Time to face the change..cha cha changes!

My good friend MadMother has often used the analogy of riding a roller coaster when living with ASD. Every bodies lives have ups and downs but life with an Aspie often mean that one minute you think that you are sitting on the bench seat watching other people on the rides and the next second you are not only racing through the ride but it starts from the free fall position! The extremes and challenges are so much more extreme and challenging than in 'normal' life.

This post however is not about Aspergers, it is about my life and the extreme ups and downs that I have been riding. The highs of thinking that perhaps it would all be ok, the lows of realizing that it won't work out the way I envisioned. Making plans, setting goals and having them break over and over again. Each time I believe that I can't get up anymore I do anyway. I get up and I look at everything again and i try to work it out as best as I can and I hope it turns out....and it doesn't.

Last night I discovered that I would be starting all over again once this house is sold. I dont mean that I am getting a fresh start or am referring to beginning in a new house, I essentially mean that I am starting out ALL OVER AGAIN as though I was fresh out of school going from a part time crappy job while going through Uni to a proper job and having to figure out how to live and stand on my own two feet! Except this time around there is no fiancée and no excess cash in the pay packet. Instead there are three children and nearly enough to get by and just little enough not to that i can use my juggling skills to manage (I am glad I taught myself to juggle two balls in my youth, even if I couldn't master three!)

I had a complete and utter panic attack. A freak out over the magnitude of what this will mean to the kids and my life. Of what this means to our everyday and I can honestly say that there were so many moments when I felt like just giving in to it all. Of giving up. Fighting is hard....giving up is easy. Lying down and saying that you can't do it anymore seems so appealing. No more fighting, no more hard work...just quit. If we will be living in poverty anyway then why should i slave my life away? I'll just join the over stretched public waiting lists for OT and SPEECH and PSYCH for the boys and save my hip pocket. I may as well stop working too right? Put my hand out for benefits and while I'm at it I'll dump that very expensive health cover and rely only on the free public system! Giving up seems very appealing....I am so tired from fighting....

But I am NOT a quitter! I Don't give up! I crumble and don't sleep, I watch bad movies and tune out the world until finally I can get up and start thinking and planning and hoping again. With the help of my good friends I take a step forward and I start to live once more.

Today we had a family through the house that liked it a lot! Maybe this time tomorrow this house will be sold? Maybe it won't too. It is something to hope for but not a contention of joy considering that it may not sell for the desired amount. But it is a step in the right direction.

Tonight, sitting watching ABC3 with my babies and on the net at the same time I started browsing through real estate. My daughter looked over my shoulder and said how a yard was too small or this or that wasn't right in a house. She was critical...she was looking for the match of this house. K sat there too..the smallest houses he found the biggest positives to. For each perceived flaw he was able to explain it away. He is excited. The buy button and rent button were both clicked. He is excited about this potential change...I am too, even if it may come along a path of worry and hardship...it is the future and the future can only lead to better things.

Sitting next to my babies tonight I remembered the thing that kept me awake the most the night before. Not the money, the fighting, life..it was the worry that I'm not strong enough for them! That I am not going to be able to supply ad be all that they need. What if I can't work? What's will happen to us then without money? What about the therapies, Hama I helping the boys enough? Is my daughter getting enough time? Am I doing enough/ good enough/ STRONG ENOUGH? The fear that I won't be enough to get through it....well it was answered tonight by a voice I haven't heard in a very long time. A voice that said you are and you will be TOUGH ENOUGH!

Whatever it takes, however hard it will be, this is our life and I will fight damn hard to make it good enough and happy enough....we, my kids and I, deserve nothing less than that and so much more!