Life has been carrying on here unremarkable except for illness. Poor Amanda got sick and then Alex got sick and then I got sick and then Amanda again, and so on…. We kept trading it back and forth for a while, and just when I thought it was all over - Alex got sick again!
On other news, I was finally diagnosed as hypothyroid and have started medication for it. Hopefully it will kick in soon and give me more energy - I desperately need more energy!
But onto today’s topic. It is all the small things of adopting an older child that have me freaked out today. Alex and I were working on the research paper for his science fair project yesterday (Ok - he was dictating and I was typing) and he noticed that I changed a font size. He asked what I was doing and when I showed him, that was the end of work, he then spent the next hour playing around with different fonts and sizes of letters. While it was a great lesson in word processing, we really needed to get the paper done. But even more than the paper was the volume of things I realized that Alex didn't know. He had never worked with word processing before. These are things that G4 and Amanda have just assimilated as they have grown up with computers, whereas Alex hasn’t. He is not particularly tech savvy, even with things like cell phones. He used to text a little in Ukraine, but only when he had money to put on the phone. Here, where it is unlimited, he gets flustered when too many texts come in.
Also, email has been an issue. He had never sent an email before we started to work on the since fair project. That was another whole lesson on email etiquette. Don’t get me wrong, I am so happy that he is learning these life skills, but I am freaked out by teaching those and then by the way, there also have to other things taught like spelling, math, etc.
I never realized how much my bio kids already knew about the world before Alex came into our lives. When G4 got his driver’s license, we didn’t eve talk to him about roadside assistance (he had been in the car with me enough to know how to call them and how to react) or where the registration was kept, etc. He was just off and driving.
But with Alex, once he got his driver’s license, it was several more days of instruction as I showed where the important documents were, how to call for assistance, where the light was for oil changes etc. I felt bad for him because he just wanted to get in the car and drive but we had to hold him back a little until all this information could be conveyed.
In the end the whole driving thing has worked out. Alex has had his license for a while now (about 1 month) and has been such a help to me. He has been able to take over driving Amanda many days to Tae Kwon Do, and he drives himself to his karate and drum lessons. It has been wonderful for me to have a little more time to myself! He has been so responsible. Every time he drives himself somewhere, he calls me when he arrives. I never asked him to, but he wants to connect and show me how good he is being.
In fact, he was just saying that he felt so grown up the other day and responsible. He said he never thought he would ever feel this way! We have pretty much given him the minivan to drive - with over 110,000 miles on it - we figured it couldn't go to bad if he crunches it - it isn't worth too much anymore. He was so funny though, he had to get in it and clear out all my stuff and move things around to suit his taste.
Anyway, back to my freaking out about all the little things like email, font size, etc. It seems insurmountable to be teaching all of that new on top of everything else. And he wants to go to college? How am I going to get all this in his brain in the next 2-3 years? Or even 4 if I cut myself some slack? Daddy John would accuse me of trying to boil the ocean right now instead of just 1 cup at a time, but it is hard not to freak out. I wish I had a time out button to stop time and allow me some extra time. So any thoughts or advice on this subject would be greatly appreciated.
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