It is my birthday tomorrow. And it is my husband, Mike's birthday too. We were born on the same day, Valentine's Day, in the same year.....4 minutes apart. Someone once told us we were either twins or complete opposites. 21 years later and we are still trying to figure out which!
Anyway, this year I know without even asking, what Mike wants for his birthday. I want the same thing. We want our son back. We want our son with the quirky sense of humour, the one who speaks in silly voices so much that it is contagious, who is not too big to give his mom hugs, who has compassion for those with special needs, and loves to draw. We see him on occasion, but lately he is hidden behind an angry, frustrated kid who is ready to give up on himself. For my birthday I want nothing more than for that kid to take a back seat, and for Jacob to shine again.
Jake is struggling academically, he seems to have gotten himself into a vicious cycle at school. He has days where he is so overwhelmed (either by anxiety caused by workload, inappropriate expectations of him, or bullying issues) that he has a panic attack even before he goes out the door. Or sometimes they even happen in the middle of the night, he will wake up in a confused and scared state during a night terror that stems from anxiety. Other days he is just too tired to be able to get out of bed and function. These are happening less often, due to his physiotherapy, but if he over exerts himself on a weekend or evening he pays the price the next day. Or there are days where he refuses to go to school because he "hates it" and does not see the point of going. When he has these mornings he does tend to miss school. It is not without a fight from us, we do not simply give in and let him stay home all day playing video games. It is quite often a huge battle of wills, thrown out consequences and fear on our part of being "played". (That is another story.) Anyway, after taking a day to regroup, Jake plans to go to school the next day. But then he wakes up and thinks about the work he has missed, how much he has to catch up on, tests he will be missing information on, and the trouble he will get in for missing school in the first place. Unfortunately the school system plays upon this fear, "you should have been at school", "you have a lot of catching up to do".......yes he does, but Jake does not need constant reminders of that after struggling to walk through the front doors. He needs a "hey, good to see you made it", or, "let's figure out how to catch you up".........This is how that vicious cycle I was referring to works.
In a perfect world this cycle would be broken and Jake would buy back into the school system, being set up for success....but even in this perfect world Jake would need to help himself too. Which he does not. So I guess I need to add that to my birthday wish list. I wish Jake would help himself, because you cannot help someone if they are not willing to help themselves. He has given up on himself and does not understand that he is important enough to make the effort, that he is worth it. I want him to see that even with the help of all the counselors, therapists, teachers, psyhiologists, neurologists etc, he still has to do the work himself. I wish that Jake would see that he has huge potential and that he can overcome this.
And with that I blow out my 29 birthday candles and make my 2 wishes. And Mike's wishes too.
Happy Birthday to me and Mike!
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