The-Courier-recoveringnoah

I was digging through the kitchen drawers earlier and came across a stack of photos from when Noah first came home. He was, without a doubt, the cutest little thing I'd ever seen. He had these chubby little cheeks and a smile that could light up a room.

But the thing that struck me the most was looking at pictures of us holding him and how he made the best eye contact.

One of the things that we're doing for Nandi - in an effort to build attachment - is bottle feeding. I hold her in my arms three times a day while giving her a bottle.

She won't even look at me.

I hold Eli in my arms and sing songs to him.

He won't even look at me.

And then I find these photos of Noah - my sweet, little Noah - and he's making the best eye contact. And I can close my eyes and I remember rocking him hour upon hour and feeding him and he would stare into my eyes the entire time.. .with so much love.

And then it was stolen from me. Autism took it away from me.

My only child who truly bonded... the one who should have been at the most risk for not bonding (traumatic birth, lengthy hospital stays, and, in my opinion, subpar care)... he's the one who truly bonded.

And it's gone. And now I have three kids who can't even look at me when I hold them. And my heart is just breaking.

Ya'll, I'm just tired. I am so tired. This is just so much work. I'll think we're making progress and then we slide back even further than before.

I don't mean to be such a downer. I know that I still haven't responded to the comments from my last post. I'm behind on emails. Behind on blogs. I just want to take a really long vacation - by myself - and sleep for a week.

Okay, I'm going to change the subject.

In other news... and completely off-topic in order to not end this blog on such a depressing note, I have signed me and Noah up for a 10k run. Which is quite a shock, as my personal best is the quick sprint I did to grab handfuls of candy when some kid finally knocked down the pinata at a fifth grade birthday party.

Mainly, I'm doing it for a few reasons: partly as a fundraiser for Sarah, partly because I'm just plain nuts, partly because I thought Noah would enjoy the excitement of me pushing him in his stroller during a race, and partly because, for once in my life, I'm hoping that all this exercise will give me that tight ass I've always wanted.

What? You didn't think I'd lost my sense of humor, did you?

I may be tired, exhausted, and depressed.... but I still haven't given up on my goal to look like Jenny McCarthy. ;-)

Oh, and, uh, pardon my French....

I promise my next post won't be as depressing.... I made myself giggle and actually feel a bit better now. Okay, I'm laughing at my own jokes... obviously, I am tired.

Good night, sleep tight, and don't let the RADlings bite.

Oops, I did it again...

Okay, I've gotta stop. I swear I'm sober. Just tired. And will most likely delete this whole thing in the morning because of sheer embarrassment. It's like the ramblings of Sybil...

I'm signing off.