Teen Mom

Today I promoted teen abstinence—not that Allerina needed a reminder to stay away from boys. She's never kissed anyone and I’m proud of her for her refrain. Not that I would know, but kissing boys in middle school is definitely not worth it. Big sister Bambie would know. She would agree with me.

Allerina accompanied me to Atrain’s quarterly audiology appointment. Why would I take my little sister out of school and drive her three hours away from her home for my son’s doctor’s appointment? It really doesn’t have anything to do with abstinence. It has much more to do with the fact that I’m not abstinent and now have two kids. One of them has to spend three hours listening to beeping noises every four months (and needs my full attention to help him). He hates that. The other son has to eat every two to three hours, and he won’t eat without me. He hates that. I can’t do it without help. I hate that.

My mom couldn’t help; she’s getting ready to go to Canada tomorrow. My sister who lives near the audiologist couldn’t help; she had class. I’m too proud to ask my mother in law; no matter the inconvenience she would drop everything and come. So, when Allerina offered excitedly to be my on-site babysitter at the audiologist, I couldn’t pass it up. Even though she didn’t know what she was in for.

I picked her up yesterday after she cleared the absence with her teachers and picked up her homework. She was happy to miss math class, and I was happy to tutor her. Atrain was happy to see her. Jodg howled the whole way home. Allerina made dinner while I fed Jdog, then she bounced Jdog while I spent the rest of the evening at a work meeting. Then when I returned we did her homework before heading to bed at one am.

The next morning we began prepping for our long adventure to the audiologist. I told Atrain the bad news when he awoke: that we were headed to the cochlear doctor today. He cried, but perked up when I reminded him about the listening games we’ve been practicing and the chocolate egg rewards. I skipped my run and revolved everything around getting the boys ready and keeping them happy. We played games, I gave in to more of his chocolate requests than usual, I didn’t make him take a bath, Allerina took him to the playground, I worked hard keeping Jdog awake until we loaded into the car. It was a success. We drove the 90 minutes to the audiologist with both boys happily snoozing in the back.

When we got to the appointment Allerina took over Jdog duties while I convinced a frantic Atrain to let our audiologist hook his cochlears up to the computer. Poor kid. I don’t really even know what I’m talking about when I tell him that it’s not going to be bad. I don’t know what he hears when we hook him up to the computer. I know that sometimes we have to turn the sound off, which makes him understandably upset. But the kid is tough. I know he can do it—even if I can’t completely understand what he has to go through.

The audiologist and I quickly got to work, and to my surprise, Atrain quickly became cooperative and even happy. He was doing it. He was listening for the beeps and consistently pressing the button when he heard them. It was the first time in his life he was giving us feedback about how his cochlears hear. The chocolate egg incentive helped and our practice was paying off. He was even having fun. Whenever he heard the beep (it’s something that only he hears…and we have to discern whether or not he really heard it or he’s just pretending to hear it so he can push the button) he got to switch the pictures of cars characters on the computer screen. He was laughing at their expressions, talking about what they were doing, and asking me the names of the ones he didn’t know. Even though he couldn’t hear me respond he would read my lips and repeat what he thought I was saying. I try to teach him to read lips while he takes baths, but he’s never tried to repeat the words I mouth to him. He’s actually quite good at it.

All the while we’re in the sound booth making the most of Atrain’s productive appointment, I’m wondering how Allerina is holding up with Jdog in the foyer. I can feel that he’s getting hungry. After an hour and a half the audiologist, Aaron and I take a break so that both boys can eat. Then we get back to work. To all of our astonishment, Atrain keeps at the task for another ninety minutes. Amazing. We’re gathering so much data about my kid’s listening skills that we have to schedule another appointment for next week so that we can finish testing. He’s really growing up.

We finished the appointment an hour over schedule and Allerina and Jdog were relieved to see us enter the waiting room. Baby J looked angry. Allerina looked exhausted: my superhero sister, saving the day, swallowing the kryptonite so that Atrain’s appointment could be a success. She was amazing. She missed school, missed her friends, missed her young women’s activity so that she could save me. And now she was clearly ready to go home. So was I. The kids, on the other hand, had other plans. I had to pull Atrain away from the toys in the waiting room. That was a first. Jdog arched his back when I put him in his car seat and started to cry. It was a long ride. My poor baby cried on and off most of the way home. For a few moments I flashed back to the days when I was Allerina’s age, babysitting while my parents were out for the night, bouncing my colicky newborn sister to sleep for hours next to the dryer in the laundry room. She always liked the sound of the dryer.

Allerina went to sleep for most of the ride home, despite my howling baby. It was probably better that way. Toward the end of the ride she woke up and in a dazed state her true feelings about her day surfaced when she asked, “What’s his problem?” Jdog just kept crying. I kept apologizing for making her day so miserable, then thanking her for being the person who I know loves me enough to put up with the misery, then apologizing again. “I bet you would take math class over this,” I said. She said no, but avoided eye contact. “Do you ever want kids after today?” She snorted and replied, “not at least for another ten years. Good. Glad I could be of service.