That's Just Not Normal

Hannah wrote a picture book last year. A beautiful story about being different. A little kid born into a fabulously famous clown family has no inclination towards the family business, the kid just isn't funny in the way that everyone else in the family is. Throughout the story this little clown finds his own place, his own voice, his own way to be fabulous and still be a wonderful important part of his family. Really it was her story, her experience.

I knew something was different about Hannah when she was an infant - she slept like infants are supposed to sleep, ate like they are supposed to eat, played and grew like they were supposed to play and grow.  From the time she was tiny she would sit on my lap, in the swing, car seat, bouncy chair, and quietly watch her older two sisters in complete amusement.  I used to say that Hannah was so easy she was an argument for having a 4th child.

Later when Rachel had been finally diagnosed with ADHD, then their father, my husband Mark, then younger sister Mary, then Mariah I started to panic and took all the rest of the family in for testing. I was afraid I was going to miss something and have another child struggle needlessly without proper help and intervention. Sure enough there was something different about Hannah, she was the only one of our 6 (biological) children that did NOT have ADHD and all the accompanying co-conditions. It was me and her in a sea of ADHD.

It has been a remarkable difference to watch. One night when we had told everyone to get ready for bed and then meet in the living room for family prayer. Mark and I sat on the couch and chuckled as chaos circled around us. We reminded, then we followed up, then followed up again and again. Jaren was swinging from the bars of the top bunk in between the two beds hooting like a monkey. Mary was still dressed in her day clothes with robes on, holding some kind of stick as a scepter, and a crown wanting someone to give her some proper processional music before she would head to the living room, still not ready for bed.  Older sisters Rachel and Mariah were writing and/or drawing, both insisting that they had to finish getting out the idea before it was lost forever. Hunter had a bike helmet on his back using it for a jet pack, Nerf guns in both hands running in circles with sound effects for both the guns and jet pack.  Hannah was sitting quietly on the
couch with us ready for bed, waiting, watching in complete amusement.

By fourth grade a friend of hers made a remark that, much to Hannah's chagrin, has never gone away.  They were playing on the playground and she turned to Hannah and said, "Hannah, you're perfect and that's just not normal." It stuck! We loved it! and still to this day the we tell it to her all the time. She is certainly perfect to us in so many
wonderful individual ways.

Hannah is the uncontested favorite of everyone in the house. One year, after we had carefully drawn secret Santas for our Christmas gift exchange Hannah came to us privately, she was very upset.  As it turned out everyone of her siblings had come to her separately and confided who their person was and asked advice on what to give them.  She knew everyone's secret santa, which took all the fun out of it. We redrew then and every year after that with strict orders NOT to reveal to ANYONE, especially Hannah, who their person was.

It is easy to confide in her. She is calm and listens intently. She is wise in her advice, trustworthy and loving, and above all patient.  In fact, you know you have really crossed the line when Hannah gets upset because she is so patient. She is an anchor in this house.

People frequently ask how we balance her needs and the many needs of our ADHD kids. I think the answer is the same way we handle our ADHD kids. We treat her individually just like we treat them.  Looking to what she needs. We have treated all of our kids with the philosophy that each of us comes to this earth with strengths and weaknesses and our job as parents is to teach our kids how to strengthen and use their talents and conquer their weaknesses. She just has different weaknesses than the rest - she is allergic to bees and walnuts, she has terrible asthma, had to have eye surgery, she is quiet and reserved. While we were trying to get everyone else to control their actions and tone down their presence a bit we were pushing Hannah to be bolder. It has worked, and now as she is getting ready to step into the world as an adult and high school graduate (both events happened this week) she has come up with her own saying, "Why Not Be Bold!" She even wears a little leather bracelet with BB printed on it around her wrist to remind herself to step out of the shadows.

Capitalizing on her strengths has been the easier part. Like the rest of our children Hannah is a creative genius. Her amazing imaginative mind swirls with stories, drawings, characters, the perfect shot to set the perfect emotion sailing across the big screen.  In many ways she is a product of her natural talents and the free spirited talents and imagination of her siblings, which they wear so readily on their sleeve, unable to control or contain it. They like her are learning to find the right balance, each benefiting from the others struggle and experiences. And she is finding the boldness, last year it was applying to go to the California
Summer School for the Arts, getting accepted, and spending a month immersed in the amazing creative environment and learning they provide there. It was what gave her the courage to apply and get accepted to Cornish College of the Arts. It is that experience that will give her the courage to leave home in a couple

months, move to another state, and pursue her dreams.

We will not be the same without her here, she is a great part of the balance in our hearts BUT we will love her from here, support her in all the ways we can, and cheer her on her path as we do the rest of our children, each finding their own way, the way they will make a difference in this world.

Hannah, I know I speak for everyone when I say you are perfect for us and while it may not be normal, especially in our house, we love you and are so proud of who you are and who you are becoming.


Interested in other post about Hannah and her life as our only child without ADHD you might like these...

Studebakers and Bullet Trains

Creativity and ADHD Part I

Creativity and ADHD Part II

The Magical Drawing Fairy is Real

* all art work is the copyrighted property of Hannah Aro

Vacuum Tube Transportation and Other Strokes of Genius

I have to admit, the older the kids get, the more responsible they are for getting their own medication in the morning, the harder time I have managing when they are getting close to running out.  Then, I'm in a rush to call the doctor's office for refill prescriptions, get them to pharmacy, and get refills before they run out.  So, more and more I end up in the drive through line at the pharmacy with one or more of my kids.  They're there because they are completely unmedicated.  Best bet is to take them with me.

Interestingly enough, my 13 year old son was talking about the experience of being unmedicated as we were on our way to pick up the medication.  He said he kind of enjoys being with out medication at first - there's a sort of freedom to his thoughts.  He indicated that at first that is a fun feeling - ideas bouncing around in his brain like a hand full of bouncy balls that have been thrown down really hard on the ground.  A sense that he's carried by his brain - having no control over where it will take him.


But, he added quickly, there's a relief when he takes his meds.  A sense that control is on the way, that soon he'll be able to manage the thoughts running through his mind.  He'll at least have some control over what he thinks about and where it will take him.  What an odd paradox - the freedom feels good but uncontrollable and therefore a little scary.  The control from the medication feels safe but somewhat restrictive.

We were still very much in the "freedom of thought" state when we pulled up to the pharmacy's drive through lane - the one with the vacuum tube that sucks your payment and paper prescriptions up a tube and deposits them in the pharmacy and then sends the medications back the same way.  I thought my boys were going to have an aneurism they were so excited.

They wanted to jump out of the car and into the tube themselves. They wanted to take it apart.  They wanted to know all about how it worked.  They wanted to make a super large one that ran from our house to their father's work and stick him in it every morning to send him off.  Dad's 6 foot 3 - he is a big guy.  This was an amazing visual that they could not resist.  Can you imagine, they mused, somebody's standing at work and wooosh, "Hey, it's Mark.  Mark's here!"  The sound effects and scenarios filled the car.

But what if he got stuck?  Easy, all they needed was a gigantic plunger or maybe a bunch of gigantic plungers.  A hatch would open, the gigantic plunging system would fall into place and plunge until daddy was successfully dislodged and sailing through the vacuum tube once more.  I was slightly disturbed - they were in heaven.

My next stop was to take my husband his lunch and medication, since he is equally as bad at telling me when he's close to out of meds, great at telling me when he has taken his last day.  As he walked up to meet us at the car the boys couldn't contain their excitement - they were talking over each other explaining design and functionality of vacuum tube travel.  The sound effects were flying like bullets in a war zone.

What did Mark have to say about all this, "Hmmm, what if you got positioned in the tube wrong.  You could get a really horrible wedgie."  Well, that was an unexpected answer.  The boys loved it.  Jaren pointed out that they were not going to stick him in the tube directly - he would be in a pod of sorts, sailing through the tube underground.  No atomic vacuum tube wedgies.  Mark was not happy about traveling underground.  He was totally up for vacuum tube travel as long as he could be up high, have a sense he was flying, and a great view. 

I passed out the meds and bottled water.

It was time for a little thought management.  Freedom of thought is not bad thing.  Most of the time it's amusing and certainly adds a lot of humor into our lives.  I am sure that many of the world's greatest creations have come from moments just like ours when one thought sparked another until something totally new and revolutionary came to mind and then into existence.

One thing that all of my ADHD/ADDers have pointed out is that medication does not take away their creativity and, believe me, they are an intensely creative group.  The minds in our house are full of art to draw, music to compose, inventions to build, films to make, and novels to write.  Medication allows them to aim their creativity, to follow through with their thoughts.  It allows them to take a concept, have the wherewithal  to take out of their mind, and create it in the real world.  Not without struggle, but it opens up the potential and makes success plausable.

This same son, Hunter, who was talking about his love hate relationship with medication pointed out that one of the hardest aspects of ADHD and its co-occurring conditions is to have such great thoughts.  So many thoughts that completing any of them is a struggle.  One great thought knocks the other out of the spot light, then that one is knocked by another in never ending bombardment of great ideas. The medication gives him the concentration and focus to further that cascade of brilliance and carefully direct it towards a fabulous end.

Does that mean that those that can't take medication or choose to not take medication are doomed.  No.  We have a daughter who has recently gone off stimulants.  They aggravated her anxiety, impulsiveness, and some other ADHD qualities to that point where what she gained in focus was nothing compared to what she lost to these other symptoms.  She would be the first to tell you how hard it has become to direct those brilliant creative thoughts into tangible completed work.  She's having to master her brain without the benefit of a stimulant and it is exhausting.  It easily one hundred times as hard, but, definitely doable.  Especially, since she is aware of the battle that's raging.  Trust me when I say she has a lot of, "lost the battle but will still win the war" days.

We are still laughing about my big husband, Mark, sailing through the vacuum transportation tube with a wedgie, on his way to work, hoping to avoid getting stuck in the tube, and having to be plunged to continue on his way.  We will be for a long time.  It's not likely that this particular idea is going to be the one we see to completion - I'm not so sure it should be.  But there are many more where that came from, in my house and in houses around the world where these brilliant brains reside.

These are the brains that given the right support, encouragement, and tools will change the world.  They will change the way we see it, feel about it, and interact with it.  The trick for us as parents, teachers, and caretakers of this unlimited amazing potential is to remember the possibilities, continue to encourage, and direct even when we are exhausted from being up all night because that child has insomnia. Even when your teenage daughter is torturing the cub scouts because she's frustrated and over stimulated.  Even when your brilliant child is in danger of failing because they haven't turned in one homework assignment all semester and no one told you until it was almost too late to fix.


The trick is to remember and hold onto the knowledge that they are brilliant because of their unique BRAINS not in spite of them.

Warning: Objects in Motion Stay in Motion

We have a way of raising eyebrows and inciting laughter all at the same time.

Our shear numbers can be shocking.  Add to that a bunch ADHD and a lack of inhibition and we are pure entertainment.  It might make some people uncomfortable but for the most part people seem amused.  Sometimes they even laugh or comment on what fun we are obviously having.  That was certainly the case the other night when we met Mark for pizza. 

It all started with the jukebox and some Michael Jackson.  Toe tapping, then shoulders, and then everyone is dancing in their seats, even my husband, Mark.  A little singing along but restrained, well, restrained for our crowd.

On to some classic rock and head banging.

By the time Justin Beiber came on Rachel was singing to Hannah, "Baby, baby, baby, oh, baby, baby, baby, noooo!" and really getting into it.

Leaving we met one of pleasantly amused types.  The first question is almost always, "Are they all yours?"   Almost always followed by, "It must be a party all the time at your house."

Not always, though we certainly do have a lot of fun.  With so many people and personalities we certainly have lots of moments where someone is upset, angry, sad, tortured, depressed, traumatized.  In fact, some days it seems like I rotate from one drama to the next; but, not this night.


After pizza we were off to the grocery store where I couldn't help but think about the post I made the other day; Parkas in Summer, Shorts in the Winter.  I was remembering those days when they were all small and all held onto the cart.  In some ways life was a bit simpler.  In fact, I think I may have threatened to make them all grab a corner of the cart.


Yep, everyone in this picture at the grocery store is with me!

I wish you could have seen my expression as I looked up to this sight in the freezer section.  I think my head tilted to the side like a confused puppy!  I couldn't help but laugh when Fernie, a permanent fixture in our house and also ADHD,  went and stuck his head into the freezer case.  I was just about to ask what he was looking at when all of the sudden there they were with their heads down in the case.  He pops up, "I was just wondering how many would come and join me." 

It was a crazy fun night.  Truth be told no one was unhappy, no one was so far out of line that they were making the night stressful.  No one was sad or depressed or angry. 

Can you ask for more?

Life Used to be SO Simple

I was driving the other day and came up behind a truck with this saying plastered to the back window, “Life used to be so simple.”  WOW!  This was very profound and especially hit home this week which seemed to be the explosive culmination of several crazy weeks in which life seemed to go completely sideways. 

So here is why I have not posted in such an intolerably L O N G time.  It started with Hannah’s anemia.  It has been a while now - Hannah has lived a tortured existence of iron pills, multi-vitamins and gross iron rich food.  I can not see a difference.  She is still exhausted, weak, and in pain.  She stays home at least one day a week to try and catch up.

Enter stage right Mark who has decided that now is a great time to abandon good health and be sicker than I have seen him in nearly 19 years of marriage.  A sinus infection and Bronchitis?  Really?  Bronchitis is my game not his.  He has been saying for three weeks now, “Man it stinks to be you!”  I appreciate the empathy but I wish that he would have kept it at imagining life in my shoes rather than living life in them.  He is now on a second round of antibiotics, prednisone, and inhalers.

One week ago Mariah injured her ankle; it has been hard to take it too seriously because she did it while sitting on her bed.  Surely, you can’t do that much damage just changing positions on the bed.  Wrong, she hasn’t been able to put pressure on it for a week, she has a date with the doctor on Monday to try and figure out what is wrong.

So we start the week with three members of the team benched for injury.  We are strong, we plug on, moving forward as best we can, faced with a crazy busy week of writing tests and Blue and Gold Cub Scout Dinners.  We are plate spinning at our best juggling school, church, film, life just to mention a few.

We get to Wednesday.  It is looking like Rachel is getting a little congested but I am hopeful because Rachel, like Mark has a stellar immune system.

We are baking cakes for the Blue and Gold Cake Auction, making casseroles for the potluck, racing to the church, decorating.  I think we have arrived when we sit down to eat.  Ha Ha Ha - silly me.

As we finish dinner and are getting ready to hand out awards when there is a huge collision in the doorway.  Hunter was running to get one of the boys and the boy was running to get into the room for awards. 

You can see where this is going, but here is what I didn’t expect.  The other boy is taller than Hunter and apparently had his mouth open.  His teeth went right into Hunter leaving about an 1 ½ inch gash right below his eyebrow.  

Hunter is realizing he is bleeding and starting to freak a little.  Hunter is a little OCD about such things, often telling people, “I have safety issues.” 

The other boy is walking around clearly astounded telling people, “I have blood on my teeth, but it isn’t mine.”

I grab napkins and slap them on Hunter’s eye.  Rachel announces that we hate to eat and run but that is exactly what we are going to be doing.

I say stitches, the other parents are trying to console me, maybe a butterfly bandage.  Until one grandpa opens it a little and the adults, who are all gathered around looking intently at the wound, step back in unison and announce, “Stitches.”

Off we roll; I drop off kids at home, and take a couple of the teenagers with me, Rachel and Fernando (faithful family friend).  We are on the road for an hour long journey to the hospital emergency room.  Fernando is dedicated about keeping Hunter calm and distracted by talking about various weapons and video games the entire ride.

It does not look good when we get there and of course you can’t help but over hear the horror stories of people there for 6 to 12 hours. 

I call Mark along the way and he wants to meet us at the ER, he has been working on the film after a full work day at the news station and the doctor’s appointment that lead to the prednisone.  Problem he is dizzy sitting down and dizzier standing up.  Not looking like driving is a good idea.

Hunter is sad, Mark is sad….I am SAD but life keeps going and I have to also.  Wait, wait, wait, stitch, stitch, stitch, and we are out of there.  I am thinking this going to be okay.  We get a snack and hit the freeway when Rachel announces she has a bloody nose.

Rachel gets bloody noses pretty frequently so I am not too alarmed…at first.  This bloody nose just goes crazy, the craziest thing I have ever seen.  Blood is pouring out her nose and she is gagging on it going down her throat.  I am trying to find every absorbable material in the car - I am running out.

I am thinking I am headed back to the ER.

But first I have to get some more paper towels or something, so I get off the freeway and think mini-mart.  There are NONE open!  I finally find one BUT they don’t sell paper towels or any towel like item!  After my frantic description the attendant hands me a whole package of there bathroom paper towels and a plastic bag of ice.  Thankfully the bloody nose stops.  We go home.

Wednesday transcended into Thursday - pharmacies, flat tires, more sickness and so it goes, right?

Friday, as I drove Mary to speech therapy in one town and occupational therapy in another town calling home intermittently to check on ankles, noses, and eyebrows I saw that truck, the truck of truth.

Life used to be so simple!

What's ADHD stand for?

Jaren just asked me what ADHD stands for? Hmmm... How do I answer that question? The first thing that came to mind was not Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. The first thing that came to mind was CHAOS! Maybe it is because I always feel like I am swimming up stream trying to get all my ducks in a row and headed the SAME direction - something that is a constant battle and rarely happens. Maybe it is because I am still reeling from the holidays and I feel like my house has been turned upside down and shaken so hard that everything fell out. Maybe it is that today I am trying to keep three home schooled kids on track and working on school (ON being the operative term here) while their three older siblings are still on vacation and are gleefully following the random dictates of their mind - despite my continued efforts to redirect them to CLEAN CLEAN CLEAN!

More philosophically I think of their creativity, artistic drive, compassion, dramatics (both appreciated and sometimes not), their musicality and so much more driven by impulsivity and the moment of wonder when they are carried away by their incredible minds. I think of their struggles to reign in that amazing brain; to find balance and some measure of control. That simple question...what does that stand for is never very simple. A constant struggle carrying great blessings. Or as my ADHD husband, Mark says, "A gift with a heavy price tag" - that is what ADHD is to me and my family.