracking down odds and ends for packing, and just trying to mentally and physically organize whatever I could.  There are so many last minute details and I am freaking out about it.  Just trying to fit everything into carry-ons is hard, but we're close.

I feel like COVID gave me such anxiety, and it's a struggle to beat it back right now.  I'm out of practice on a lot of this stuff and then adding in fears of illness, lost bags, weather, and whatever else is making me crazy.  There are so many details, and while I feel relatively capable thanks to lists and being generally neurotic, there's still a lot of anxiety about things not going well, guilt if I could have done something better, and concern that some random thing is going to ruin the vacation again.  My family thinks I'm nuts when I'm trying to remind them to put liquids in baggies or bring a change of clothes, shoes, and a bathing suit in their personal item carry-on, because weird things have happened to people's gate-checked carry-ons.  But if I didn't and something went wrong, it could ruin the vacation and I am doing everything in my power for that to not be the case.  It's a lot.  This could be the trip of a lifetime and I don't want anything to get in the way.  Twelve hours from now we'll be on our plane.  Wish us luck...and maybe a little pixie dust, too!

Crazy, Hazy, Not-So-Lazy Days of Summer

We have officially hit the stretch run of summer--we seem to be through the worst of the heat, we've apparently hit the monsoon season of our drought-filled summer, camp is over (though Carter's stint ended a week early), and we're just trying to maintain sanity until vacation on Monday.  It's been a wacky week, with both kids home and both of us working between home and the office here and there to try to maintain a presence with the boys as much as possible.  They haven't killed each other yet, so that might be a win, but they're driving us nuts anyway.  If that wasn't enough, Craig is in the midst of a Thursday through Sunday trip to Toronto for a lacrosse tournament, and then we leave Monday morning.  How I'm going to manage possible school supply buying, packing, and kid wrangling all weekend, I have no idea.  I'm trying to get laundry done and start some early prep, but evenings weren't long enough this week for me to make much progress.  It's going to be a lot.  I just kept waiting for 5pm today, and while I feel like I did a reasonably good job wrapping up work, there is now so much left to do at home.

Before this crazy week, Carter and I had some business to attend to--I had promised him a trip to Darien Lake to make up for missing his Seabreeze field trip for camp (since we pulled him out a week early to avoid COVID ahead of our trip), and Saturday was really the best/only day to do it.  My work schedule got crazy complicated for these last two weeks, so weekdays didn't work.  The 9pm closing time on Saturday seemed like it would offset any additional busyness, so we picked that day--and bonus, we found out it was a Bills preseason home game, which I think kept crowds down a bit, too.  Carter was so excited about it that I could barely get him to stop bragging about it to other kids.  Oy.

But before that, we had a gorgeous, warm Friday night with nothing to do, so I suggested we go to the cool playground near Seabreeze and watch the sunset from the beach.  It was predictably busy, but at least we didn't have to be jealous of the folks across the street since we had an amusement park adventure of our own the next day. 

View from the top of the playground - you can just see a single car going up the hill on the Whirlwind in the distance.

We climbed around a bit but there were a lot of kids so I mostly hung around and picked my spots to climb on the equipment when it was clear.  Carter really wanted to ride that round swing thing (like amusement park swings but only three seats), but it was pretty hard to grab a spot.  When he finally did, he realized that another girl on there was in his group at camp!  They adorably chatted back and forth for a bit before it was time for her to leave and us to walk to the beach for sunset.  We walked down the sidewalk on the strip of land between the lake and the bay, past two grill-and-custard spots, past Marge's (the best hole-in-the-wall beachfront bar ever), past the Irondequoit Bay boat launch, and down to the beach.  Before we hit the sand we changed from our shoes into our water shoes.  We came unprepared last year and did the beach in bare feet, which wasn't the most comfortable because of rocks and shells but also meant a lengthy clean-up and dry-off at the end.  This time we brought a towel as well, which helped a lot.

Anyway, the sunset looked promising as we got down to the water, and it was indeed a great one.  The oranges and the wispy and billowing clouds were gorgeous.  It was so peaceful just hanging out with our feet in the water, watching it evolve.

The one "volcano" cloud, as Carter called it, was all billowy and only got taller as we stood there.  It's hard to see the detail in it, but it was neat.

The wispy clouds off to the side were just as pretty.
 

The water felt cold initially but we adjusted soon enough and enjoyed the waves and sinking into the sand.  

Always a selfie with my boy!

Carter liked playing a game trying to avoid the waves.  I deemed it impossible and just enjoyed the lapping water.

The colors continued to get more vivid, and I soaked in every bit of the beachy mood courtesy of the music from Marge's and the bonfire and parties at beach houses along the shore.  It's quite the life down there.

If you zoom in on this picture, I think you can see that the tip-top of the volcano is blocking the sunlight and created what looks like a couple reverse (shadow) sun rays in the clouds above it.

It was incredibly gorgeous but I figured we needed to head back to the playground before it got too dark, just because I promised Carter we'd go back for a bit so he could get more swing time.  

We headed back off the beach leaving this view behind...

It still took a few minutes to clean off our feet, and it was pretty dark by the time we got back.  But the playground was still busy, maybe busier than before!  After killing some time on other equipment, Carter finally got a spot on the swing again, but the two other girls on it literally refused to get off.  I get that it's cool but their insistence to stay on until they had to leave was jerky, especially since it was clear there were other kids waiting.  I will say the one girl was a master at spinning it hard and hopping back on.  Eventually I pulled Carter off because someone needed to give other kids a chance.  It was getting late anyway, and we had a full day ahead!

Ah, Darien Lake.  Carter still refers to last year's trip as one of his favorite days ever, even with our awesome Kennywood day in the meantime.  He was so excited to go back.  He'd been asking all summer and while I was hoping to find a day, it wasn't looking good.  But given his Seabreeze sacrifice, I had no choice but to make it work, and if we wanted to do the water park (we did) we had to go in August.  We had an open Saturday, so off we went!  It was going to be a hot day but the weather forecast looked good.  I was definitely looking at this as a trial run for Disney, both in my planning and how the day would unfold.  I carefully thought through what would be in my backpack, what would go in the locker, and what would be in my fanny pack.  I tried to think through timing and how we might fit everything in.  It was giving me anxiety but I guess I was grateful for the chance to think through some things before the bigger deal next week.  In truth, almost everything will be different but it helped to get in the preparedness mindset.

We didn't get on the road quite as quickly as I hoped.  I wanted to get there right at opening, but due to a number of factors--including sleeping well past my normal Saturday morning wakeup time and some Thruway traffic--we were a little late.  We ate sandwiches on the last 10 minutes of our trip to tide us over for a bit and avoid the expensive food in the park.  Despite a long security line, we made it in pretty quickly, and we were off!

Carter wanted to hit up the Boomerang first.  I wasn't excited to knock my brain around first thing (even with Dramamine) but I knew that was his favorite.  We nearly walked on, which was helpful.  I think it got some ride jitters out of his system and it definitely got the adrenaline flowing! 

We tried to ride the drop tower, which would have been an upgrade for him (slightly bigger than the one in Ocean City last year), but they had to bring in maintenance while we were waiting, so we moved on.  We did the awesome Motocoaster, where you ride on a motorcycle-style seat for a fast and twisty launched coaster ride, and loved it just as much as last year.  The tall swings were right next to it and the line was reasonable, so I asked Carter if he wanted to go.  He's not a fan of heights but I told him this was the best way to keep conquering that.  We had to wait one ride cycle, but it was a lovely ride up high.

We moved on to the Viper, which was my first "real" coaster post-Disney, and Carter was excited to do it again.  It's definitely not my favorite these days but I love that I still know the track by heart--it was the peak of my coaster world for quite a few years, after all--until Cedar Point.  I told Carter that he should enjoy all of these sub-par coasters at Darien Lake now, because once we get to Cedar Point, hopefully next year, he will realize just how awesome coasters can be, and these won't seem as great.

Next it was on to the Tantrum!  We got shut out of this one last year because it was closed--probably a staffing shortage--so we were excited to ride it!  The completely vertical lift hill was a new one for me, and the beyond-vertical drop was also something I haven't done much of.

You can see the car going up the hill--you're literally flat on your back!

It was a short but super fun ride!  Lots of twists and turns but smooth and fun!  I wish we had time to ride it again!  We grabbed a pretzel before our next ride, since we knew we were heading toward the water park soon and would need some sustenance to get us through hours of fun there!

Our last ride pre-water park was one we skipped last time--Shipwreck Falls!  Once upon a time, Darien Lake had two water rides--a flume and a round raft.  The flume was my nemesis as a kid, as I hated getting wet, and then they built Grizzly Run, which was even worse.  As I got older I would bargain to ride the flume so I could avoid Grizzly Run, which usually worked.  Funny to think my family would leave me alone at the overlook to watch rafts while they rode!  They added Shipwreck Falls in the early 2000s, but luckily by that point I rarely visited so I didn't need to do much to avoid it.  The log flume was replaced by Tantrum a few years back, and Grizzly Run is no more, either, though that just sort of sits mostly intact out of sight if Google's satellite view is any indication.  As we waited for both Tantrum and Shipwreck Falls, I noticed some odd remaining concrete structures which I think came from the log flume channel.  Looking at old maps, I couldn't help but wonder if Shipwreck Falls' one spot was part of the old water park that used to be in that section.  Anyway, I made sure we prepared for this ride--I had my bathing suit with a skirt bottom and flip flops, and Carter changed into his suit and water shoes.  We needed it--we were so wet!  And Carter stood on the bridge for an extra splash, too!  It was a good day for it, but I was grateful we were on our way to the water park.

Wet kid with a big splash in the background!

We ended up spending a lot of time--too much looking back--in the water park.  We had a blast, but we probably got there around 2:30, maybe, and left just 20 minutes ahead of closing at 6:40.  Lines were long but we were determined to do a few things so we just did it, not really realizing how much of our day it was taking up.  Carter played in the kids zone initially, doing both little slides and climbing through all the water elements.  Next we did the racing slides which Carter did not do last year.  They're not my favorite because of the amount of water in your face, but they are fast and quite thrilling!  Then we got in line for the new ride, Wahoo Wave.  That was a LONG wait.  But it was new and we HAD to do it.  It was basically a four person tube (so hard to carry up the stairs!), a fun little twisty tunnel up top, and then down a steep chute into a wall of water that you rode up pretty high and then slid back down.  I wish we would have swished a bit more in that section, but it was just up and down and right into the exit chute.  It was fun and I'm glad we did it, but I just wish the wait would have been shorter!

The blue and yellow stripes are the wall, outlined in orange.  We probably shot out about halfway up.

Next it was on to the Brain Drain, which only Carter and Kate rode last time.  It's a body slide where the floor drops out from under you to shoot you into the slide.  I promised Carter last year that if we went back I would ride it.  It was time to pay the piper, I guess.  Again, another long line, but we amused ourselves in line talking to the group before us that had no idea what the ride was like.  Carter took great joy in sharing with the very nervous lady in the group how the floor drops out!  We had one extra mechanical issue wait, too, but finally reached the top.  I could see the terror on that woman's face when she went, and I'm sure my face was no different.  You load into that capsule and just have to wait to be plunged into a tube that's nearly vertical at the start.  When that floor dropped, it was literally just a swirling tube of darkness.  Instantly I was plunged into the tube, which was pretty intense since the initial drop was straight down for probably 8-10 feet before swirling in circles for the rest of the descent.  The ride itself wasn't too bad but the end had the usual deluge over the face that those slides always have.  It definitely wasn't my favorite, but I'm glad I did it.  Our line friend survived as well!

Next was the Tornado, which was a favorite last time.  Similar concept to Wahoo Wave except in this one you do a few back-and-forth half-pipe style swoops inside the funnel.  Once again, it was a long wait, but SO much fun.  We always come out hysterically laughing!

  

Our last stop was the complex of four different slides.  Last year we could only do a regular one since that's what was open for a double tube.  This time we were thinking we were going to do the toilet bowl--Carter wasn't tall enough to do the Seabreeze one last time we were there and it had been a while since he went on the one at the indoor waterpark all those years ago.  But then as I was looking at the slides, I realized the toilet bowl one just had a quick tunnel to the bowl, you'd swirl around, and then be done.  But there was another slide called Mr. Twister that seemed to have three little swirly areas interspersed among the rest of the tube slide, and as I could recall, you'd supposedly swish around in those three areas a bit.  So, we decided to try that one since we couldn't do it anywhere else and it felt like it might take longer to go down.  And we picked wisely!  Mr. Twister was so much fun.  We went through the tube, swished into the first spot and up the side wall a bit, just enough to turn us backward.  We swished against the wall in the next one and turned forward, and then swished one more time in the last one and went through the helix at the end of the slide backward.  It was such a fun ride, though!

I was not thrilled when I realized it was nearly 7pm by the time we finished up.  We had to rush to change, and then I wanted to grab food because I was starving.  We split a chicken finger dinner and then realized we were maybe a little too full for a ride.  I suggested we start with Predator, which was right across from us, but when I discovered the line was really short, I suggested we wait in the line for the front car.  It would give us digestion time and probably made the ride a little smoother.  The Predator is one of the coasters I swore off years ago, along with the Mind Eraser, and I wanted to wait until later in the day to ride either of them because they tend to hurt me.  Predator is a rough wooden coaster and Mind Eraser is a suspended coaster, but not the good kind like Cedar Point has.  It's more like the one I swear gave me a mild concussion at Canada's Wonderland when I was a teenager.  But I promised I would ride both later in the day so any head injuries didn't impact the whole day.  They did retrack some parts of Predator with steel track, so I was hopeful.  It was a new coaster style for Carter since this was probably slightly bigger than the woodies he rode at Kennywood.  Unfortunately, the wait was probably a little longer than would have been ideal, even if the digestion was helpful.  But it was a nice spot in the park...
  

We were excited!

The ride ended up being pretty awesome--better than I remember.  Maybe it was the retracking that fixed the area I remember bumping heads with my mom on, maybe it was the front car, but I enjoyed it way more than I expected--just a classic newer-generation wooden coaster!
 

After conquering the Predator!

Our next stop was Ride of Steel...well, actually, we had stopped at Ride of Steel before Predator because we wanted to get Carter measured.  We weren't sure he'd be tall enough--he's 53-1/2" right now, but 54" with shoes.  He JUST made it on the measurement!  But again, at that point we had just eaten and this was really a whole different realm of coaster for him, even though he did do a 200-foot hill at Kennywood.  This one just feels different and faster.  The wait wasn't super long at that moment so we figured maybe Predator would be a better starter, and then he'd be primed for Ride of Steel.  As we walked back over, the sunset was looking lovely.

You can see the Predator cresting the hill in the distance

We waited for maybe 10 minutes and then all of a sudden the people ahead of us felt a couple raindrops.  And then we did too--big ones.  Just as we reached the station, it started pouring!  We were hopeful it would be a short-lived cell since the sky didn't look that bad and the radar didn't either, but alas, then some lightning hit and all hell broke loose as people took off.  I figured we were dry so we'd stick around and see how it went.  But the longer we waited, the more it became apparent this wasn't going to go well.  

Sad faces...sort of...not sure what mine is!

When the lightning continued to hit and we were only a half hour from closing, we knew we were screwed.  Eventually the closing call came to the station and we had no choice but to brave the rain (much lighter) and go.  Luckily I had kept my fanny pack with my phone with us (the worker at the entrance wanted it off but I hid it because I knew it would be above the restraint) because the bag storage area wasn't the best and our bag was a little wet from the downpour.  I would have been panicked if my phone had been out there!

We walked back through the park dejected, but the lights were pretty so I took a couple pics.  

Carter loved the colors in the swing tower in the background.

I liked the reflections in this one.

It was dark but still pretty.

As we walked, Carter went from sad to grumpy, just like when things didn't go well at the end of Zoomagination a few weeks ago.  He was just writing off the whole day because one (big) thing didn't go right.  He missed Ride of Steel, the drop tower, and Mind Eraser, all of which we planned on hitting up at the end of the night after Ride of Steel, even if it meant waiting in line past 9pm.  And trust me, I get it--we were so excited for him to ride and it was a disappointment that it didn't work out.  I explained we had almost no way of knowing because the thunderstorm came out of nowhere.  It had been a lovely day and it came on so quickly that not even my weather app notified me ahead like it normally does.  Had we known we would have structured a couple things differently, but we just didn't.  I was sad for him and bummed we couldn't finish off a great day the way we would have liked, but I reminded him we did a lot of great stuff and that this was a much easier fix over the next couple years than, say, if things don't go well at Disney.  But just because a couple things didn't work out didn't mean the whole day had to be deemed terrible.  It was a wet walk back to the car, but I did stop to get this picture after we grabbed our other bag from the water park locker.

On the bright side, when we got home, these were there waiting for us!

On to bigger and better things, we hope!

We also got a few of the items we ordered to make Disney a bit more comfortable, so it was making everything a bit more real...even if I've spent all week terrified of something going wrong.

 

On Sunday we went to Buffalo for some outlet shopping and to visit Craig's parents.  We did pretty well--Jacob got new sneakers (of course), Carter and I got BOGO slides (did you know a women's size 7 = a kid size 5?), Jacob got Crocs (ugh) and Craig got Crocs flip flops, and I got new black Rockstar pants for work since my other ones are getting a bit faded.  Everyone got a little something.  We had a nice visit after that--luckily Craig's dad is doing a bit better--and I caught this cool picture on the way home of the sun just poking through the clouds over the lake.  See that little dot near the horizon?

And so ended the weekend before the final stretch heading into Disney.  The busy couple days had me wondering how we'd all hold out with long, hot days at Disney, but hopefully adrenaline (and Genie+) gets us through.  But before we could get to that, we had a marathon of a week to get through first!

Connecting the Dots

During the pandemic, one of the most underrated things I missed was my commutes.  Yes, commutes can be frustrating and stressful, and upon working from home we've all discovered they're a bit of an unnecessary time suck.  But I also realized that my commute--which is a very tolerable 15-20 minutes, minus any kid pickup--also serves as good decompression time.  When I work from home, I find I still prefer about 20 minutes on the couch with my phone before I get up the energy to make dinner.  I know I'll be occupied for about an hour and a half after that so I need to work up to it a bit, mentally at least.  I can't say I get right to dinner when I get home after a commute either, but it's more of a physical break than a mental one.  But the pandemic taught me that decompression time is a thing for me and I never realized my commute served that purpose some days. 

Another benefit to the commute was the solo time to sort through my brain.  When you have two chatty kids, you really do find out what it means to "not be able to hear yourself think".  Your brain is so full of their input that you can't even dig into your own thoughts properly.  Without commutes, my uninterrupted self-reflection time was at a minimum.  In the midst of the pandemic I felt like I was never alone, and life was always noisy and full of interruptions.  It was hard to form complete sentences, let alone think through things past surface-level.  I remember a lot of my later-pandemic road trips to Buffalo turned into marathon deep-thinking sessions pondering all of the stuff I hadn't had the chance to think about in months because my brain could never quiet itself long enough to go deep.  

I've been going into the office twice per week for a little over a month now, and I've been appreciating the quiet thinking time in the car, complete with my preferred music.  The other morning on the way to camp, Carter and I somehow got on the topic of Jacob's behavior back around the time of our last Disney trip.  Carter made a comment about how it's worse now, and I corrected him and said, "Oh no...it was MUCH worse then."  Yes, Jacob can be really frustrating these days, but back then he was impossible.  I don't think Carter can even fathom what that time was like for us.  He wouldn't believe his eyes.  In fact, when I went back and looked at a couple posts from that time, I found myself wondering how we ever survived that time.  The posts were gut-wrenching.  Jacob was so clearly suffering and we were powerless to stop it.  Now it's easy to look back and feel more sympathy for him, but at the time we were so confused about why he just seemed to make everything so much harder than it had to be.  Even now I'm not sure if it was just the pain from his undiagnosed Celiac Disease, or if there was an actual mental blip that made that period so much worse.  If you want an example, just read this post--this sums up about where we were at the time.  But most of the posts surrounding it are equally painful to read now.  I'm thankful I wrote about it, though, because I almost wouldn't have believed it had I not written it, and I think it provides important perspective and a reminder how far we've come.

Back to Carter, though...I tried to help him understand how bad things were, and how Jacob's behavior now is just a mere inconvenience/frustration compared to the hell we lived in then.  I didn't tell him this, but I genuinely thought we were on the road to in-patient care.  That's how bad it was for a time.  Carter asked me when Jacob got diagnosed with ADHD, and I explained that was actually three years later.  We got him evaluated in Kindergarten at the request of his teacher, but they didn't diagnose him with anything then.  It wasn't until third grade that they could no longer deny something was up.  But after I dropped Carter off, I got to thinking...how did that doctor--who I am sure is a very good doctor--miss it?  Jacob clearly had so much going on at the time, so how did he not catch any of it?

And in the 15 minute drive to work, with just me and my brain, I had an interesting eureka moment that connected a bunch of dots for me and made clear the differences between my two ADHD kids.  It's something I've long struggled to put my finger on, but I realized that so much of Jacob's issues go back to two specific traits that have actually been quite clear since those big problems began nine years ago.  I've decided that most of Jacob's difficulties tie back to being self-centered and being impulsive.  

I know in most cases self-centeredness denote an arrogant selfishness, but his is more of a blissful ignorance.  He's simply very focused on how things affect him and how to address his own needs, and empathy has never been his strong suit.  He's not actively trying to ignore other people--it's just that he's so wrapped up in his own stuff that it almost doesn't occur to him.  And I swear it's not because he wasn't taught properly--trust me, I tried so hard--that's just how his brain has always defaulted.  I'm sure four-and-a-half years as the only child didn't help, but much like his brain has always been exceptionally wired for sports, it also seems wired to have this self-focus, and Carter's birth seemed to electrify everything even more.  When Carter was born, Jacob lost the ability to be the full center of attention at home.  I don't even know if he was conscious of that, but his body clearly felt it.  From that point forward, everything he did in regard to Carter was to ignore him completely, draw attention away from him, actively put him down, or make himself look far superior.  That continues to this day.  Even if something doesn't have to do with Carter, Jacob's focus is usually making himself prominent in some way--breaking into a conversation with his two cents or setting circumstances to benefit him in some way.  Again, I don't even think he realizes that's his goal--it's just his nature and I think it's now become a habit to the point he never knew a different reality.  He's simply always honed in on how things connect back to him.  That's not inherently a bad thing, mind you, but it does tend to get in the way of thinking about how those efforts might impact other people.

His impulsivity originally manifested in "naughty" behavior, then in tantrums which were probably uncontrolled impulses from reacting to stimuli.  Back then he had a very hard time managing reactions when something didn't go his way, and in some cases that's still an issue--he's just a bit more mature about it now.  Impulsivity is actually probably his biggest issue now, and the one for which we most encourage him to take his medicine.  When he doesn't, he overreacts to Carter constantly and blurts out whatever is on his mind, with no filter.  He will interject the most random, pointless things into conversations, often in a feeble attempt to be funny, and constantly says demeaning things to Carter.  We can usually tell when he hasn't had his medicine because he purposely makes things difficult--not answering questions or avoiding topics--and he stirs the pot wherever he can.  This is where the self-centeredness takes things to a whole different level.  He doesn't care if his random comment takes the conversation right off track--he just wants to get his point and/or joke in.  He will put Carter down just to elevate himself.  He will avoid our questions because it's something he doesn't want to deal with.  I've always said he had his own agenda, and it's still true in more ways than one.

As I thought about his evaluation with the doctor nine years ago, I think the doctor didn't see anything because his evaluation was primarily through one-on-one interviews and activities.  Jacob did well.  He scored well on the testing and stayed attentive.  But I realized that could have been because he was getting the one-on-one attention he craves and he was content with that in the moment, so there was no reason to want to do anything else.  But in a classroom, it was definitely not one-on-one, and as such, he probably had things he preferred to be doing that were more in line with his own priorities.  The impulsivity was stronger than the peer pressure, and as a result, he appeared inattentive and uncooperative.  His teacher thought he might have Asperger's, which had crossed our minds as well--the kid with Asperger's on the TV show Parenthood felt all too familiar in many ways, from his clothing quirks to his toy arrangements to his oblivious, self-centered perspective on life.  While ADHD had crossed my mind, too, admittedly I was never sure because he didn't seem to have the hyperactive component.  Yes, he was very active but it was more purposeful activity--he was playing sports and running around because those were things he liked to do.  Once in a while he'd rock in his chair or do those kinds of fidgety ADHD behaviors, but I don't know that it was significantly more than any typical energetic kid.  The reports from the school should have been a red flag, as were the tantrums we experienced, but the doctor didn't see an issue himself.  He labeled him a "difficult personality" and we were on our way.  It wasn't until three years later that his academics started to suffer as the school work got harder and we tried again.  That time, between the school's observations, our answers to endless scales, and the therapist's observations, Jacob got ADHD and ODD diagnoses.  For the record, his ODD (Oppositional Defiant Disorder) seems extremely mild compared to some cases I've read about.  I think he definitely had that the first time around, based on the absolutely awful tantrums and defiant behavior we experienced, but the doctor obviously didn't get to see one of those spells so he wouldn't have known other than what we told him.

Even though both boys have ADHD and impulsivity is a major element for both of them, I feel like their circumstances are still very different.  I see Carter as being an even purer ADHD case, even though our overall troubles with Jacob were worse.  Carter was actually a sweet, typical kid until he got around the age where he had to start formal learning, right around Pre-K4.  That's when his symptoms started showing--with reading and writing specifically.  In addition to the lack of focus, he does the typical stuff you picture with ADHD--not being able to sit still, fidgeting, having little patience with things he's not interested in, interrupting constantly, losing interest in projects, and very little attention to detail.  When Jacob was little he was active simply to play sports.  Carter's movement seemed less goal-oriented--he was content simply running or riding his big wheel, mostly just down to the corner and back.  To this day Carter has a heck of a time sitting properly in a chair and tends to always have a body part in motion even when he is.  He'll randomly rock the la-z-boy or swing on the stair railing.  I have to remind him daily to sit on his butt at the dinner table.  His movements are still so impulsive that he tends to be clumsier--he fell on me trying to quickly climb into bed the other night, and he's infamous for accidentally walking into any Lego structures Jacob leaves a little too close to the walking path through the living room.  He constantly interrupts conversations with completely unrelated topics.  Sometimes his brain or his body gets ahead of the other and it just causes problems.  My goal in life is to get him to slow down and think about what he's doing before he does it.  Jacob mostly just speaks before he thinks, but Carter does everything before he thinks.  Maybe Carter will grow out of some of these things, just like Jacob did with some of his behaviors, but even a lot of reminders on my part hasn't done it yet.  

My other big frustration with Carter's particular brand of ADHD is that he defaults to screens way more often than anything else.  I think there was a time in the midst of the pandemic where all the screen time left him with a massive craving for stimuli, and screens were the most instant gratification for that and the only thing that would hold his attention with an overstimulated mind.  We slowly brought him down from that state as things started to go back to normal and he started taking his medication, but it's still his default.  Toys will sit unplayed with because his first choice is his phone, and his second choice is the TV.  He has a hard time choosing toys if either of those two are options.  Even worse, if toys are put away and not visible, he will almost never go looking for them.  If he needs to do any work finding pieces, it's too much effort.  He forgets what he has and can't be bothered to think through it--he just decides the screen is easier and goes with that.  And when he's on a screen, his ADHD-driven hyperfocus is hardcore.  He blocks out everything and it takes a couple tries to get his attention.  And it's like pulling teeth to pull him away from screens to start his breakfast or get ready for bed.  I don't want to take them away completely because they're something he enjoys and I don't want to make the "forbidden fruit" situation worse, but sometimes he does need a detox.  I wish he'd be more thoughtful with his choices on how he spends his time, but I know it's mostly the ADHD and his impulsivity that make it hard for him to do that.

On the bright side, at least Carter does have empathy and shows an amount of affection Jacob hasn't shown since he was a toddler.  I get lots of "I love you, Mom" and lots of hugs, often randomly but especially when he's happy and we're doing something he enjoys.  I love having my little adventure buddy because it gets him away from screens and exposes him to new things--and he's such a wild card that I never know what will resonate with him.  He appreciates the activities we do together and finds joy in little things like his favorite fast food or snacks.  He still likes company at bedtime and sometimes forgets his own size when he climbs on me for hugs.  I sometimes wonder if he's getting too old for all of the hands-on affection, but I know he's my last, and after Jacob, I know affection like this is special regardless, so I'm savoring every bit of it.

I guess at the end of the day I'm not entirely sure I know what to do with all of these connected dots that helped me better understand Jacob's journey and how Carter differs, but I think being aware of both kids and their tendencies and differences helps me to think through how to speak to them or how to set up a situation to best work with their strengths or weaknesses.  For Carter it may mean setting up his toys differently or actively encouraging him to do a specific activity, rather than telling him to "just go play".  For Jacob it might mean reminding him to think about how his decisions impact other people--like how him leaving his dishes and bottles all over the house makes me crazy, so maybe he should make more of an effort to clean up more frequently--or even reminding him that cleaning up benefits him because he'll run out of cups a lot less often if they make it in the dishwasher regularly.  It's next-level parenting psychology I haven't quite mastered yet, but it's helpful to keep in mind when I have a moment of clarity.  I never thought two kids from the same set of DNA could be so different.  I already knew that no two kids are the same or can be raised the same way, but ours really take things to an extreme.  Even among the things they have in common there are major differences, so we need to be more intentional about noticing them and reacting accordingly.  This parenting gig is hard and we're doing our best.  I wish our best was better most of the time, but little moments of understanding like this make it a tiny bit easier--until the next obstacle, anyway! 

Disney Deep Dive, Part 2

We last left off at the trip I took to Disney (minus my protesting father) when I was nine years old.  I don't know when I figured I'd make it back--we were not big fancy trip people, at least until my parents discovered cruises, when they became big fancy trip people--but I still don't think I expected it to take as long as it did.  In the end I had a 20-year gap, and it was a super significant 20-year gap.  There were two new parks, lots of new or changed rides, and an explosion in re-theming to incorporate all of the super blockbuster animated movies Disney had put out since shortly after my last visit.  Ponder this--on my last trip in 1987, The Little Mermaid, the first of a long line of movies that launched the new era of Disney princesses, was still two years away.  The Disney World I experienced was a much more classic place, where the time-tested, part-of-American-history movies were at the forefront.  But once the princess train came busting through, nothing was stopping it.  It's shocking to realize how much happened to movies and merchandising in the interim, and in turn how much it impacted the parks themselves.  

Twenty years after that second trip, Craig and I had already been married more than four years.  We wanted to have a baby but things weren't going according to plan as that summer came to a close.  Usually we took one significant vacation per year, but Craig's schedule was crazy even in summer by that point so our options were limited.  A couple years earlier Craig won a week's accommodations in Orlando through a golf tournament and we had long thought about using it for a trip to Disney.  Miraculously, we found a rare week in December where Craig was free, which would allow us to go outside of the brutal summer heat.  We weren't even sure that the prize was still valid after a couple years, but we confirmed it was and eagerly booked it a couple months ahead.  I can only think we booked it at a time where we had basically given up hope a bit on the pregnancy front.  Well...in mid-November we were shocked to discover I was pregnant, and now our trip was only a month away!  I panicked a little bit because I was already super nervous about having a miscarriage.  I did some research on rides and realized that I really should forego any of the exciting ones--including Space Mountain, which I spent the past 20 years regretting not riding, and two new coasters at the newer parks.  Of all the rides not recommended for pregnant women, the only one I made an exception for was the safari at Animal Kingdom, as I felt like the bigger risk was for someone with a visible, bump-able belly.  I was sad, of course, but Craig wasn't into those rides anyway, so at least we'd be doing the same activities throughout the trip.  My challenge, however, was that my family knew how excited I was to ride those rides, and since we hadn't announced the pregnancy prior to leaving (we ended up having to leave it for Christmas due to our schedules), I needed to either lie or come up with an excuse for not riding them!  In the end I told my parents on the phone when they asked about Space Mountain that "it was a long story", which bought me enough time to wait until we saw them in-person and they could understand the real reason why!

Our trip ended up being really amazing despite my limitations.  My nausea and tiredness went away almost immediately upon arrival, and somehow my body held up despite the long days.  We got to enjoy all of the Christmas decorations and did a pretty great job of working through parks at a good but reasonable pace.  The "winterized" castle was incredible!

One of my favorite things was the Osborne Family Spectacle of Dancing Lights.  It was an awesome display of buildings in MGM Studios (now Hollywood Studios) draped in lights that "danced" with the music.  It even snowed!  It's too bad it was discontinued a few years later.

I was so excited to get my picture taken with Figment, who was one of my favorites 20 years earlier.  I think I still have my little vinyl figure of him from my previous trip floating around somewhere in a memory box.  On our most recent trip I bought a stuffed version of him as Carter's souvenir, since he was too young to pick anything himself.  It felt appropriate...and Carter did like chewing on the horns!

I still look at pictures of me from this trip and marvel that I was pregnant at the time.  Definitely not showing but maybe looking a little chubby after meals?  Once you're so ingrained in the "mom" version of yourself, the old version is hard to wrap your head around.

And here we have one more sombrero photo for good measure!  I think they may be getting smaller, at least!  In lieu of a sibling partner in the picture, Craig found me a parrot.

Canada was one of our favorite souvenir spots on the trip, and it was apparently the only picture of us together.

I could post a ton of pics from that trip.  Digital photography was still relatively new and I loved being able to document everything!  It was like a dream to be there in warm weather in December (it was basically perfect until our departure day, which had a tornado watch!) and explore together, all with the knowledge that the next time we went back we'd hopefully be parents.  There was so much to see and do, and I look back on that trip fondly, especially since everything changed six months later!

The history of our last trip is well-documented in this blog, probably back around November 2012 when it got postponed, and then again leading up to the actual trip itself in August and September 2013.  It was supposed to be a group trip, first with Craig's whole family and then with just his parents, but emergency surgeries changed things both times and in the end there was some relief going alone because Jacob's behavior was so challenging at the time.  I think his grandparents might have been a bit offended at his perceived lack of gratitude.  It was a very hard trip and while I guess "hard in the most magical place on earth" was better than "normal hard", it holds a lot of mixed emotions from me.  I take it as a good sign that we came out of it with lots of fun memories despite the challenging stuff, and it gives me hope for this upcoming trip that even if some of our issues follow us there, we'll still make some life-long positive memories as a family.

One of our first memories from that trip was our welcoming committee--a giant frog on our patio chair!

Jacob has always been obsessed with sports and I didn't realize until I read my blog back that he started a basketball obsession shortly before that trip after seeing Space Jam.  It took a break for a few years before coming back strong in 2019, but it was enough back then that I was excited to find him basketball sneakers on Walmart clearance right before we left (as seen in this photo) and he spent most days begging to go play basketball at the resort's court.  We have been saying we should try to recreate this photo when we go--he'll be as tall as Craig now and have no trouble hitting the net!

And speaking of little, look at Carter!  Gosh, he was adorable.  He was at such a great stage when we went--super smiley, very laid back--although we were dealing with him projectile vomiting after trying rice cereal in the prior couple weeks.  We took a break from food for the trip and tried to figure things out back at home later.  He may have had a rice intolerance but we're still not entirely sure.  That, along with Jacob's probable Celiac diagnosis that we received on the first full day of our trip, as well as the behavior problems we were already managing, made this trip a short oasis in the middle of a very difficult period.  Like I said, it was far from perfect, but even just a few good memories were more than we probably would have had at home.

When we were at Hollywood Studios on our first day, we met a bunch of characters...and I was able to be reunited with Minnie almost 26 years after we first "met"!

For some reason Jacob had a random crush on Cinderella at the time (ironically the complete opposite of his tastes in girls now--haha), and while we never met the real one, we did find this one at Downtown Disney (now Disney Springs) and he eagerly posed for a photo!

I couldn't resist this photo op with Carter!  Maybe this trip they'll actually fit him!

The pool at our hotel was pretty cool as it had a sandcastle waterslide.  Every morning the kids would battle the (life)guards and "conquer" them to open the slide for the day.  Jacob got in on it one day and loved his bandana and balloon sword.  

This was our only family photo from our last trip, or really even the only picture with both kids together...and of course I'm making a face because I was trying to talk the cast member through using my camera.  It's for that reason I keep thinking we should bite the bullet and get the absurdly expensive Memory Maker package, but I know I could also find moms taking pictures of their family and offer to trade taking each others' family photos, and that is much cheaper.  Will the kids be willing to pose or wait?  I have no idea.  

This was one of the better pictures I got at Animal Kingdom - check out that tongue!

I think this one should be recreated when we're there this time!

This was one of my favorite photos from our last trip, and it was also the last one I took!  We'd had a bit of a rough day at EPCOT.  It rained a lot.  We had to poncho up (stroller included) and dash across the park to find any place we still needed to visit that was indoors.  It was pretty miserable.  We had already done part of EPCOT earlier in the trip but we definitely didn't do most of it justice because of the rain.  There were a bunch of rides that we missed out on entirely.  The rain had stopped by this point but I'm guessing I felt a bit defeated that we didn't make the most of our day and sad that the trip was over...and yet maybe a tiny bit relieved as well.  But what a lovely way to leave.

The good news from this trip is that I was finally able to ride Space Mountain, Expedition Everest, and the Rock 'n' Roller Coaster that I had to skip previously.  And I got to relive the joy of my first coaster ever in Big Thunder Mountain.  This time I get to share that joy with my coaster buddy and hopefully add a few more to the list.  But knowing we missed a bunch last time makes me nervous for this time.  I know Genie+ should help, and if I give myself permission to buy Lightning Lane passes, it will help even more, but I am going into this trip with a brain full of what ifs.  What if our flights get screwed up?  What if something happens with our luggage?  What if the weather stinks?  What if we tire out too soon, and what if I turn into a raging you-know-what trying to keep everyone moving because we paid too much money to crap out halfway through a park?  What if transportation is as bad as people have been reporting, or we get stuck trying to find good gluten-free food?  What if the motion sickness patches don't work and someone doesn't want to ride all day and wastes the whole experience?  After two major problems during last year's vacation, it doesn't seem out of the realm of possibility that something might go wrong this time, and the stakes are even higher.  I keep hoping the excitement and adrenaline will get us through, but I also know my family.  We're not exactly resilient.  I will basically push myself to illness to make the most of an experience, but Craig is definitely not like that and the kids generally aren't either.  But we're not going through all this trouble to miss everything because we're tired or hot.  I mean, it might be the case where Carter and I push through with rides and let the big boys go back to the resort for a bit, but I hope not because I want to make family memories.  I should lower my expectations--and I'm trying--but it's hard with a trip of this magnitude.  If these pictures are any indication, these memories stick with you and I want them to be good ones--for all of us.