:grouphug: :grouphug: :grouphug: it sounds like a normal and rational reaction to a life that is full of stress (and not so full of sleep, or time alone). its good to eliminate medical causes, and i'm hoping your doctor ran blood tests for anemia, thyroid, vitamin deficiencies, etc. . for me, low potassium, magnesium and vitamin D were part of the puzzle. this summer, maybe you could find a "mother's helper" to come in for one morning a week? When I did this, I stayed home for the first month, but in our bedroom, reading, showering, tidying, having a long bath, etc, etc. it was a neighborhood tween who was gearing up for babysitting the following year. it gave her practice in a safe environment, and it gave me a break. it turned out it took me more than the summer to bounce back, so we hired a retired mom to come in one morning a week. i stayed home the first few mornings to make sure it was okay, but after that I went out and did things.... got my hair done, shopped, met a friend for coffee, etc, etc. ie. I gradually returned to the land of the living. by Christmas, I was more myself. it was about $120- a month, but much, much cheaper than if I had continued down the rabbit hole. fwiw, ann

someone asked what didn't work for the kids when the dance studio here collapsed. it was all in the frame the parents chose to put around the picture, which changed what parts of the picture the kids focused on. same picture, different frames, different results. the kids who struggled (and some who still do) were the ones who had been around adults focused on retribution. some parents were just so angry (justifiably, mind you) that they focused on the owner rather than on the kids and the dance. they spent a lot to time and money on lawyers, private detectives, etc, etc. , and a lot of time vilifying the owner. if the legal options had happened quietly in the background, it would have been better for everyone. the kids who did best were those whose parents were more aware of how deep the relationship was between students and owner. it often is more like a family than a business. the kids who managed best were offered some variation of: "we don't know why. we think it may have something to do with addiction/alcoholism/bad drugs/bad choices. teachers x, y and z are trying to find out what they can do to help. its very sad when a person we care about loses their way. there are great organizations out there who can help, but the person needs to want to be helped. and sometimes it gets pretty horrible before a person gets to that point. even worse than this, and this feels pretty bad, doesn't it?" (for me, i turned it into a lesson on how taking "bad drugs"... the girls were little....we talked about how it didn't just damage the person themselves but everyone around them, and how they must never, ever do that. one unexpected consequence of what happened is that i don't know one of those kids from that studio who became an addict.... at least, not yet, and they now range in age from 15-28.) and then we talked about how of course we would do whatever we could once we knew what would help, but until then we would focus on the things we could do, and that was making sure that the "show went on". fwiw, ann

:grouphug: :grouphug: we had a studio owner in our town who behaved almost precisely like this. in the end, it did turn out that it was simply that she took the money and left. its been about ten years now, and some of the kids still show lasting impact in areas of trust. some of that came from how their parents handled it on top of the situation itself. the kids who did best were the children of parents who said some variation of "we don't know what's going on. teachers x and y are looking into how the owner is doing. teachers a and be are looking for a recital site. teachers d and e are working on the program and teachers f and g are working on costumes. the job of the kids was to dance their best, and the job of the parents was to help the teachers to arrange a site, costumes, etc. and then to involve the older dancers in helping with costuming. what i would do if it happened now would be to encourage one of the teachers to step into a lead role, and the others to gather round and help out. and to have a parents group to work with the teachers, to gather support and help, etc, etc.... and then, if you need it, a group to deal with the legal aspects of it all. many, many hugs. ann

(((hugs))) could you call the new doctor you saw and check to see what he thinks about what you are hearing from your dd? or its possible that your health care provider has a nurse practitioner whose job it is to listen to clients and help them sort out what is happening, and to change it if that is possible. fwiw, ann

i think its 028. eta: just found the email. that's it! :)

one of our dds took AP Chem this morning, having done Chemistry thru AP Pennsylvania homeschoolers (and chem advantage :). one down, one to go (AP ENG. Lang). next year will be AP Calc and AP US history (and maybe AP music theory... time will tell ;) there is a high school about 30 minutes away that offers almost all the AP exams, and their staff have been incredibly helpful. so glad to just have one testing site! will feel better once its all done! ann

we have two still at home, just finishing 9th and 11th grades. for the rising senior, her days look like: up at 7am. makes breakfast, goes for short walk. 8am one hour violin practice 9-12 school work 12-1 lunch + short walk 1pm one hour violin practice 2-5 academics 5-6 one hour violin practice 6pm dinner up until christmas, the last violin practice was earlier, and she left ~5pm to do 3 hours dance four days a week, and at 3:30 on wednesdays to 5.5hours of orchestra rehearsals. in Feb, she dropped dance to leave another 3 hour academics block in the evenings. she is doing three online classes, so there was also 3 hours of online spanish class, and one hour a week of study group for AP chem. weekend days look pretty much like week days. for the rising sophomore, she is up by 8am, breakfast, chores, then 9am one hour of violin 10-noon academics lunch 1-4 academics 4-5 one hour piano and then evenings the same as her sister. however, she puts in 8+ hours of academics each weekend day. she had three online classes, also, so 3 hours of spanish online, 1 hr physics, 1 hr english online. hth, ann

I used to live just north of Freiburg. Its such a beautiful area. Have you been to Nancy? I loved it there. It might be interesting to share some of your favorite places with your kids.... Its too far south i think, but i've always wanted to take a sail thru the Canal du Midi. On the German side, there is a lot, too. have fun! ann

i am with catwoman. see a different doctor ASAP. meanwhile, maybe you could have this doctor write a prescription for a wheel chair and see if not putting weight on them does make a difference. some pain just hangs around regardless. it would help you know. And if that works, you can just use the chair without the amputations, in case some new procedure comes along in a year or two that would work. And it may be that 1 month/2 months/6 months off your knees would be all they needed to heal. Ask about physiotherapy, too. Sometimes, strenghtening specific muscles can help hold the knee cap in a way that it won't hurt as much. fwiw, ann

Do you think its because the songs are special to you that you want to keep them to yourself or Do you think its because you will feel "judged" by your dh for your choices? dh and I share music, but we don't share TV shows. i actually really enjoy some shows he considers trite.... so its just easier to watch them when he's not around. i enjoy them more, and he isn't annoyed by them. (classical art is like that, too. i love it, he doesn't, we go to galleries occasionally together, but if i want to truly appreciate the art, I go on my own.) fwiw, ann

What a beautiful thing for you to share. Grace and Light to you. hugs, ann

:grouphug: :grouphug: :grouphug: prednisone is both evil and wonderful. i had to take it for 7 months with each pregnancy, plus many other times...... it is not something anyone does if "just juicing" will fix it! sigh..... in the misery loves company department, it was a GI Doctor whose comment reduced me to tears during pregnancy #3. something about how selfish i was and how i had to choose between myself and my baby. he doesn't work for Kaiser anymore...... and my kids have a mom, and are healthy to boot. sheesh, some people...... but at the time, I was almost hysterical. In the end, I came down on the side of making sure it didn't happen to someone else. its been such a long haul for you this time. i hope the newest antibiotic proves to be the one that works! hang in there, ann

in our house, dc often complain/argue when they think i might cave. fwiw, that means that i am both the problem and the solution. when i finally said "you will play the violin each day until you are 18. you may get good at it, or you can stay in book 2 forever. your call," that is when the complaining (mostly) stopped. occasionally, i need to add extra incentive. no chores for practice done before noon, or no activities if practice isn't done by dinner. however, now, with just two of them left at home, i have five hours of practice going on daily..... so after 7 years, its no longer a problem. i remember even for me, who loves music, the first five years of piano were horrible for my mum. but we are both glad she made me stick to it. i wish i had figured that out when the older girls were littles. so do they. fwiw, ann

Many children's hospitals have teachers who teach kids who are hospitalized long term. It may be worth a call to area hospitals to find that person, and then see if they can help. fwiw, ann

If you aren't finding other options, and this one covers many of the things you want, i would go for it. Your ds will only be in college for another few years, and then he will be in his own place with his own job. so while him not being mobile seems huge now, it really is a time-limited problem, and he can always get his license if he discovers he needs it. re walking the dog. if the pets weren't a concern, i'd say "wait", but it sounds as if it will be difficult to find what you want with a landlord willing to take the pets. hth, ann

:grouphug: :grouphug: lots of good options suggested. fwiw, here's how i would approach it. (not necessarily the Right Way, or even a Good Way, but at least its an idea ;) 1. prioritize. for me that is always roof over my head, job to pay for roof over my head, car to get me to job to pay for roof over my head, and then, Dog : ). 2. i research. from years of doing this, we have a short list for used cars which starts with toyota (corolla, and if a really cheap camry comes along). this is because they are low maintenance, last a REally long time, and get great gas mileage, so its cheaper to own. so I would start with that research, because i've done it before, and its relatively simple for me. 3. i research dogs. (because I like them). i look pretty much every day. i don't get one until we are ready, but i have fun looking, and that decision gets easier as i go along. 4. i research houses. (because I like them, too). i look pretty much every week, but when we are in the market, i look every day. sometimes twice ;). i visit some, because while i have a list of things i want, it sometimes doesn't actually reflect what i need, and i figure that out by standing in houses that are for sale. it took me weeks of looking the first time before i realized that the first words out of my mouth to a real estate agent had to be "there need to be no interior walls, or practically none, on the main floor." 5. jobs. well, jobs are scary for me, but i simply start looking. i like to live near where i work, so sometimes i try to do those two things together (jobs and houses). moving near to your dh's job might mean you don't need another car. (if he can walk or bike to work). but then at the end of the day, i do a visualization where i have many shoe boxes on a book shelf. i take down the one labelled "dogs" and put any dogs i looked at that i really liked in the shoe box. then, i put the lid on and put it carefully back on the shelf. then, i take down the "cars" box, and put what i've discovered in there, and then close the lid and put it back on the shelf. same for "houses" and "jobs". then the next day, when i sit down at the computer to research dogs, i visualize taking the shoe box down, opening it up, looking at what is there, etc, etc. hth, ann

you asked what you weren't thinking of.... for me, i would add pros to current job: being family together. and to babysitting, a con for me would be not being family together. you would be family +2. it alters dynamic hugely. your kids get less of your attention, and someone else's kids get more. a 1 year old isn't just one more kid, its one more kid with needs who is competition with your own 1 year old. i have taken care of other people's kids with my own. i am good at it. their kids benefit. mine don't. fwiw, ann

hugs to you. maybe if he finds a different outlet? its a bit like reformed smokers; they have a real need to share their new insights. here's one: http://www.pandasthumb.org/ they have forums, and lots of discussion. some of it is around new atheists. he may also want to read the research that shows if you confront people about their beliefs, they become more entrenched, not more enlightened. http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2011/03/denial-science-chris-mooney another avenue to explore is where morality comes from, and how he will now root his. many atheists are deeply moral people. it may help him to explore some of their writings. sam harris has some deeply thoughtful writings. but this posting on facebook path is unlikely to end well. fwiw, ann

"I care about who you are, how we relate to one another, and what motivates you. I care about what matters, and I really don't care about the rest." amen, sister, amen!

in australia, the families we camped with were spending a year in camper vans. that made sense to me; a 5th wheel is large enough and hard enough to handle over long distances. ie. i wouldn't want to drive one for 18 months. and gas costs are way less, too. i can't quite imagine crossing Canada in less than two months; we split it and did three weeks east from toronto, and five weeks west from toronto. (and it wasn't nearly enough time). i can imagine that going in one direction only, two months + would work out nicely. last summer we took three weeks on the USA west coast, but we drove thru most of california, as we had spent time there already. will write more later. ann

Its an HP Envy17t touch. :)

dd#4 is studying with Vicki Dincher this year (intro to physics) thru AIM. I am impressed. She is learning a lot, and is inspired to learn a lot. I like the once a week live class, and so does dd. the text book is thorough, and accessible. (a neat trick). and the labs are well designed. Next year, I think dd will do Bio and Physics with her, prepping for APs. hth, ann

for spanish, we really like Sr. Gamache and his funclase (high school level live classes), but he also has a video series the girls did when they were younger. and we continue to be impressed with AIM Academy (debra bell), and with AP pennsylvania homeschoolers for other things. hth, ann

we have just switched from Dell to HP. we have used dell for years, but the last round every single one of them (we have four) was a dud. just simply dreadful. (slow, frozen, oh look, it can't find the wifi, frozen, snail paced.... oh look, the curser isn't working anymore.) i spent hours on the phone with support, dh spent hours on the phone with support..... in the end, we bought one HP, and couldn't believe the difference. youngest dd would be on line when the rest of us couldn't get on, or had been booted off. next dd then got one which is a touch screen. :wub: :wub: we ended up going with the 17 inch, which i really like. hth, ann

"know when to walk away; know when to run" .... run. run now. whether or not he has any sinister intentions or not, there are simple boundaries for keeping everyone safe (including him from false accusations). anyone who works with kids needs to have these in place. so it worries me that he doesn't AND that whoever is overseeing him doesn't, either. does he have a teammate? working in a volunteer capacity it is always better to have an opposite gender teammate for safety and accountability. the texting thing is simply a function of the generations. that said, it is reasonable to ask to be cc'd on them. my kids still do that with emails. (mid-teens) with texting, we have only one phone for the girls and I, so everyone gets to see everyone else's texts. i did youth ministry at the presbytery level for 7 years, with retreats once a month. there are some rules one doesn't even think of bending, and opposite gender interaction without oversight is one of them. When I did one on one councilling with each person attending the retreats, we did it as a "walk and talk", so that there was never any question of inappropriate behavior. i wonder if it might help your dd to approach it as learning the skills she needs to keep herself (and others around her) safe. one of the rules our dds and I have come to over time is that they do not ever get in a car with someone who isn't me or their dad without letting us know first. it was that way when they were littles (thou shalt not get in a car without speaking to me first regardless of whether it is your grandmother or a friend's uncle), and as they approached the teenage years, they saw enough go wrong in the community to realize they still wanted the rule. It gives them a second to think while they call me, and it also gives them the "my mom won't let me" out if they want/need it. good luck! ann