I haven’t actually updated my blog in a while especially when it comes to my life, so I’ll do that now.
I have to actually go back to last year when I visited a Psychologist here in France; this was a court-ordered visit to find out if I was suffering from some mental disorder that caused me not to be able to speak. I never got the results so I had no idea what the results were until our next court visit in February before my 37th birthday.
The Psychologist came to the conclusion that I was Autistic; I had Selective Mutism, Generalized Anxiety, Social Anxiety, and Childhood Trauma. I thought this was an official diagnosis but apparently not, since Psychologists can’t diagnose Autism in France like they can in the US. If I want to get an official diagnosis, I will have to pay out of pocket and look for someone on my own, and I can’t afford it, so I have an answer to all the questions I’ve had for my whole life, but I don’t have paper proof that I can use for official paper if I want to apply for aid.
I’m not really surprised at this diagnosis, especially with how I grew up and how much my father and younger brother display classic signs of Autism.
Last week, something terrible happened in my family; I lost a cousin unexpectedly, and it has been really hard. My cousin Craig was like a ray of sunshine; when you were depressed and at your lowest, he would find the most insanely funny way to make you laugh; he was a champion of the disenfranchised and the first to have your back. He had an intense dislike for Roti, especially chicken roti with bones; he likened it to daggers stabbing your gums and wondered why anyone would choose to eat it.
There are days where I remember him with a smile and a laugh because I remembered something funny he said or did, and there are days when I cry deeply at the slightest reminder that he is gone. I hope my cousin knew the impact he had on the people around him and how much he is missed.
The time had come at last for Oyanie to go to Crèche, we visited on Monday to have a little tour and for Oyanie to meet some of the staff.
It’s not a big crèche which I find suits my personality, smaller and more intimate makes it not as anxiety provoking.
As usual I’m only following half of the conversation because I still have trouble with spoken French, from what I gathered I was to bring her on Tuesday for a little trial run. I was immediately drenched in despair, we’ve only walked to the crèche once and that was months ago, I didn’t remember how to get there. I looked at Google maps but the route was unfamiliar and I don’t do well in unfamiliar places. I get lost easily even in my own neighborhood if I don’t see familiar buildings. Another thing that bothered me is that my husband didn’t tell the staff that I was situationally non verbal, telling people I don’t speak French makes them assume I can speak which unfortunately isn’t always the case. I can manage a bonjour but that’s it.
I went to sleep wracked with anxiety and dread, we had agreed that I would take her in the afternoon since mornings are not so good good me. I barely slept, I woke up extremely tired and shaking, my hands trembled even though I was in my own home alone with my child, I didn’t eat anything, I couldn’t, I fed Oyanie, got her ready and I sat and tried to find a route to the crèche from home that would be familiar to me. I spent hours looking at the map using the steps feature, I left my house virtually at least 20 times and thought maybe, I can do this. I was not confident but I was going to try.
This isn’t a picture from yesterday, I forgot to take one but I love this picture and feel it portrays how she acted.
It was time, we left home and walked down our route but looking at Google and actually walking are two completely different things, I ended up lost and far away from where we should be. I didn’t recognize the area at all and to be honest, I was friggin scared, I had no one to ask and even if there was someone I couldn’t ask them anything. I just stood there looking at my Google map and trying to figure out how to get to the crèche or how to get back home. I tried to turn around and retrace my steps but that was difficult given that I didn’t even know where I was. I was fighting back tears and pushing the stroller hoping to see something familiar. Finally I got to a street I recognized and as quickly as I could went back home.
I broke down, I cried and I cried, I felt like a complete failure, I’m 35 years old and I can’t even do this, I forgot to mention that I did text my husband and told him I was lost and he asked me to show him where I was but I couldn’t do anything other than get back home at that moment. I didn’t feel safe, I was overwhelmed and lost and too many things and emotions were swirling at that moment. I replied once I was no longer crying and told him I was home. He tried to help me find the crèche but telling me something is on the right is like telling me a mathematical equation, I don’t know what right and left is, I can’t give or follow directions. I don’t know what south, east, north, or west is. I know my limitations and I know that feeling me to turn right here and then left there is just going to be me getting lost again.
I only take one route to school because it’s the only route I know, I don’t go an adventures alone because I know I will get lost, I need reliable routes that I recognize so I can stick to my routine otherwise nothing makes sense to me.
I know most people won’t get it and that’s fine because I know there are those who will get it and will understand.
So today, I might not have made it to my destination but I wasn’t a failure, I attempted something I never did before, I made it out of the house and I put myself into a position that I should have never had to be in but I survived.
At the end we decided to try again tomorrow, my husband told me an easier route, my son would be home with me, and I felt a little better about the situation.
I didn’t look at the map this time, there was no need, my husband explained it and I knew what I had to do, I had a new routine and I felt comfortable, we left the house and this time we made it to the crèche.
We’re not supposed to arrive early which is something I always do because I hate getting somewhere late. We had to wait until they opened the gate which was aggravating for me because that meant I was losing time that I hadn’t accounted for. Once they opened the gate and let us in I took Oyanie out of her stroller and brought her inside the building. We took off her coat, gave her her doudou and said goodbye.
She didn’t even look back, didn’t cry, didn’t make a fuss, just left to go play with her new friends.
Naveen and I started the walk back home and it takes us about 29 minutes so we had only a few minutes to sit before we had to go pick up Oyanie again.
This time she did cry, she screamed and threw a fit because she didn’t want to leave, she wanted to stay and play with her new friends. I was happy for her, she always want to play with the little kids at the school and now she has her own friends to play with.
They asked her if she wanted to come back the next day and stay for longer and she said yes. So now I’m going to take her back on Thursday to stay for two hours.
I am or used to be an avid reader, I used to read about 100 books a year and always wanted a Kindle so that I could bring all my books with me instead of trying to bring several physical books.
Since I found out about ebooks I would read on my phone usually with the Kindle app or an E-reader app like Moon+Reader but I wanted an actual e-reader because it was better for your eyes and I would get terrible eye strains reading on my phone for hours.
It was actually a gift request I had for years and my husband bought me a really cheap off brand e-reader that couldn’t even load my books or Kindle app. He tried his best but a Prestigio is not a Kindle. This Prestigio would frequently freeze or not load and I would get so frustrated with it, when buying an E-reader that’s inexpensive go for the inexpensive not cheap because cheap is always lost money even if it was just 40€.
So after years and years of wanting a Kindle in June 2021 I finally bought one when it was on sale!
I was so happy, a dream that finally came through, I immediately side loaded my books from Google play and other epubs I had gotten over the years and synced my Kindle library, over 100 books and not even a dent in the memory!
But my happiness was not to be…
My daughter was one at the time and I foolishly left the Kindle on the bed side table where she could reach it. I had only received the Kindle two days before this post.
I looked everywhere for the Kindle, in the dirty clothes hamper, behind the bed side table, under the bed, under her crib, I did not look in the bag of dirty diapers before I threw it away and after the fact I was so scared she had put it in there.
Almost a year went by and I had given up hope that I would ever find the Kindle, I was trying to figure out if I should just buy a new one but I’d have to wait for it to go on sale again and I had no idea when that would be. I tried to go back to reading on my phone but it just wasn’t the same.
And then it happened.
When they say you find something when you least expect it they are not lying, I was going through some of my daughter’s old clothes to see what to get rid off and there my Kindle was in the bag, I don’t even remember this bag of clothes being in the bedroom where she could reach.
Needless to say I don’t leave my Kindle where she can reach, most of the time, sometimes I forget but I always remember at the least minute because it takes one time for your Kindle to be abducted and hidden.
Welcome back or if you’re visiting for the first time hello.
The last time I posted “The Last of them” my grandfather had just passed away and I was not in a good frame of mind. I’m doing better now, not 100% but I don’t feel like closing myself up in a deep dark hole, I got the space I needed to grieve and I’m thankful for that.
One of my nieces went on vacation to the beach and my son wanted so badly to join her but the closest beach to us is almost 5 hours away! There’s no way we’d travel that far to go to the beach. Or so I thought…
On Monday, all smug like, my son said to me “we’re going to the beach tomorrow”, Yeah right, I thought, we’re not going anywhere but his father didn’t say anything to me, then again his father waits until the very last minute to tell me anything. I’m sitting there contemplating this information and whether or not I can trust it when Marvin comes home and asks Naveen if he told me.
Told me?
Told me what?
Naveen said “yes, I tell Mama”, you mean it’s true? We’re going to the beach tomorrow?
Apparently.
I had a rough night, Oyanie kept waking up even though she was sleeping for a good six hours, this night she decided four hours was good enough. So there I was on Tuesday morning, tired as hell and have to get up to start packing and making sure we don’t forget anything.
Everything checked and double-checked, we were on our way, on our to where? I didn’t know. I just knew we were going to the beach. I mentioned before that my husband doesn’t tell me anything until the last minute? Well for trips he doesn’t tell me where we are going at all… I think he works under the misinformation that I like surprises, nothing could be further from the truth, after 10 years I’ve just accepted that he likes surprising me. I’ve never hated any of his surprises so I’ll allow it.
First, we stopped to get gas, can’t drive for so long on an empty tank eh, that done we started our long drive to the beach, at first I was admiring the scenery as we drove but that quickly turned to fatigue as we continued driving, we’d been driving for almost two hours when I felt the car slowing down, I didn’t see it ok, I fell asleep, it was a very long drive. We took a little break so we could stretch our legs, eat and drink, and just rest for a bit. We still had about two hours left of driving to go. I was curious about what kind of hotel we would be staying in this time and anticipating just dropping onto the bed and staying there for however long I would need. Sitting in the car for so long had made my back ache like there was no tomorrow.
With our little break over we were back on the road again, this passed by like a blur, I remember a lot of trees and buildings and then water, some of the water was greenish colored but the closer we got to our destination the bluer the color became.
Finally, we arrived at our destination, this wasn’t like any hotel I’d ever seen before because it wasn’t, we were staying in someone’s air b&b?
It was an apartment of sorts, the door was one of those really old European doors, an ancient wooden panel with a round knob that looks like it might fall off at any moment, it didn’t though, these doors are pretty strong despite their appearance. Inside was a kitchen slash dining slash living area. Kind of like what we have at home, there’s no definition of space in the homes I’ve visited here in France. There was an upstairs, where I assume were the bedrooms and bathroom but there was one problem.
The stairs looked like something out of my worst nightmare…
Apparently, Naveen felt the same because he refused to climb the stairs, we had no choice though, the beds were upstairs and the toilet which we would need sooner or later. His father helped him climb the ladder, I refuse to call it stairs, I followed behind gingerly placing my feet on each rung and holding onto the railing as my life depended on it. If you think going up that monstrosity was bad, going down it was worse, each rung was so narrow I had to try to climb down sideways so my feet could find purchase on each slender step. The worse thing about this was when I had to go up or down with Oyanie in my arms, There I was with my tiny baby held tightly in one arm and the other wrapped around the railing and trying to gauge how far down each step was from the other.
Naveen became a pro at the stairs, he went up and down like they were nothing, me? No such thing, I took the stairs only if I really needed to otherwise I was fine to stay upstairs or downstairs wherever I was at the moment.
We didn’t end up going to the beach the first day because it would take another hour and we had reacher too late to go to the beach. We did visit an old wash station where there was a river flowing through. Naveen told his father he didn’t want to go to the beach anymore, he was content to stay here and enjoy the river, we didn’t come all this way for the river though. We were going to drive to the beach the next day.
A semi-good night’s sleep, Ms. Oyanie was up every four hours again, we had breakfast and relaxed a bit before heading to the beach around noon. The drive was interesting, we followed a canal of water along a very small road, you literally had to ride the wall to let another car pass, at the end of the canal was the beach.
I’ll be completely honest, being from the Caribbean I grew up with white sand, blue waters, literally beaches of your dreams, this, was not it. First things first, the sand, more like dirt was speckled with something gold that felt like dust on your skin if it touched you. The water was not beckoning at all, add in that there were so many people there, my anxiety went sky high and I was content to stay on the bench we scored under the very shady tree. Marvin asked me if I wanted to go in the water and it was a big no. I’m fine love.
We spent about two hours there, Naveen enjoyed himself immensely, Oyanie stayed with me most, and Marvin went in the water with Naveen, everybody enjoyed themself and it was time to drive back to the apartment.
Had an okay night, it was time to head back home which meant another long drive, strangely, going up and down those horrifying stairs gave me muscle aches in my legs, I will not miss them at all. And because I completely forgot that Oyanie made five months yesterday I decided to take some pictures, she was not cooperating at all so I got many many very similar pictures lol. I thought I had settled on the best picture but I felt like the background was too busy and you couldn’t see her face well enough so I moved locations and voilà, the month 5 picture.
This drive I did better, I didn’t fall asleep so I saw some cool things like this church? on top of the hill, not sure you can really see it in the picture.
Also saw this really cute tiny castle on a roundabout.
Finally, we were back home!
This trip wasn’t the only thing I was up to, I also found this really interesting app on the app store, you upload a picture and people try to guess where you are from, it said to input the furthest back your ancestry went so I entered France and Nigeria. Trying out the app I realized that I really can’t tell where people are from, I get lucky sometimes but for the most part, I guess very wrongly.
Here’s what people guessed for me:
The last interesting thing I have to talk about is a secret campaign I was selected for. I can’t say what I’m supposed to review yet but when the package arrived I’ll write a post about it. Stay tuned for that!
Today is Father’s Day, a day I usually don’t care for because of my own weird relationship with my father, so, today I’m going to talk about the many father figures I’ve had in my life and how they lead me to the father in my children’s lives.
My Father
Me and my father 1987-1988
My father is not an easy man to understand, some days you wonder if he even cares, I’ve spoken a bit about this in The Useless Sibling and the truth is it was so much worse, the other day someone asked me what was the best feature of my father that I looked for in a man and I just couldn’t think of one. Almost everything I thought of was something I didn’t want. I didn’t want to be treated as a mistake in my partner’s life and I sure as hell didn’t want him to view or children as playthings for his public persona. That saying that a father is a girl’s, first love? Not even close to being true for me.
Two of my most vivid memories are of my parents fighting, one where my mother was going to leave the house and had her keys in her hand and my father grabbed her arm and was pulling it like he was going to break it, I jumped on his back and started pummeling him while I yelled for my brothers, my oldest brother came with a broomstick and my father finally let go of our mother. The second incident I don’t remember as well but I remember my mother bitting into his arm and he was hitting her in the head trying to get her loose.
These were just two extremes but they fully cemented in my head that I didn’t want a relationship like this. I didn’t want a man like this, I wasn’t even sure I ever wanted to get married, all the marriages in my life save one was toxic, cheating, children on the outside, fighting, just a lot of toxicity.
Uncle Luis
Now I’ll talk about that one good marriage in my life, one of my mother’s sisters, Aunty Cathy, married my Uncle Luis, from the very first time I remember meeting him he has always been very nice to me. With my Selective Mutism, I didn’t speak to him, I remember feeling very shy around him for a long time but that didn’t change how he treated me, he would talk to me, show interest in my drawings, try my failed attempts at sodas haha, he did everything my father didn’t. My uncle out of everyone in my life is who I based the ideal mate on. My aunt and uncle lived with us for a while and those were good days, I felt heard and seen, I had a good male figure in my life and he treated my aunt really well.
The day they moved out was one of the saddest in my life, it meant I would go back to being ignored or yelled at for just existing. Even though he no longer lived with us I never forgot the way my uncle treated me, I would look forward to their visits every time.
My Husband
Before I met my husband I wasn’t sure I wanted to get married or have children, I was pretty content in the fact that I would be single Aunty Lynnette, the cool and strict aunt. For whatever reason, my cousins believed I was a traveling girl? Meaning that I had many boyfriends and several sexual encounters. That couldn’t be farther from the truth, I didn’t do much as kiss a guy until my husband.
I mean sure I had lots of male friends but they were just friends, I also didn’t meet any of them in real life, my mother says I’m pretty unobservant because a lot of them were flirting with me but I never noticed it? I like my friends, they’re good men but not for me, they weren’t like my uncle none of the guys I met were like my uncle so definitely not someone I would be interested in forming a permanent bond with.
I spoke a bit about how I ended up with my husband in My Truths. Before we even had children I saw how he was with his niece and how he was with my nieces, it reminded me so much of my beloved uncle and they were both tall and wore glasses, if this wasn’t the universe talking to me I don’t know what it was.
Marvin and Chacha
One of my nieces was so taken with Marvin that she started calling him Daddy, I routinely call her his first child haha, I have to say that even though I was determined to find a man nothing like my father, Marvin and my father shared several similar tastes and qualities. I somehow found a man that was a balance between my father and my uncle.
The most notable quality between my father and Marvin? Determination. I swear I’ve never seen two people who would never give up until they have accomplished what they set out to do.
Crucianize 