A Little Retail Therapy

What do you do with a teenage girl who is so bored she may die (or so she claims)?

Go to the Mall.

We don't have a Mall in our town, so we drove an hour south to the closest city. My good friend Jody joined us and we three girls indulged our cravings for shiny new things, especially Queen Teen. She had a gift card to Justice where she picked out a new dress. We also hit the Disney store where we reminisced about our trip while checking out the toys. Even Jody got into the spirit when she almost bought an Ariel tub toy (It was so cool! Her mermaid tail fluttered so she could swim).

I told Queen Teen she could buy a new toy and I expected her to grab some kind of Cinderella thing, but she surprised me when she chose a Tinker Bell stuffy. It appears that Cinderella may have slipped from the favorite position. Since we saw the Tinker Bell movie this weekend, Queen Teen has been enamored with Tinker Bell and all her friends. The stuffies were two-for-one, so she chose a Cinderella doll to go with Tinker Bell. But she kept Tinker Bell in her lap as we rolled around in her wheel chair and Cinderella got stuffed into the shopping bag. Poor Cinderella.

We left the mall and walked up a tree shaded street lined with shops and cafes. The weather was gorgeous; a good 20 degrees cooler than our home. After exploring, we sat in the lovely sunshine near a fountain in the town square where Queen Teen ate her snack and Jody and I drank lattes. Queen Teen rolled herself around the little park, enjoying some freedom, happy to be able to go outside without being seared by 105 degree heat.

Back at home, the retail therapy buzz lasted for a whole day. She was cheerful and happily played with her new dolls. But by the second day, the blues slowly crept back in. Too bad the mall cure is so short lived.

President's Day Week and Rain Are a Bad Combination

For some odd, unknown reason, schools in our district close for a week to celebrate President's Day. George Washington and Abraham Lincoln get the entire week rather than a Monday. They are very important people in America's history, but do we really need a week off from school to think about them?

Queen Teen's district feels that we do, so she and I got to spend an entire week together stuck at home fending off boredom. To make it more fun, it rained almost the entire time.

Queen Teen hates the rain. She is a sun worshiper. You can see her entire body glow on sunny days as she soaks up every ray of blue sky. She smiles and laughs, is attentive and even seems to hear better. On cloudy, rainy days, she is withdrawn and sullen. The longer it rains, the more miserable she becomes. I am the exact opposite: I LOVE the rain. When it hasn't rained in several weeks I start to get itchy, feeling as thirsty as the gold tinged hills of California. When the sun is out I hide under a wide brimmed hat and long sleeves, avoiding as much contact with those sunbeams as possible.

I should live in Ireland.

So, there we were, Queen Teen scowling at the rain with nothing to do, and me scowling at her scowling at the rain, longing to go for a walk in it. On Saturday, the first day of vacation, we had Dennis to distract us. By Sunday afternoon, Queen Teen was miserable, lying on her bedroom floor, sighing dramatically and proclaiming, "There's nothing to do." Sunday turned into an even rainier Monday, and she glared at me like I was a terrible mother because I couldn't make it stop raining. Gee, sorry kid. I appreciate your faith in me, but even a Super Mom can't control the weather. No matter what I found for us to do, from coloring to playing with her Groovy Girls to watching Sponge Bob, she remained morose.

On Tuesday, we were saved by the arrival of the greatest child-care worker in the world, A! I got to run away to school (they didn't give me the week off!) and Queen Teen got to whine at someone new. Actually the distraction of a new person broke the boredom and on Wednesday when A returned everything improved because the rain finally stopped and Queen Teen got to go for a walk in the sun. A bleak sun, but sunshine non-the-less. When I returned from school that afternoon my daughter was smiling and seemed glad to see me.

We had one more day to get through, Thursday, which thankfully remained dry, although not so sunny. I spent most of the day pushing Queen Teen in her chair walking around town, just happy to be out of the house with a happy girl. We ate the cookies we bought at the bakery in the town square and talked about clouds and the other people in the park, wondering where they worked and what their names were.

Friday I drove her to visit her dad for the weekend, and when I drove home, all alone in my car with bad 80's music blaring on the radio, I felt my shoulders relax for the first time all week. Why do I get so worked up when Queen Teen is unhappy? I simply can't stand it when she's sad. Every alarm in my head goes off like air-raid warnings. "Mayday. Mayday. Queen Teen is bored! Emergency! Prepare Plan A for depression aversion. Repeat, Prepare Plan A for depression aversion!"

Depression is the real enemy, not boredom. Boredom is only the precursor to depression, so if I can head off boredom the moment it starts, we can avoid the depression that causes Queen Teen to cry and lash out angrily, hitting people and throwing toys. She gets frustrated that she can't do what she wants because of her hand tremors, like color inside the lines or play with her doll house without knocking something over. All of her friends from elementary school have moved on, leaving her behind as they chase boys and talk on cell phones. Queen Teen understands profoundly how different she is from everyone else, including the other children with disabilities. She doesn't fit in with the blind kids because she's also deaf, but doesn't fit in with the deaf kids because she's also blind. She is very, very alone, and when she doesn't have the distraction of school or walks or sunny days, that feeling is so overwhelming she lashes out at everyone around her.

That's why I frantically try to keep her busy, while at the same time trying to work and keep up with my homework from graduate school. It is exhausting keeping up this constant song and dance for my daughter's entertainment, but the depression is far worse.

I had Saturday all to myself to do nothing but rest and play on the Internet. I managed to get a little work done, but mostly I wasted a lot of time, doing unproductive things like wandering around MySpace. My hubby and I saw Slum dog Millionaire and The Pink Panther 2 (I'll see anything with Steve Martin). We had a romantic dinner and drank too much wine and got to reconnect as people, not only as parents.

By Sunday, the rain had returned and I drove to Santa Rosa to meet Queen Teen and her dad. When I found them in the restaurant, she was crying. Her dad didn't know what to do. I picked up a napkin, wiped her tears, fixed her hair, sat beside her and held her hand. The tears slowly vanished and she agreed to eat her lunch. Her dad looked at me perplexed.

"What was that about?" he asked.

I shrugged. "Who knows. She's thirteen."

Queen Teen finished her lunch and grinned at me.

Summertime is Not for Wimps

Ah yes... it's that wonderful time of year again. Summer. When all the little children are home with their parents spending quality time with each other while trying not to drive one another crazy. Or maybe the children ARE trying to drive their parents nuts? I know mine is. Being 13, bored, and stuck in the house because you can't stand the heat means you feel entitled to WHINE non-stop all day long. "I'm bored." "There's nothing to do." "I don't like that movie!" "I don't know what to do." "I hate that game!" On and on it goes while I try hard to focus on the positive (we're spending more time together. That must be good, right?) and think of new, creative tasks to keep her busy.

To be fair, this summer has been especially difficult. Not as bad as last year when she had surgery, but definitely hard.

First, her step-dad had bariatric surgery and is now home recovering. Things are going well and he's getting stronger by the minute, but it meant he and I were away for several days while she stayed home with her grandparents. She was happy to see her grandparents, who she adores, but not so happy with both parents disappearing to San Francisco for four days. Then, when we got home, her dad went to bed and I rushed around trying to get everything set up for him. Queen Teen and I took a long walk to our local cafe the following day, which helped. However, I've been so busy taking care of Rick she's had to play by herself a lot. She tries, but when you're 13 and don't know if you still like your doll house or not, playing by yourself becomes a challenge.

At the same time, I've been taking care of the family dog who was attacked at the kennel by another dog. One of those weird, completely unprovoked accidents. Our dog, Bourre, was seriously injured and had to be rushed to the vet for surgery on both front legs and paws. She then spent four days recovering there. I brought Bourre home on tuesday and happily she's doing great. What a relief. Queen Teen was very worried about both the dog and her dad. She kept a thoughtful distance from both, waiting to see if they were alright. Now that Rick can get up and is moving around more, she smiles and hugs him and they joke and tease each other in the morning again. As for Bourre, Queen Teen talks to her with a gentle voice and tries very hard not to bump the dog with her walker.

Then yesterday Queen Teen had dental surgery. Finally! She broke her front tooth back in February and it took this long to get into the surgeon. Plus, her adult teeth were coming in around her baby teeth rather than pushing the baby teeth out, so seven baby teeth had to be pulled. The dental surgery center is in Windsor and is FANTASTIC. These people are truly dedicated to helping children and providing dental care, despite Medi-Cal cuts and other insurance problems. If I ever win the lottery, I'm writing them a big, fat check.

The surgery went well and she recovered quickly, but woke up this morning with a bad cold. Sigh. Luckily she isn't in pain, so today she's lounging in bed watching movies while blowing her nose every ten minutes.

Two-and-a-half more weeks of summer, and then she and I start school on the same day; she Jr. High and me San Francisco State Graduate School. Anyone have any good ideas to keep a teen-ager busy?