7 Quick Takes #26

Back again for 7 Quick Takes with Jen & Co. Last week was tough and painstakingly slow, this week is the opposite. I feel like I just wrote this post yesterday.

–1–

First order of business is the therapy evaluations we completed for Emmett this week. If you’re a first timer here at 4Life4Life, meet Sweet EmmyBee:

Emmett is 2.5 years old and if pressed, has recently referred to me as “Monny” or “Nonny” and is displaying developmental delays in speech and sensory processing. We are just beginning the journey to exploring how best to help Emmett grow and develop to the fullest of his abilities. This is an unexplored path for Craig and I, and for our extended family. Until this week, his previous therapy sessions have left us wanting information and slightly frustrated with the lack thereof.
But Monday my husband came home with Emmett from an Occupational Therapy evaluation with a handy tip!
We have a hard time brushing Emmett’s teeth. He allows us to brush his molars regularly, but when it comes to his incisors, especially his top front teeth, we have to pry his lip from wrapping around them while holding his head firmly enough that he cannot thrash it away from the toothbrush. Usually, the toothbrushing session ends with someone sweaty. This process is every morning and every night. So one would think that Emmett would grow used to the routine, but no.
“Try brushing his teeth with a children’s electronic toothbrush,” was the advice given, suggesting that Emmett’s disdain for tooth brushings is based on a sensory thing.

So as I sat with him, the whirring of the Sonicare touching his front teeth met with EMMETT RELAXING AND ALLOWING IT, I brushed his teeth in amazement.

Breakthrough numba uno!
This is top story news for us at Bumpy Bridge House.

–2–

Thursday morning, a separate, State-run pediatric developmental organization met with me at Bumpy Bridge for an initial parental interview assessment. It was an hour and a half long Q&A about Emmett, our challenges and daily routines, through which all three of my boys played quietly on the floor as we talked at the table. I, however, was rent with anxiety that I’d have to be breastfeeding, cleaning up explosive diarrhea, sopping up spilled milk, and using my most forced-civilized-public-peacemaker voice to break up fights and temper tantrums –all at the same time.
I was so stressed about it, I closed the front door an hour and a half later, exhausted by the sheer pressure of my brain anxiety over what COULD go wrong, instead of being able to relax because while there was, in fact, a poopy diaper and a few Mommy Mandates issued, no one had the imagined diarrhea, and there was no such avalanche of bad things occurring all at once. It went fine.

Except for the part where I got up to wash my hands and throw away a poopy diaper and Lexington pounced on the silent moment to say this tidbit of information:

“Umm, Lady? I have something to tell you. Lahhhst day (“last day”: how he refers to past events, recent or very long ago),
when Dad was sleeping on the couch,
there was a big bug on the ceiling!!!”

He continued on for 3 minutes talking about the size, shape, color, and flight pattern of the bug…

Of all the things our son could have thought to say, Mr. Personality, Mr. Talk-Til-You-Drop, thought of that special little slice. No, forget about Zoo visits and lions and monkeys and giraffes. The bug on the ceiling many, many months ago seemed like the best thing to tell her. Of course, he’d been listening to me tell the lady past events and stories of Emmett’s life and about our family routines, so I’m sure he believed he was adding a very valuable piece of information; and of course, his focus of the story was the bug, and that’s why he remembers the circumstances, but yeah. Dad slept on the couch, Lady. Image of a healthy functioning family there for ya. Whether or not Dad sleeping on the couch was due to back pain, bad gas, or dog-housedom, I left Ms. Lady to the creativity of her own thoughts and sat back down at the table with a smile while my anxiety level jumped about 10 notches north.

Thus we begin that chapter of our life. Kids saying the darndest things. I look forward to it.

[ The next takes are completely unrelated, so, transition! If by some strange randomness, there are male readers here, first of all: Welcome! Secondly, you might want to back out now cause I’m about to do a little menstruation talk. Not too graphic, and I’m not staying on that topic for the rest of the takes, so maybe just skip this next one unless you’re wanting to help out the wifey ]:

–3–

I’m trying the Diva Cup. I’m reserving my final judgements until I’ve worked past the learning curve, but here is why I’m trying it:

• I’ve never liked using tampons. It’s uncomfortable inserting a big ball of cotton which can leave traces of itself and irritate me or infect me.
• I always use tampons with a sense of panic that with every passing minute or hour I don’t get a chance to change it, I’m increasing my probability of getting Toxic Shock Syndrome. Changing too soon, or too often can be irritating to vaginal tissues, so there’s this internal anxiety running with me during period week on top of my PMS symptoms.
• I am completely unwilling to just wear a pad on the lighter days, but using a tampon on the light days feels like I’m ripping out my entire womb.
• Using a Diva Cup is more eco-friendly- less waste.
• Using the Diva Cup will cut out the cost of purchasing tampons every month- not by millions of dollars, I assure you, -and I don’t even buy tampons every month- but If I can buy an extra container of strawberries a month instead of a box of tampons, kudos, yo.

Anyway, just like the learning process that comes with using a tampon, I am learning to use the Diva Cup. But it is not inserted in the same way a tampon is, so it’s kind of like learning a new iOS and kind of like I’m 14 years old again. So far though, we’ve had success: I’m finding it to actually be cleaner and more comfortable. The biggest plus for me is that I only have to empty the cup about 3 times every 24 hours. I’ll perhaps do a more full review later, if anyone voices a wish to know more.

–4–

Jen often writes about her temperament/personality type and asks her readers to share theirs. I’ve been thinking a little more about my own. I’ve always known I’m a little withdrawn but kind of write off my introverted tendencies as laziness and something which can be practiced and worked out of my demeanor by constantly exercising conscious efforts to be more proactive in bettering myself. But over the years, I’m increasingly finding myself completely put-out by various tasks that seem to suck the energy from my whole being. I am an INTJ and according to the great and powerful Wikipedia of the Net, I’m a mastermind, no less (come on, you’d be jumping all over that too).
I mean, hey, I’m a mastermind, Jack.

Honey, I’m sorry the house is a mess and the children are still in their pj’s… I’m just a mastermind. Can’t help it.
I can’t get out of bed in the mornings… my brain is too heavy with labyrinthine thoughts….

Oh the fun I’m going to have with that one. hehehehhh.

The Anchoress tweeted an extremely fascinating HuffPo article about the surprising and varied traits of an introvert, which opened my eyes a little wider. My absolute favorite from this numbered list is this:

“To me, a ringing phone is like having somebody jump out of a closet and go ‘BOO!,'”

I hardly ever answer my phone and I always get flack for it. I am not kidding when I say that phone talking zaps my energy and is often overwhelming to me if I cannot be mentally prepared for it. So when I recieved a text a few weeks ago from an old college girl friend saying, “Hey, Carolyn, it’s been a long time and I’d love to catch up… do you mind if I call in a few weeks?”
The heavens sang. I literally thanked her for her courtesy. This is why I love texting.

Even more interesting is this video linked within the article:

Who actually clicks on the links people insert into their posts? Me. I do.

This video is a woman speaker discussing how, as a culture, our education system seems to center more around an extrovert’s preferred way of learning: overstimulation, group projects, classroom desks clustered in “pods”, grading based on “active participation”, etc. The speaker even discusses exactly what I wrote of myself above: a life-long suppressing of introversion in order to be socially acceptable and in order to make the grade in school. But suppressing this introversion without realizing it! It’s wildly, wildly fascinating to me. The human being, introvert, extrovert and every in-between is such a wonder to me.

–5–

What made me feel completely excellent, though, is the fact that some my fellow INTJ-ers are the following people:

Susan B. Anthony
Jane Austen [YEEESSSSS!]
Emily Bronte
C. S. Lewis [Aslan rocks, Screwtape Letters rocks.]
Thomas Jefferson
and fictional characters:
Mr. Darcy […He is tolerable, I suppose…]
Gandalf the Grey [YOU. SHALL. NOT. PASS!]

Not so exciting, however, are the following fictional INTJ’s:

Hannibal Lecter (Silence of the Lambs) […yummay…]
Professor Moriarty, Sherlock Holmes’ nemesis [ …checkmate, old boy.]

Sooo… That’s fun. Go check out your personality type, and share with me your famous personality type matches! (That test is a free version, and not the official Myers-Briggs test. You have to pay mucho dinero for the real deal.
I enjoy this more for simple self-knowledge. Rather than using it to excuse and encourage laziness or weaker character traits, I can recognize when I’m shutting down, or foresee difficulties in my weekly tasks and prepare myself better. It can also be useful to know the personality type of your spouse for strengthening communication and finding healthy ways to build each other up.

–6–

Verily Magazine. A newly published women’s magazine which, to me is a breath of fresh air in contrast to Cosmopolitan’s obsessive compulsive headlines habitually reading: “1,000,000 MIND-BLOWING SEX MOVES” or “HOW TO GET HIM IN BED”. I don’t typically purchase magazines, but if I had a day at the pool, and no children to hike my anxiety through the ozone layer, and no other books to read, and I’d lost my iPhone, and it was kinda cloudy because the sun puts me to sleep, and if I wasn’t sleeping, I would read this magazine.
Verily’s tagline is this:

“Less of who you should be, more of who you are”

This article from their site was another of my favorites this week: Wasting an Ivy League Degree by Being a Stay At Home Mom. I’m very encouraged by the women who are working to reveal the real life, genuine woman as they are in a society which continually objectifies and pressures them to fit superficial moulds.

–7–

So I’ve been working over the last few months to be better at my graphics and photos included in my posts: making my own watermark, editing the photos so they’re simpler and clean, making it overall pleasant to the eye. To me it’s a difficult trade to learn because I’m a detailed/fine art-oriented gal who normally clutterfies with extra swirlies and organic, viney fonts. Oh, and to add words to a graphic? I never know the most simple, eye-catching words, and I always make it too wordy. For me to post, a finished blog entry, it’s safe to assume that half of the time spent on one post is devoted to editing, re-editing, and making a few choices of different photos to include. I’m getting faster, but it’s more time consuming than I know it should be. Luckily, I’m able to do it all- photo-taking and editing on my iPhone.

True story. A saying my mom, sister and I enjoy. Also: There’s a difference between “bitter” and strong bodied coffee. If you are given bitter espresso, have the barista remake it for you. Black Gold.

I’m still finishing my post about the Mass and why it’s like a Dictionary, but come back Monday for the juicy sirloin. See you all Sunday for Fine Linen & Purple‘s What I Wore Sunday Linkup!