UPs at Night

I'm sitting here in bed trying to decide what I should post about today.

Marc is sleeping peacefully (or at least acting like it) on my right.

To my left, out side my bedroom door, across the hall in Baby's room I can here "kiddie" songs blaring on Baby's iPod.

Maybe it's not blaring... maybe it just seems like it because the entire house is quiet other than the clickity-clack of my computer keys.

She hasn't been able to fall asleep very easily the last few nights.

Really, doesn't seem like a big deal to me because I actually spent the first 7 years of Brother's life, which coincided with the first 4 years of Sister's life, not getting much sleep.

They just didn't seem to need sleep.

They would stay awake all night with hardly a moment of sleep.

I remember many nights of zombily watching Thomas the Train on the coach next to a wide awake and bouncing Brother trying to get some kind of rest while making sure he was safe—not escaping the house, getting into things he shouldn't or trying to wake everyone else in the house.

This was a really frustrating time.

I even remember times where I would be able to keep one child entertained in their room quietly while I dealt with the other one, and then have to make the switch throughout the night.

It was exhausting.

I had learned that this was very typical of kids with Fragile X Syndrome. Something about them not making enough Melatonin in their bodies to induce sleep. I've heard it happens a lot with kids with Autism too.

When Sister was around 3 or 4 we learned about Melatonin and Clonidine.

Those meds saved our lives!

Melatonin helps them fall asleep.

Clonidine is actually a blood pressure medicine, but it helps them stay asleep once they are asleep.

I really don't think that I could have done 15 years on barely a wink.

So, there's part of me as I listen to Baby lay awake in her bed watching "My Little Ponies" that makes me think back to those days, but then the logical part of me remembers the help of meds and that this "not falling asleep" phase must mean that she has grown a lot and needs her Melatonin dose upped a bit.

Oh, thank heavens for medications and herbs that work!

Anyway, that was a long tangent, but, I guess it is really an UP!

Medicine!

Yay!

OK, anyway, my other UP was seeing Brother at his last track meet of his Junior High Career.

He tried his hardest and he was so glad that I was there to cheer him on.

He's on the far right in lane 1

He did pretty well on the shot-put today

I think he even improved in the long jump!

The real UP for me, though, wasn't even the events he participated in but seeing him say "hello" to fellow peers and seeing him, at least twice, calling someone's name to get their attention.

It is so special to see him trying to socialize.

It makes him seem so grown up in my eyes.

Then tonight just before I read him Harry Potter before bed, he asked, "Mom, did you have Child Development in High School?" I told him I couldn't remember and he then said, "There's a permission slip in my backpack," I asked him what the permission slip was for and he got really quiet and a huge smile crawled across his skinny face as he quietly said, "Baby."

I've seen kids carrying around the "real life" baby dolls that teaches them about taking care of an infant and thought it was interesting/funny. I never thought, though, that Brother would want to take care of one.

It's going to be interesting.

On the permission slip is even reminds you that the baby may be up during the night and wake not only the student, but other members of the family.

If he were a typically developing kid I could chuckle and say, "Ha! Payback!"

I think I'll just be happy if it survives for the 2 or 3 days he has it.

Then of course, I got to hang with the Mary Poppins cast tonight! I only have 2 rehearsals this week so being with the cast has been a rare experience, but always and UP.

The mirrors make some of us look a little ... iffy...