Noah was retiring so he could forcibly take work away from me. That was well on its way to happening. Our kids are incredibly high needs. They need a lot of mental stimulation and a fair bit of physical support. I appreciate that my kids don’t have any shame for having a lot of needs. They don’t feel bad about themselves because they need support. We get on with it. They’ve not had to deal with being in an environment where they didn’t understand the rules and had to figure it out on their own. I feel mixed about this on a lot of levels. The older kids have done fine when they are tested out in the world. I feel both like maybe I have overly coddled my kids and like I don’t coddle them nearly as much as other people seem to coddle their children. Recently my parenting has been described as both entirely based on nurturing and draconian and Victorian. Where is the truth?

My therapist has applauded the weird grounding my daughter has gone through. I communicate with her about why I need it. She still has joy and support and physical activity and love but my central nervous system requires a break from being activated. I need to not suddenly find new messes/things to correct. I don’t need it forever. I need it to last a few days consecutively because I am deeply overwhelmed and on the verge of over reacting in ways I would not be proud of. I arranged respite care for a couple of nights this month. A good friend will come over and stay with the kids while I have 24 hours off. I need it really badly. It’s hard being on duty 24/7. It’s hard being patient all the time. It’s hard feeling like I have to provide anticipatory service for their needs all the time. The first one was last Saturday night and I’m feeling much better.

Also, the grounding is over. A three day grounding lasted 31 days because she kept sneaking out to do stuff she wasn’t supposed to. It was a learning experience all around. The big kids reflected on what they learned from their own epic grounding experiences. All three of them come out of these groundings saying that the biggest thing they have learned all the way down to their bones is that mom doesn’t bluff. If you push me hard enough to make a dire threat I then have to follow through. You and I will both suffer. I don’t care. I will be consistent with what I say. This is why I’m never allowed to use violent ranting language. It’s a bluff. There’s no bluffing in this house.

I appreciated the big kids talking to Shortie about how she has now seen for herself that when you break a rule you need to be very certain that it is worth the consequences you will receive. In many parts of life it is worthwhile. There are times when breaking the rules is worth the cost and you need to go into the act knowing that you will suffer for doing it. The ability to spread food through every box of toys in the library is not a good example of that. You don’t get to eat the fun food. It goes in the rubbish. Then you get grounded and lose good things. When you fuck around while you are grounded you find out that it can always get worse and it does.

By the end of a grounding my children are all super emphatic about the fact that most of the time their life has layers of awesome built into every day. I think about their preferences and I do things to benefit them all day long. I literally build my life around making sure they get as much happiness as possible. I think a deprivation vacation is good for the soul.

As I’m reading this book from my mother in law I feel ever more affirmed in my beliefs. It literally is harder for my children compared to most people like it was harder for me. There are genetic legacies here that mean we are playing a slightly different game than other humans. Our impulses are bigger. Our compulsions are terrible and driving. Our self control is barely there and requires a lot of outside support while we develop if we aren’t to fall into life harming habits. I knew I would have children who would need more support.

Here they are. The living embodiment of my planned science experiment. Can people like me grow up to be happy and functional human beings? Are we doomed to lives of intense misery and suffering before we die young? Everyone in my house has rough days and rough phases but we work through them. When someone is blindingly furious we give them space and we don’t allow ruptures to happen. You are entitled to your feelings. You are not entitled to be allowed to hurt us. Have the feeling. Work it out of your body. Then when you can be calm, come negotiate for how something needs to change. We are infinitely malleable in this house.

I love that my 8 year old can say, “I’m going to work hard not to get grounded again. Food stays in the kitchen. If I am grounded for another reason I am going to stay in my room for the first three days because I can’t take another long grounding. I don’t have the self control yet to wander around the house while I have limitations. I will wait it out in my room. That’s the way I can make myself follow the rules.”

Frankly, I’ve come to the same conclusion in my own life. When I have urges that are very dangerous or inappropriate I hide alone until they pass. It’s how I stay out of a lot of trouble.

I feel comfortable and safe in my family. I feel grateful that I am helping my children learn in their bones that suffering for a set time period is possible if you put your head down and breathe through it. (They are suffering through boredom and I choose to believe that they will be able to generalise that to other things later. It works for the big kids.)

They have learned how to not be a zoo animal like me. They are more domesticated. They do not instantly start hurting themselves when they get bored. They know how to channel frustrated energy in more healthy ways. I watch them and marvel and desperately wish I was as good as them. They are the ideal models for me to live with.

It’s a funny thing, teaching. I can teach all kinds of things. I taught a boy trigonometry. Do you know what class I have never taken? Trigonometry. Using the book and the knowledge the boy had from all his previous maths classes I talked him through teaching himself trig. He got an A on the final. He said I was the best teacher for maths he ever had. I thought that was hilarious. I was literally incapable of doing what he was doing. I would fail that test. I can’t do trig. I don’t understand it. Not even the basic bits.

My children understand things emotionally that I don’t. They have access to deep wells of understanding and knowledge that is outside my ken. They say they learned it all from me. I say I am a conduit and conduits don’t hold on to the thing they disperse.

Sometimes I feel as if I spend most of my life as a vessel where I am not. I can help people go through the journey they need to experience. I leave almost all of me out. I don’t say all of what I’m thinking. I don’t reveal the layers I am experiencing simultaneously. This is hard. I used to share them with Noah. There will never again be a person who knows so much about me. Now there is no point in talking about most of what is going on with me. No one has enough context for it to be useful.

My children now see the most of me and they still only see a comically small part of me, let me tell you. I ache with the lack of feeling witnessed. Honestly that drove Noah’s insistence on us spending so many hours together. He was trying to fill his own staggering insecurity and my deep wounding over not feeling seen.

Moving over 60 times in my first 25 years of life left a harsh mark on me. I feel like a fractional human in every circumstance. My children will be the longest relationships of my life in terms of time spent together. Now that Noah is dead I’m pretty sure no one else will even vaguely come close. I didn’t live with anyone in my family of origin much. I spent almost 10 years living with my mom spread out in chunks–never longer than 3 years at once. She only managed 2 jumps of living with me for 3 years. The first 3 of my life and from 15-18. I spent a similar overall, sometimes overlapping, amount of time with Auntie and Uncle. My mom could best handle living with me when her big sister was there to do all the work for taking care of me.

I’m very scared of coming to need someone and having them run out of give for me. I don’t feel entitled to anything from anyone. I don’t feel deserving of much. I’m achingly aware of how unfair it is to befriend/date a breeder. We are selfish. We put our energy into our children instead of into reciprocal relationships with adults. We have the need to take more than we give when it comes to adults because we are being drained so constantly in our homes. I don’t feel like I have paid enough into any local relationships to deserve that.

Whether or not I can pay it back now or not I have to be selfish right now. I am asking friends for help. I am trying to make my job easier. The transition into trying to carry my load as a single parent is achingly complex and there are layers that are going to take many years to sort out. I am really grateful one of my Kids is coming over and helping the house feel more maintainable a few days a week. I’m so grateful he has the time available and the willingness to spend his time this way. It is such a gift.

I ask for a lot from Gentleman. I am crossing my fingers he doesn’t think I’m going too far. I’m scared. I’m scared to get to the point of feeling like I need him a lot more than I do now. I already feel like my life would be tremendously harder without him. He makes me happy. I really need to feel happy. It’s hard to feel happy in the 24/7 demand cycle of my life. I have moments of happiness in my life but mostly I dwell in patience and suppression. Most of me is not allowed.

It would be really easy, right now, for me to fall into “mother” being the only identity I get to have. That will crush me like a bug. I can’t. I can’t subsume my whole self that way. I will explode. I will break and I will act out in problematic ways. I can’t feel too trapped. This is what Noah and I were working on at the end. His death flattened me almost as hard as having a baby does. Only I need sex.

I need a lot of things. Most of them I don’t get. I work as hard as I can to share as much as I can but it’s not enough. I am not enough. I am reminded this morning that what I have to give is not enough. I was silly to think that putting up with me is worthwhile. I am too hard.

I should have kept my head down and my mouth shut. Then I wouldn’t have hurt someone I never wanted to hurt. My inadequacy causes pain. I have to live with knowing I do that. It’s going to be a hard, slow day. I feel so sad.

It doesn’t matter how I feel. It matters what I do. I have to get up and serve. It is all I have.