19 months later, another mental health post

I worry a lot about my mental health.  As I've turned 56, I frequently meditate on the types of things that drive who I am and how i live.

There's lots of childhood scars, there's a lifetime of things that happened to me or that I caused myself that impact my life to this very day.

What I don't think anyone prepares you for is that you also take on these scars/issues that your children go through as well. You care so deeply for this human that you helped bring into this world, you raise them to be fearless, bold, brave, only to see that they are a pretty good carbon copy of you and they get hurt/suffer battle wounds in the very same way.

My son is one of the most loving, caring people in the world, it's how we've raised him. His ADHD however, will have him process things that happen to him very deeply and they affect him a lot more than it would for me.  But I can see that he's already built a shield around himself that I worry, just hides the much larger pain he's feeling inside.

After supposedly finding an ideal situation for him with a sports team, it has gone incredibly pear-shaped because the coaches have changed. One coach was kicked to the curb by the other 3 "buddies". How we approach games has now completely changed as well as, although completely within the rules, they decided they wouldn't communicate it to the parents of all the kids. Instead we found out after the game had started already.

It's the classic bully/hazing sort of behavior and it's come about because frankly, this team is NOT a good team.  But we were plugging along, having some success, but in general, 3-16 on the season is not a good feelings, especially for the amount of money everyone is paying for "travel" sports.

Other than the one coach who got booted, the other 3 rarely have a kind word for the kids. They don't build-break-build when errors happen, it's much easier to just yell at them, pull them from the game mid-inning and sit them to make them "think" about their error.

But now apparently they feel that there's 2-3 kids who just aren't able to perform. So they are now benched and we're playing by the rules that MLB plays by.  In order for you to go into the game (if you're on the bench), someone has to come out for the rest of the game.

Normally, I would accept these decisions as, it IS how High School ball is played and these kids are now HS aged. Its just that nothing was said and it looked like those 2-3 kids were targeted.  Again, if they actually WERE the 2-3 worse kids on the team, it would make sense, but these 3 bullies have decided that it's only their clique who gets to play.  Based on the actual performance data, there are 5-6 kids who are all about even at the bottom of the stats, based on batting average, pitching and fielding percentages.  But my son is one of the 2-3 who are now, showing up like good soldiers, expecting not to play each weekend.

2 of the bullies kids have all the tell-tale signs of, "I play because my Dad coaches".  1 never makes the weeknight practice for whatever reason and his "on field numbers" are not much better than my kid's. The other, makes many errors on the field (may lead our team in number of errors), kicks dirt, puts his head down and just doesn't give a crap. He can't catch a ball that bounces in front of him if his life depended on it. Last weekend, he hit a pop-up in fair territory and didn't even bother to run it out.

Last night, surprise, a new kid shows up who is now on our team for the rest of the season.  Apparently he was playing for another team in our club and they don't need him. Normally that wouldn't be weird except that we then find out that the kid lives by one of the 3 coaches so he was already "one of their clique".

This stuff stinks to high heaven and I can only imagine what our Coach is telling the management of our club as to my son's performance and how they desperately needed another body to help out.

My son is upset by this.  But he's being a young man about it. Shows up to practice, helps out during the game with warm-ups or whatever, cheers his teammates on.  But I'm saving all of my evidence.  Tryouts for next year are just over a week away.

My point to all of this is that my mental health is taking a hit here.  I can't sleep, I hurt FOR my son (who is hurting for sure as well), I talk to him daily about the right mindset to have even if these 3 "men" treat him unfairly and unevenly compared to all of the other kids. I'm training him how to cope but I'm positive that I'm not teaching him how to mentally cope because frankly, this has made me a wreck.  Kids are malleable and they DO process and manage these pains differently but I hurt SO MUCH for him right now and I am taking it personally.  It also means that I have to take my time to construct my arguments about the coaching style and actions and not take it out on the other kids who are not good players but are just playing a game and don't really have an impact on my son. It's their Dads who are horrible people and insensitive and frankly, massive bullies.

We'll see how this plays out. I am definitely going on the offensive soon though because I'm not going to spend money to go to Michigan and Indiana for tournaments to watch my kid sit on the bench for two solid weekends.

SMH: Welcome Class of 2027!

As I entered the doors of West Aurora High School Wednesday night with Mary Kay and Aidan at my side, we saw a simple sign on the table, "Welcome Class of 2027!".

Yep, as we prepared for a 75-minute winding path of Kindergarten registration, there it was, slapping me right in my big, fat face.

There's certain 'years' that I remember for some reason.

• As a 9-year old, figuring out that I was going to be 33 when the calendar turned over to 1/1/2000.
• The summer of 1976, the Bicentennial Celebration of the US and the July 4th Parade in Des Plaines, IL (as my Dad was on the Board of Directors of the Des Plaines Elks Lodge, 1526)
• My 29th birthday (1995 when I spotted my first grey hair)
• I remember Benet Academy's 1981 Frosh Fest (I was a Sophomore working it) and some Alum was there with a baby who had a t-shirt on that said Class of 2000

Although I think I've joked about it several times that when Aidan goes off to College that I'd be roughly 60 years old and probably ready to retire, it really hadn't hit me down deep in the dark, recesses of my stomach that it would be 2027.

Now, I know a lot of my friends have kids at a wide range of age, so for some of you, well, you're well past this part of your lives but this is both exciting and frightening at the same time.

Open House at Goodwin Elementary is April 10th and first day is August 21st.  This summer is going to FLY by far too fast.

Hold on Brian, hold on tight.

Why Old Music Monday?

Yes, I know that in my original post, I said I'm using Old Music Monday as a vehicle to ensure I write more but it's also to take time to express my creative side which sometimes is blunted by the day-to-day rigor of my day gig.  But every so often, it crosses my mind that by the time Aidan is eighteen years old, I'll be sixty.

As we get older it's inevitable that we ponder what life will be like without us.  I'm not fixating on that, but with all of the social media we're engaged in, and I, a heavy-user, there's going to be amazing catalogs of material on us that one could use in tribute when we finally pass.

For me it's more about sharing with Aidan things that I may not take the time to do as he continues to mature and grow into the wonderful, young man he's going to be.  I think I'm doing a pretty good job of it right now by ensuring his iPad is loaded with a good balance of current and older music.

I'm amazed at which songs he gravitates to and which ones he doesn't.  It's actually become a bit of a game by me changing songs on his playlist to see what he picks up on the most.

But since life can be short and sweet, I might as well document songs and artists I love, give a tiny bit of history on where I was in my life or what was going on when I embraced it and hope that he learns to do the same.

So bud-bud, this specific tag is for you.

Our little puzzle master

As a kid, we never had Lego to play with.

Not sure if it just wasn't popular enough or if they hadn't figured out that by making pop culture translate into Legos, you can sell a hell of a lot or if it was just the fact that Tinker Toys, Lincoln Logs and other building kits were just more popular at the time.  It was the 70's so go figure.

And since we waited until later in life to have our son (he's 5 now) maybe we just didn't see the rise of Legos to the crazed frenzy that they now occupy in the lives of kids these days.

But our son is now a die-hard Lego builder and has more fun sorting through hundreds of pieces to build characters from his favorite shows or movies than I ever thought he could.

Now admittedly, from a very early age, he was enamored with puzzles.  He would do them, break them up and then do them again.  He started out with the very simple Melissa & Doug ones or just any good old 12-24 piece puzzle, but he would bang through them so quickly that we found it problematic trying to keep challenging him.  Before we knew it, he was up to 100 piece puzzles and knocking them out in less than an hour.

So it really shouldn't come as a surprise that he's attacked these 3-D puzzles so voraciously.  As of late he has been taking on the 120-150 piece Lego sets all on his own, and working with Daddy or Mommy for anything larger.

Until this past Sunday.  As Mommy got caught up with work from her normal gig and Daddy vegetated out watching some playoff football, little man took on his 452 piece Lego Ninjago Samurai X Mech and completed it in about 2 1/2 hours.

Here's a shot of our little wunderkind and his completed Lego set.

He and I have been working on Jabba's Palace (from Star Wars) which is 717 pieces.  But I will admit that for the most part, I just take care of finding the pieces for the next step for him and have only put on about 30 pieces on the set.  We're about 70% done.

Future in Engineering for him?  Who knows but the skills required are mostly critical thinking, ability to visualize and of course, following directions which could lead him in any direction.  Whatever direction he decides is going to be a real hoot to watch though.

Hotdog, Hotdog, Hot Diggity Dog

Only a few days left until we leave for Florida and little Mister's FIRST ever, Walt Disney World experience.  If you don't know, we've held off on telling him we're ACTUALLY going because, as anyone who has ever had a 4-year old can tell you, if you tell the little monkeys more than 1 day before you're actually going, you'll be asked 4,293 times a day if tomorrow is the day we go.

So last night at dinner (he chose Eddie's Pizza because he loves it and since he took his nap at school AND got his stamp for being good, it was his choice; hey, the kid's got taste) we asked him what he would like to do in Florida.

When he let out with a "Go to Mickey's House" comment, I almost put a brown stripe in the back of my pants.  Is the kid psychic or does he just overhear too much for his own good?  Yeah, probably the latter.

We asked him what he thought Mickey's House might look like, what might be there.  He thought it was mostly like the MM Clubhouse on TV and that there is a Castle like at the beginning of all the movies (Cinderella's castle with the fireworks shooting) and that's pretty good because that IS pretty much like it is but with a couple hundred thousand other people who get in your way and annoy you while standing in lines and, oh yeah, wayyyyyyy over priced food, drink and souvenirs but that's not the point.

I gave him some grief and said, "Well, we WILL be driving BY Mickey's House so maybe you'll be able to see it from the highway and wave at him, but we need to get to Nana and Papa's House".

He seemed content with that but MK asked him if he thought Mickey's Hizzouse had rides like roller-coasters and he said, "Yeah, but I don't want to go on the ones that go upside down."  I love how he's already assumed he's going on ANYTHING at Disney since we didn't confirm we were going but it once again cemented in my head that he really IS my child in that, I puke on any roller coaster that goes anywhere more than 90° vertical.

He's been so excited about going to Florida that his behavior has been on it's OWN roller-coaster as of late.

One day he's absolutely the drunk at the end of the bar, harassing everyone coming through the door, but because he's the son of the owner, no one calls the Police, and the next day he's Zac Efron/Justin Bieber cute and can do no wrong.  (For the record, I'd call the Police on Zac/Justin just because they are results of the machine and Satan's Spawn and will end up AS the drunk at the end of the bar someday, but that's not what I was going for in my original statement)

But because of the behavior swings, we've really had to dangle some freakishly huge, State Fair-sized carrots in front of him and for the most part, it's working.  The bad news is, of course, that we've burned one more trick-in-our-bag that he'll be hip to from this point forward.  But he seems to be on the right path and that's good.

We decided awhile ago that with the long car ride, there's going to be a predictable meltdown somewhere in North Georgia and THAT'S when we tell him we're going to Disney just for our own sanity.

But that's about it for now, the excitement builds.  But we need to get through the weekend first.

The genius of "Nana"

From very early in my life, I always knew that my Mother was extremely creative.  After all, since she was a teacher of 1st & 2nd graders, she needed to show mad skillz at getting them to pay attention and learn something so that they didn't end up being a bunch of tools later in life.

I've been amazed at how, even after 30+ years since early retirement, she continues to use those skills to help teach and open up a world of knowledge to her Little Prince, her grandson, my son, Aidan.

Two years ago, I laughed out loud at seeing the appearance of construction paper cut out into cars, airplanes and other creative shapes for Aidan to put stickers onto or to color or to do whatever he wanted with them.  They were the exact same cut-outs that she used with my brother and I when we were little and with her students.  The templates were originally cut out of manila folders and she STILL has them.

But she's also had some "new tricks" up her sleeves that update methods she used back in the day.

The newest one takes the cake though:

We've already instilled a strong sense of "saving" into Aidan.  He has his own savings account at our local bank, he has a piggy bank that he puts spare change into weekly, and he participates in the "bank at school" program that our bank has with The Goddard School which he attends.

My parents are also headed back to Florida tomorrow and so their contact with Aidan will now be limited to phone calls and/or Internet video calls on the weekends.  He has made it infinitely clear that he didn't want Nana & Papa to go back to Florida because he was going to miss them and all the fun that they have together.  He said that he was going to be sad about it.  It's always a teary time for my Mom when she says goodbye to Aidan when they won't see each other for more than a week.  Waterworks flow.

It's with all of this in mind that she's created a nifty counting/savings/calendar technique to help ease the pain of the distance between she and Aidan.  She gave him a roll of pennies last night.  She told him that when he got home, to put 6 pennies into his "money bank" and then each morning thereafter, to put one more penny into the bank.  Not only does he make some money but when he gets down to the last penny left and he puts it into his bank, THAT is the day we pack up the car and head off to Florida on vacation.

Today was the first morning and he ran right to the bank and reminded me to help him get one penny out of the roll.  It's going to kill him to still wait 43 more days, but at least he'll know we're getting closer.

Time is fleeting...

Wowzers.

We got a letter from Aidan's school that by the end of August he's going to move on to the next room, Pre-school II. Sort of came as a surprise because we though that he wouldn't move on until his 4th birthday but it's making sense that the changes now will happen in line with the normal school year schedule.

As much as we want him to stay this loveable little boy, which, he challenges us about every single night as of late with antics to avoid going to sleep, he's growing and it's going much faster than we ever thought it would. EVERYONE tells us this but you just want to believe that he'll stay this adorable little man forever.

And it has been challenging. One minute you can have almost an adult type conversation with him and the next he's making silly noises to try to drown you out as you talk to him about getting in his pj's to go to bed.

We continue to try to instill loving, thoughtful behavior into his life and he reflects that with things he says and does. But he definitely has the fighting spirit of his Mommy and Daddy. I know I can be tough on him but it's just me holding on to the last shreds of hope that I can protect him from everything bad in the world. Unrealistic as hell but yet, based on my own life experiences.

Don't get me wrong, we're not trying to change him, nor are we the worst stage-parents in the world, but we all know that these formative years will set him on his path and we just want him to have the best shot at it all.

You know when your Mother threatens you that she wishes you have a child "just like you"? Well, I'm glad he's just like us.

A 3 year old's mind

So last night when I was putting Aidan to bed, I had another interesting exchange with him.

Prior to bedtime he was particularly naughty.  I won't go into details but let's just say that instead of staying up for another 45 minutes it was straight to bed time.

There were lots of tears and not wanting Daddy to put him to bed, but once we got settled down and I started to read it got interesting.

One of the books I was reading to him was based off of The Incredibles movie which is one that we have not seen.  Bob, the Dad, at one point blew off someone named Buddy.  Years later Buddy turned into an evil genius named Syndrome and tried to exact his revenge against Bob and his family.

Bob

Buddy

Syndrome

Aidan repeated to me that Buddy was a child when the initial incident happened and that now that he had "grown up" he turned into a "bad guy".

• He asked me if "Buddy had been bad to his Mommy and Daddy".
• I said "yes".
• He then asked me if "Buddy had been bad to his doggie too".
• I said "yes"
• He immediately projected Buddy onto himself and his evening's actions.
• He then told me that he didn't want to be like Buddy and that he wanted to grow up to be a good superhero.  (remember, we're in this massive Batman/Spiderman phase right now)
• I told him that "that is a great idea" and that "we want you to grow up and be a good superhero too"

He then let me finish the book.

It's good to see that he's recognizing his bad behaviors and then wants to make amends for what he's done.

Who knows, maybe someday  WILL be a good superhero.  We can only allow him to keep living his dreams.

You are your Father's Son

I'm sure many men have heard this as a phrase that basically says "you've grown up to be just like your Dad", which, depending on the family dynamic and your own situations could be a good thing or a bad thing.

As objectively as I can be, I can say that when it comes to passion for work, passion for family and core values, I did grow up to be my "Father's Son".

Where I didn't was in the fact that I don't want to get out of bed on EVERY given morning, I'm a technology geek (which is mostly just generational), I'm relatively A-D-D, my music tastes are radically different, and our political views are quite divergent.  Maybe those last two are related ;-p

But that's where the pay-it-forward generational fun happens.

• Aidan has quickly adopted the "mornings suck" attitude that his Daddy has embraced since, well, as long as I can freaking remember.
• He also has his candy addiction "jones" on very early in life, probably earlier than I did but then again, it's MY addiction he's carrying on so access to it is much easier than it was for me as a child.
• He already loves his technology.  Not only did he know how to swipe his finger on an iPod Touch just shy of two years old to flip through pictures, for Christmas he got his very own first digital camera.  Below are two pictures that he took along with a picture of the camera.  He can frame it well, but he's still moving his hands quite a bit so most of the pictures are Dali-esque.

Blurry Daddy or Daddy's normal look circa 1985	Extreme close-up of Wrigley

So I think we all know this happens but being more aware of it at this point keeps me on my toes.  Some of his mannerisms are very much like mine and he cracks us up with his "overacting" at time when he's trying to make a point.

I love him to bits.

Here's a shot from December of the three generations of LoCicero men.  Damn we're smokin' hot! ;-)

Negotiations with a dog

He did it again.

That son of ours had us cracking up right at dinner time last night.

He came over to the table and both of us were in the main part of the kitchen.  He had left a whole bucket worth of toys on the floor in the family room.

We asked him to pick them up because if he left them on the floor, Wrigley, our 85 lb. Golden would go chew them up.  We reminded him that recently she gnawed off the arm of the Little People™ Fireman when he left it out.

To which he responded by looking straight at Wrigley and saying, "Wrigley, you promise not to eat up my toys okay?".  He then answered for her saying yes and then looked at us and said "Wrigley promised not to eat my toys".

How could you not laugh?  Of course, other famous people have heard their dogs talk to them.  The Son of Sam comes to mind.  Okay, KIDDING!!

What a fantastic way to justify not having to pick up toys.  My kid's a hell of a negotiator, but we knew this already the way he upsells each request for candy/cookies/gummies on a regular basis.

POW! BAM! @%&# ZONK!

Well, the joys of Aidan turning three has involved his intense desire to live, breathe and act as Batman.

We really had no idea where this came from other than at school where the other little boys may have gotten into the superhero genre a bit earlier thanks to older brothers.  In fact, Aidan's buddy/nemesis at school is almost always wearing Spiderman clothes and the amount of fake web shooting out of our wrists at home has been at an all-time high for the last 3-4 months.  (This of course took me instantly back to 4th grade at Fairview School and playing with Kyle Bernsten and Stan-can't remember his last name on the playground doing the same exact thing....hmm, the Circle of Life)

But a Batman Cave was top of the list for Aidan when telling Santa what he wanted for this year and lo' and behold, he was just good enough for Ol' St. Nick to come through.

But this has really been a nice throwback for me as not only do we DVR The Batman cartoon on Boomerang (Cartoon Network) which is an updated flashy, but not as dark as Batman Beyond, but we also DVR the original Batman TV series from the 60's.

I remember always making time to catch Batman on either WGN or WFLD when I got home from school.  Now I'm making time for when Aidan gets home from school.  It still amazes me at the big named talent that they would get to play villains on that show given it's campy format.  I usually take a look at what's going to play for the week and then choose which sets of 2 (remember, most of them were always 2 half-hour episodes with the cliff-hanger in between) we're going to record.

I happened to see that early next week they are going to run the ones with Chandell (Liberace) who plays a concert pianist who tries to woo Aunt Harriet to get her fortune.

This likely will not be one for Aidan, it'll move too slow and he won't get it but since there were only 2 episodes, it'll be a great one for me.

At this point, Aidan mostly likes the loud/obnoxious villains who are also more of the "major" ones like Joker, Penguin, Riddler and Catwoman.  He also has recently become aware of Mr. Freeze but mostly because of the cartoon version we see.  Somehow these capture his attention more than the cerebral villains like Bookworm, Mad Hatter, King Tut and Egghead.

In a weird way, I'm wondering how Aidan's countless Sheriff Woody characters are dealing with the arrival of several Batmans?

Lastly, Aidan does a bit of association with lists or items I think mostly for memory but also to prove to us he can remember things.  For example, quite some time ago he got interested in what our favorite colors are and he was very proud that he could always remember each of our colors. 

For Batman, he's assigned each of us one of the Batman characters for role play.  He, of course, is Batman (there was even discussion tonight, 10 months in advance, that he'd be Batman for Halloween next year).  I am the youthful ward/boy wonder Robin, Mary Kay is the Catwoman, my Dad is Joker and my Mom is Penguin.  Quite the crew the lot of us.

Until my next post, stayed tuned, same bat-time, same bat-channel......

Manly tears of joy

Aidan (my almost 3-year old son) and I have a typical Dad/Son relationship....as if we were 54 and 13 respectively.

There are times, even at this young age (his not mine), that we butt heads, HARD.  Neither of us will give in until Mommy steps in and calls a truce.  Sure, we both say "sorry" later and leave things on a high note, but we're already in this pattern that we have to break at some point soon.  Maybe it's the Italian blood (my 50% and his 25%) but I doubt it.

And then there's a day like today.

He made a special effort (after being a holy terror/meltdown mode to both Mommy and Daddy last night) to come up to me this morning and say good morning and give me a hug.  Sure he proceeded to run right back to Mommy for the rest of the morning routine but there's this maturity level in him, scarily, that he's recognizing that he was not good and he wants to make up for it.

But that was only the start of it.  By a stroke of luck, I called Mary Kay and told her that I was leaving work and that, instead of her running to get him from school, that I'd do it.  She was buried in work and it was going to be a help to her as well so it worked out for both of us.

I got to school and he ran to me full speed (I fear every time that he's going to trip and face-plant on the tile even though he doesn't).  He was super excited to tell me that he took his nap today (this, after two days of NOT doing so, thus the meltdown last night) AND that he listened to his teachers.

Quick side-note:  As his birthday is Saturday, he's going through a transition at school as he 'graduates' from the 2½-3 year old class to the much larger 3-4 year old class.  Transitions usually run pretty smoothly but he's going from a class size of 8 to a class size of 16-20 and he's actually sort of a shy kid, but as an only child he loves to compete for the attention because he gets so much at home.  So he spends ½ a day in his current room and ½ a day in the new room for 1-2 weeks and then makes the final move.  These changes do mess with his discipline to take his naps and listen to his teachers, so the daily reminders each morning are very important for him to prove to us when we pick him up.  He actually looked at his new teacher (Miss Kristy) and asked her to confirm that he did, in fact, listen to her today.

So then we went over to his cubby hole to get his coat, hat, gloves, and his daily report (tells us what he ate, what he learned, when he napped and did his bathroom duties) and he reached right in and grabbed out a drawing he did today.  He gave it to me and proudly proclaimed "It's for you daddy!"

I was sort of surprised because he's never really drawn anything for me specifically, it's usually been for Mommy or his Nana or Grandma.  So I asked him almost incredulously "Are you sure it's for me?".

His response had a tone that almost sounded like he was offended by my doubt "Yeah, for you, it's a doggy."

Well I'll be damned, it DID look like a doggy.

I was sort of dumbfounded.  But I gave him a big hug and said thank you.

Later on, as he was getting ready to head upstairs for bed (we alternate nights and tonight was Mommy's turn) I thanked him again for the picture of the doggy and asked him if it was okay if I brought it into work to put up on my desk (he's been to my office a couple times and loves seeing all the pictures of him and all the cars I have on my desk)

"Sure Daddy" and everything in the world seemed to be perfect.