Skip to main content

A Rough "Re-entry"

We recently returned home after being "on the road" for about ten days.  We visited family and friends back on the East Coast and it was a great trip. Going to Maryland, we did it in one day - it takes about 10 hours. Coming back home, we stopped in Cleveland for the night. It's nice to break up the trip a bit, since it's only about 3 1/2 hours back to our house.  I'm glad that we have our minivan (especially on long trips), because it gives us lots of space. We have over 150,000 miles on it, but it keeps on going!!  Whenever we travel, the first thing we do when we get back home is unpack the car.  Since we were traveling for over a week, our minivan was packed with stuff.  It took a little while to unload everything.  The hubby is very predictable after a trip, he will take his suitcase upstairs, unpack it all, and then announce to me that he is already unpacked. This time, Lauren also unpacked her suitcase quickly, I think because she didn't have many clean clothes left and she was hoping the "laundry staff" would do a few loads.  A few hours after we got home, Lauren and I went to church and then headed to Kroger to get some essentials, like milk.  We got home and then the hubby needed to run a errand.  We had dinner in shifts, the kids first and then the hubby and I later.   On the Monday that we returned, the hubby went back to work, Lauren had an appointment and Dominic had music therapy.  On Tuesday, Dominic went back to summer school.  The rest of that week was jam packed and we all had multiple things going on every day.  I, like the hubby, am also predictable after a trip.  I NEVER unpack my suitcase as soon as we get home.  It typically takes me the better part of a week to fully unpack. Sometimes the suitcase makes it upstairs to my room, sometimes it spends a few days in the middle of the living room floor.  I think it's actually easier to keep it there, because it's only about 25 feet from the washer and dryer. Why take all the dirty clothes upstairs, just to bring them back down to wash them?!?!?! Yesterday, neither kid had anything going on all day - the first time since we've been back from our vacation.  The two of them just "chilled" all day - I think they were both completely exhausted.  I was telling the hubby that coming back from a vacation is kind of like "re-entering" the earth's atmosphere - sometimes it can be a bit of a "rough" landing!  You go from not really having a schedule or a routine to having one again.  How about you? how long does it take until you and your family are back to your routines after a vacation??  A few days?  a week?? longer??

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Those "Steps" to Independence Can Be Hard

We are heading towards 600 orders for Dominic's business. Since our long-term goal for Baked Goods By Dominic is having a "brick-and-mortar" and hire those with disabilities, it is essential and imperative that I continue to teach him all parts of the business. Since I prompted Dominic for so many years for speech, he has become "prompt dependent." What that essentially means is that he will look at me for a prompt, like, "what do you do next?" I do that one a lot. Dominic has been going to a private speech therapist for over ten years and she reminds me often that Dominic usually will know the answer, if I am patient and wait for him. That has been a very hard habit to break! Dominic has an incredible memory, so I put it to the test this morning. I didn't write out the steps, I wanted to see how much he could do completely on his own. We have a customer picking up his order today, but the only thing that had been done is putting the cookies into t

Why We Pursued Guardianship of our Son with Autism

Last Thursday morning, my husband, Dominic and I went to our county's Probate Court and had Dominic's Guardianship Hearing. My husband and I are Co-Guardians, and we were granted "Partial Guardianship," which means Dominic can make some of his own decisions (future educational and vocational placement options, what to wear and how he wants to spend his free time), but my husband and I will make his medical, health care, legal, contractual and major financial decisions. The subject of Guardianship in the disability "world" has been and continues to be a controversial and divisive topic.  I was a panelist for an Autism Conference this past summer and presented on what it's like to have a child with Autism. Towards the end of my presentation, I mentioned that Dominic had just turned 18 and that we were going through the Guardianship process. When the attendees could ask questions, the first person that went up to the microphone started telling me that I was

Presume Competence

Since we have traveled outside of the United States since Dominic was very small, we have had to get him a Children's Passport every five years. Since his current one expires in February of 2024 and he is now 19, we had to apply for an Adult Passport. I don't know why my husband and I picked Dominic's first day of school and Michigan State University moving in their students, but the appointment was yesterady at 3 p.m. We had gathered all of the documents needed and then went into a special room in the East Lansing Post Office just for Passports. The three of us sat down and the clerk asked Dominic his age. He said, "19." Since we were also getting his picture taken for the Passport, he went into a separate room, where she took a picture of him and then let him look at it to make sure he liked it (it will be his picture for the next 10 years)!  He said he did, so he sat back down with us. The clerk filled out a bit more of the paperwork and then she let Dominic s