It's Friday night

It's been a busy week for us. My mom arrived safely Wednesday afternoon. Nanny Rebecca brought Rebecca to me at work so that she could go with me to pick Grammy up at the airport. Rebecca was so happy to see her Grammy (and vice versa). Grammy and Rebecca have been chums yesterday and today. They've been out to lunch and breakfast, taken trips to the bookstore, done art projects, and generally had a good time.

Ramy started a trial today, so he's been busy thinking of how to defend his case. Hard to believe I'm now 2 months into the internship - the time has FLOWN! I'm 1/6 of the way finished. Must get my stats program so I can analyze my data and get my dissertation defended.

Things are busy and stressful at DBH right now. One of the effects of the current economic condition is that there are now fewer millionaires in California and those who are left have fewer millions. A special millionaire's tax pays for mental health funds. Other funds for my department come from realignment funds, which come from sales and property taxes. Property values in San Bernardino County are one of the two counties in California that have been most impacted by the housing slump, property values have plummeted, and so property tax revenues have tanked. Then of course our budget crisis has caused the governor to retract more state dollars from Medi-Cal, which is our prime reimbursement source. The good news for us is that we have job security. The bad news is that we're going to have an onslaught of new clients. This is because they are cutting out reimbursement for fee-for-service providers, who we have been able to refer people to in the past (for clients who were able to meet share-of-cost). DBH will now be the only provider of mental health services for Medi-Cal clients. What's more, we lose the ability to screen people out for lack of medical necessity. Whereas we used to triage people and send them to fee-for-service providers if they weren't as serious, now they'll have to get full intakes and be referred for services in our clinics. My clinic is really expecting our workloads to increase. For me, it means I'll be doing a lot more intakes and a LOT of crisis interventions and 5150 (involuntary hospitalization) assessments. It won't really affect how many clients I see regularly, except for the fact that I'll probably only be doing very short-term therapy with clients. So it will be interesting, and that I'll get lots more experience that is great, even if a little scary.

I went to the graduation ceremony for the Perinatal clinic today. I was officially at my intern day but was able to slip away for a bit to attend. For the next graduation, I'll go for the whole thing, because I'll have some of my individual clients graduating, and I feel strongly that I should support them. It was a moving experience, because it was such a momentous occasion for those girls. I certainly haven't ever felt such intense pride about any of my graduations, because I haven't had to work so hard to get there. For most of my Perinatal girls, this is the only graduation they've ever had and it's the first thing in their lives they've actually accomplished. The graduation is a **really** big deal, and for the six girls who graduated, there were probably 100 moms, dads, step-parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, baby daddies, probation officers, CPS workers, and random people pulled off the street to whoop and yell as they got their "diplomas."

No pics, because the computer isn't wanting to read my SD card, for some unknown reason. Probably need to reboot or something technical like that. Hopefully will have pics soon.

Will you just look at these sweet faces above? I'm such a lucky girl to have these two to adore.

Another week in the trenches. Yesterday, I came home and was so exhausted mentally, but I couldn't figure out why. When I reflected on the cases I'd had yesterday, I realized that every single client I saw had a diagnosis of Major Depressive Disorder, Recurrent, Severe. All but one of them was Severe with Psychotic Features. Yeah, I think that will drain the mental energy out of anyone. Interestingly though, all the clients I saw today were bipolar. Lord help me if that means that all of the ones I see tomorrow will be schizophrenic!

I was briefly worried about Rebecca yesterday. On the way to work, Nanny Rebecca texted me to ask if Rebecca had been sick. Before I left, I had made Rebecca's blueberry waffle with cream cheese and gave her some raspberries to go with it for breakfast. She'd been eating it and watching Little Einsteins and was just fine. Apparently, Nanny Rebecca was in the kitchen making lunch to take with them to the beach, and Rebecca said, "I messy!" When Nanny Rebecca went in, she realized Rebecca had thrown up all over herself and the couch. Nothing else the rest of the day though. Rebecca played just like always, so they went ahead to the beach and she was fine. Odd that she would throw up with no sound or warning or anything. Not sure what happened, but glad it was apparently a one-time occurrence.

By the way, I don't think I've mentioned that Rebecca is fully in regular big-girl panties all the time now, day and night. For awhile, we'd done the pull ups if we were out and at night, more for our comfort than anything else. But we've gone all week with regular panties at night, when we go out somewhere, all the time, and no accidents. She still wants an audience to go with her while she uses the bathroom, but I suppose that's fine.

Also, have I mentioned to all of you that she's brilliant, on top of being so beautiful and funny? She knows all her colors and shapes, and she's been on that for quite some time. We realized tonight, however, that she can identify letters correctly also. She's doing well learning to write the letters. The "A" is kind of hard and it often comes out more like an "H", but she's definitely got the hang of it. She has lots of notebooks that she likes to use to "write." We have regularly nightly song-fests, with Rebecca's various CDs and acapella songs. She's also very interested in all kinds of pretend-play. She washes our hair for us, styles my hair (complete with her hairbows!), cooks food for us, and takes care of her babies and animals. Recently, she was trying to make Baby Lucy and Baby Sunny sit up on the floor to watch television. Baby Lucy's body was cooperative, but Baby Sunny's was not (Baby Sunny was the $2 dollar-store doll that had been "dressed" in cheap Native American garb and sold to us for $10 in Arizona - had we known how dear she would become, I might have bought a spare, because her construction isn't of the highest quality!). Rebecca tried so hard to position her. In a high-pictched, sing-songy voice, Rebecca says to Baby Sunny, "No be afraid, Baby. You be fine. You fine, Baby Sunny!" She then picked her up gently and lovingly and lay her on Rebecca's little chair, stroked Baby Sunny's forehead, and gave her a kiss. It was such a sweet moment, and I had just started thinking how sweet she is as a little mommy. That reverie was broken when Rebecca climbed up on the chair and stepped on Baby Sunny's face while she was trying to do something else!

Ramy and Rebecca are out for a run. Rebecca has special "running shoes" and she thinks it is a treat to be able to wear them to "ex-a-cise" with Daddy. Unfortunately, going for a "run" doesn't really seem to tire her out. Rather, I think it gives her a second burst of energy and she's willing to stay up much later than we some nights!

We're looking forward to Grammy coming to visit us for a long weekend. Rebecca understands that Grammy will bring her suitcase and come on an airplane to "mama's house." I'm not sure how I became the sole owner of this place, but the home in which we live is only "mama's house." Rebecca's house is the little shed in Costco (which has recently been taken down, now that they are moving away from outdoors/gardening merchandise and toward holiday merchandise - it was a tragedy!). Grammy's house is in "Tiss-see." Poor Daddy, he has no house, according to Rebecca! I guess it is lucky for him that I let him hang out here with me! Maybe that's why he's so awesome about house cleaning!

So here we are, ready to begin another week. This is my 8th full week on internship! Yay! The days are going by very quickly, most of the time. On Wednesday, I had a no-show on my intake. I had just come out of a meeting in a very cold room, and I couldn't get warmed up, despite having a sweater on over my clothes. I was trying to do some stuff on the computer, but I was sooooo sleepy. I decided to put my head down on my desk just to see how it felt. I so wanted to fall asleep, but I knew I had another meeting and didn't want to have desk marks on my face. I've got two testing cases I'm working on currently, I've got my co-occurring group at Perinatal, and I have a weekly caseload of six clients, plus others who are biweekly. That number will continue to rise, of course. I do 2-3 intakes a week, and then I end up having to do screenings, crisis interventions, and mental status checks at various times.

We had a pretty chill weekend, with no commitments. Just the usual church, shopping, laundry routine. Ramy got the carpets professionally cleaned on Friday, so the catpets were still wet until Saturday, but all furniture is back in place. We watched Slumdog Millionaire on Friday night, then A Time To Kill was on last night. Other than Rebecca's injury on Saturday, it was a pretty uneventful weekend. By the way, Rebecca is fine. All Saturday afternoon, I klept trying to check in her mouth. Finally, she heaved a sigh and said, "My mouf not hurt, Mama." No complaints when eating or brushing her teeth, so all must be well.

Some people to pray for:
Our friend Marilyn (AKA "Aunt Mimi") - I mentioned a couple of weeks ago that she had fallen and messed up her back. Unfortunately, she fell again and broke both ankles. Medical chaos has ensued in the form of some heart and lung problems, but, true to form, she's recovering from surgery on both ankles, but still has a host of other issues going on. She'll be moving to a rehabiliation hospital sometime this week, Lord willing.

Aunt Margaret is home after a couple of weeks of initial recovery at my cousin Lynn's house. Hopefully, she will be eating and drinking and gaining strength more now that she is in her familiar environment. She ventured out for lunch with my mom yesterday, so that's a good sign.

Laura Beck will be beginning the next phase of battle against cancer. She's been having terrible pain since her most recent slate of brain surgeries, and going into heavy radiation and chemo when you've already got intractable pain doesn't seem to be the best way it could happen. Please pray for manageable pain and her ability to tolerate her treatments, and for her family who have to be more exhausted and weary than there are words to describe.

One of my other honorary mothers (Donna) has a daughter (Kari) who is also quite ill. Her situation was grave, but she is improving and is off a ventilator. There will be many difficult days ahead though, and Kari and Donna both need divine strength to get through them.

My friend Julie's husband is still looking for a job in New York. Julie starts her internship next week. They got childcare for Addie, so she's all set, but it would definitely make the transition to being a full-time working mom a lot easier if she weren't also having to play a single mother! Please send an IT job raining down from heaven.

Speaking of jobs, our Nanny Rebecca's husband got laid off, and this is his last week. He's interviewed for a promising job, but no word yet. Please pray he gets good news in the form of a job offer!

And now for something totally different:

Some Rebecca funnies:

Sometimes Rebecca gets tired of my photo-snapping habit. I was taking pictures of her this weekend and she said, "No more pictures again, Mama." She held her hand up to the camera, just like a star trying to avoid the paparazzi!

When you ask Rebecca what her full name is, she says, "I'm Becca Cisneros and a Finapino!"

When Rebecca woke up from her nap yesterday, I was out doing some shopping. When I came in, she ambled over to me and got in the chair next to me at the dining room table. She looked sideways at me and said, "So, how's your day?" as though she is 30 instead of 2 1/2.

Somehow Rebecca has learned a bit about knock-knock jokes. In the car yesterday, she looked over at Ramy and said, "Knock, knock." Ramy asked, "Who's there?" Rebecca said, "Me!" Ramy, still thinking it might be a joke, said, "Me who?" Then she got a little miffed and said, "Becca Cisneros!"

Last night, Rebecca was lying in our bed while I was doing some ironing. She looked at the wedding picture of Ramy and me, which was on our dresser. Rebecca exclaimed, "You nook [look] so piddy in 'dat picture, Mommy!" I was telling her that it was from mommy and daddy's wedding day. About that time Ramy came in and Rebecca said to him, "You nook piddy too in 'dat picture, Daddy!"

What the world needs now...

...is love, sweet love.

This afternoon, Rebecca and I went over to the Shoppes at Chino Hills, because I needed to buy bras and she wanted to go back to Gymboree. Really, she did. I didn't even have to suggest it nine times or anything. It just happened to be during their Circle of Friends sale when everything is 30% off. Just as I had picked out the leggings that would complete an outfit, Rebecca decided to run toward me and not entirely watch where she was going. Somehow she fell and hit her face on the edge of a table. When I scooped her up, I saw blood and immediately felt panicked. I ran outside with Rebecca to sit down and survey the damage. Fortunately, the blood was only because she had chomped down on her cheek when she fell and had bit a chunk of flesh. Her wails turned to heaving sobs and she sputtered out pitifully, "Mama, I need a snuggle!" Convinced that no trip to the ER was in order, we sat there for a few minutes and snuggled and then my sweet little girl looked up at me, reached up to pat my face, and said, "I nov [love] you, Mama." My heart melted into a puddle right there.

Post-Script...Rebecca decided that this was a good opportunity to request a treat. She said, "I need ice cweam." We just happened to be in front of Hagen-Dazs, so I figured that was as much of a sign as we could get. Some cookies and cream seemed to make all better, and Rebecca fell asleep in the car on the way home.

Chocolate pound cake

Last weekend, I made a chocolate pound cake for Ramy's birthday (I told you, he wants it low-key). So I tried out Paula Deen's recipe. It was a hit! He wanted no icing or glaze. I topped mine with some fresh whipped cream, and it was great. I think adding a simple white glaze would have made it prettier and would have been a nice addition.

Here's the recipe:
1 cup (2 sticks) butter, softened
8 oz. cream cheese, softened
3 cups cugar
6 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla extract
2 1/4 cups cake flour
1 tsp. baking powder
3/4 cup cocoa (I used dutch processed)

Preheat oven to 325°. Grease and flour a 10-inch Bundt pan.

Cream together butter, cream cheese, and sugar. Add eggs, two at a time, beating well after each addition. Add vanilla. In another bowl, sift together flour, baking powder, and cocoa. Add half of flour mixture to cream mixture, beat until incorporated. Add remaining half of flour mixture and beat until fully incorporated. Pour batter into prepared pan and bake for 1 hour, 15 minutes. Bake for an additional 15 minutes if necessary, but do not open oven door to check cake for at least one hour into baking time.

A couple of my tips:
1) For this and other pound cakes, I like to use the Pam Baking spray. It stays a little stickier than if I grease with Crisco and flour on my own. So after I've sprayed the pan, I sprinkle granulated sugar all over the pan before pouring in the batter. It makes the crust on the outer edge of the cake extra crunchy and delectable.

2) Have you ever made a pound cake and cut into it and saw a spot in the middle of the cake that looked still wet, like it wasn't really done? That's probably not the case. That usually happens when the butter (and cream cheese) and sugar haven't been creamed long enough. I cream the butter and sugar (and cream cheese, if in the recipe) on high in my Kitchen Aid mixer for 4-5 minutes. It makes for a fluffier batter without that dense center.


I also made a chicken and wild rice casserole for dinner this week. Some of the rice still ended up being crunchy, despite the fact that I had actually combined all the ingredients and it had been sitting in the fridge all day before I baked it. So there should certainly have been plenty of time for the rice to absorb the liquid. C'est la vie. Ramy suggested (very kindly) that next time I should cook the rice in the rice cooker separately and then just bake the chicken and pour the sauce over both.

Daddy and Daughter Dancing

Birthday weekend recap (part 2 - dinner with friends)

After we'd absorbed all the...uh...culture we could stand at Venice Beach, we decided to head out out of the westside. We had plans to meet up with friends for dinner in Monrovia to celebrate Ramy's birthday. A couple of weeks ago, I had asked Ramy how he wanted to celebrate his birthday. My darling husband never wants any fuss over his birthday, so I had anticipated his response - "oh, something low-key." So we made plans for a low-key dinner with our friends Madeline, Paul, Vincent, and Brent (and their respective families). Ramy hates attention so much that he would actually have preferred that no one there actually know it was his birthday, but, alas, Maddie actually keeps up with that kind of thing. I'd originally wanted to have it at Ramy's favorite restaurant, Gaucho Grill, but Vincent clued me in to the fact that it had closed. So Ramy ended up choosing Claim Jumper, which ended up being a good idea, because it's a family friendly kind of place. With a 4 month old, a 2 year old, 2 three year olds, and a six year old, family-friendly was a good choice. I even went out of my way to be sure that he got his free dessert but that they didn't sing to him (nothing could be more mortifying to my sweet husband).

Although Ramy enjoyed his birthday and getting to hang with his closest pals, it was definitely Rebecca who enjoyed the gathering the most. She absolutely adores Madeline and Paul's daughters Ashley and Rachel. Rebecca didn't want to eat her dinner, because she kept wanting to go over and say something to Ashley or Rachel. Rachel and Ashley are such great little girls. They're super-sweet to each other and to Rebecca. They play together well and look out for Rebecca and get that she's smaller than them. Rebecca had such a good time with her gal pals.



Rebecca isn't quite so keen on little boys. She didn't have too much interest in playing with Matthew (to be fair, I think Matthew thought he had better things to do than to hang with three girls). She did mention to me later that Ashley and Rachel and she are "neetle [little] girls" and that Matthew is "a neetle boy." I was thankful for the recap. She went on to tell me that Miles is "a baby. He sad and sneepy [sleepy]," which was why he was crying so much at dinner. Rebecca was quite concerned about Miles' crying. When Rachel hit her face on the edge of the chair and cried, Rebecca was also deeply troubled and needed to analyze the situation to see if she needed to assist. She watched Rachel cry and got teary-eyed herself, had the lower-lip quiver going for a couple of seconds, and then seemed to realize that Rachel was going to survive and pulled herself back together.



When the neetle girls and boy were getting a little rambunctious and Baby Miles had dissolved into a full-on cryfest, and since we'd already finished dessert, we decided to head over to Maddie and Paul's house so that the girls could play together some more whiel we chatted. Rebecca had an awesome time. The girls rode ride-on toys in the entryway, then Ashely and Rachel took Rebecca upstairs to play in the dress-up clothes. Later the girls all came down in various costumes to give us a fashion show. Rachel and Ashley were Disney Princesses, and they dressed Rebecca up in all sorts of scarves and sunglasses.



The three girls had such a good time together. Rebecca had absolutely no desire to leave them, even though she was exhausted. She did, however, manage to stay awake long enough to cram a couple of dozen raspberries into her mouth in less than 2 minutes before we left. Maddie probably thinks we never feed our child, so she gave her a baggie of raspberries for the ride home. Rebecca was asleep before we got onto the street!




It was a great day. I hope Ramy enjoyed his birthday. It was a fun day with the family and good friends and I think it was low-key enough that it didn't weird him out with too much attention!

Birthday weekend recap (part 1 - Venice Beach)

Saturday was Ramy's birthday, and we really enjoyed celebrating it. I'm always amused by how different he and I are when it comes to our birthdays. He really prefers it to be as low-key as possible, whereas I don't really think a ticker-tape parade would be too over-the-top.

On Saturday morning, Ramy decided he wanted to spend the day at Venice Beach. So off we went. For all of you who haven't ever been to Venice Beach, it is the epitome of every bad stereotype about California. There are freaks everywhere. It's great spectator comedy.



On the boardwalk, there are all kinds of stores that no one in polite society would ever admit to entering. Any kind of sick, twisted, perverted, crude, crass, sexually explicit, funny and even not-so-funny t-shirt can be found in one of the shops. You can also find every sickening scent of incense you'd ever need, along with all kinds of "art," and there are several stores that sell nothing but bongs. Of course, you can receive "spirital counseling" before or after getting either a real or henna tattoo or have some of your chakras cleansed before you get a piercing (yeah, I have absolutely no idea what I just wrote).



And for the health conscious, there are all sorts of medical establishments on the Venice Beach boardwalk. Does that seem surprising? If so, I should urge you to think of "medical" quite loosely. More specifically, there are all sorts of hole in the wall places staffed by physicians who do evaluations for medical marijuana. At the same time, you can also get botox! I actually think it might be important to be stoned before you get a paralyzing toxin injected into your face. Some of these places have big signs out front telling you what symptoms and conditions meet the standard for the law allowing prescription of marijuana.



What were we doing at Venice Beach, you ask? Well, before you change your opinion of us, let me tell you that we weren't getting body art or weed or anything like that. Rebecca missed a good bit of the spectacle, because she was still in the napping frame of mind.



The birthday boy and I ate pizza while we people-watched.



After we'd taken in enough vulgarity, we strolled past Muscle Beach (where people looking to get discovered for their abs like to work out) and then hit the sand ourselves. By this time, Rebecca was wide awake and ready to participate in the action. She's still a bit skeptical about all the waves coming in, but she has no qualms about the sand.



Look, here's my foot in the water of the Pacific (yeah, I know I need a pedicure).

I know you all think I'm kidding...

I know when I say that Ramy eats weird fishy things, people think I'm exaggerating. But here's an example. This is what Ramy ate for lunch.



It's a whole fish that has been dropped in a deep fryer...eyeballs, fins, and all.



The poor fish didn't stand a chance.

Jesus Loves Rebecca

A birthday wish to Daddy

Dear Daddy,
I know you are the most wonderful daddy a little girl could have. I have so much fun with you, watching Family Guy on television with you, dancing with you, running together in the park in our running shoes, sharing your "steek" and "feesh," and having fun. You are my hero! Mommy and I are so lucky to have you, and we both love you so very much. Mommy hopes I don't get all of your sense of humor, but she says that I should try to be just like you in every other way, because you are so wonderful! Thank you for taking such good care of me and mommy and for loving us so much. We both adore you!

Love,
Rebecca

For your Friday entertainment...

Boy, it's been a really heavy week!

No one could possibly get you in the TGIF mood better than Rebecca. We often pull up random music clips on You Tube (like the FreeCreditReport.com commercials), because Rebecca enjoys dancing to them so very much. Apparently, she is a fan of the late Michael Jackson. While we probably won't be making a pilgrimmage to the Neverland Ranch, it's a pretty funny thing to see. Please forgive the shaky camera work - sometimes the camerawoman was shaking with laughter...or was trying to avoid any shots where Rebecca was mooning the camera (we're potty training and she does better commando!).

Batteries and sappy movies

The great tragedy of the Cisneros household last night was that Rebecca's flashlight (a gift from Grammy) ran out of battery power. It had just enough juice to actually come on when Rebecca pushed the button but quickly dimmed to nothing. Rebecca thought it was broken and was dissolved into tears. We tried to explain to her that it needed batteries. Well, Rebecca knows where the batteries for our various cameras are, so she ran to the drawer and pulled out some AAs and the rechargable battery for the camera. Alas, this flashlight takes D batteries, and we had none in the house. My friends, it was simply a crushing blow. We told her we would buy some batteries at the store tomorrow (today), but she was brokenhearted that her "fash-ite" was "boken." I thought the storm had passed and that she had been sufficiently distracted by something else. Not so fast - this girl's memory is razor sharp. She came in the kitchen with a mournful face, looked up at me, and said, "Gammy is sad." I queried as to why Grammy was sad, and she explained to me, quite piteously, that Gammy was sad because the "fash-ite" was "boken." The Lord provides batteries like manna for little girls so saddened, because Ramy located some D batteries and the "fash-ite" was "shining." Rebecca was so happy that she had to fall asleep with flashlight in hand! This afternoon, Rebecca told me that Grammy was happy the flashlight was fixed!

Tonight, we were watching Roman Holiday on television. Rebecca watched with great interest, especially in the kissing scenes. She commented, "Awww, they kissing!" When Audrey Hepburn's character was leaving Gregory Peck, Rebecca said "ohhhh, he sad. Poor man, he sad!" She looked so crestfallen when Audrey Hepburn didn't come back!

As I'm typing this, however, Rebecca has a tambourine and is is signing quite loudly. Clearly, all is well in her world!


Please say a few prayers for some people near and dear to us:
Today is my father-in-law's birthday. Ramy's dad is, sadly, not very aware of his surroundings and likely won't see another birthday. It's a difficult time for everyone who knows and loves him. It's a terrible thing to lose a parent and terrible to recognize that the father Ramy has admired and adored for so many years has actually not been with him for several years now, even though he's still here physically. I regret that I didn't have the opportunity to really get to know my father-in-law, as I believe that many of the qualities that make Ramy the incredible man he is are traits he emulated of his dad's. I'm sad that Rebecca got cheated out of both grandfathers and that she will only know their influence through the examples and stories we share with her. It's going to be a hard time coming as Ramy has to say goodbye to his father, so please think of him, Lydia, and the rest of his family.

Aunt Margaret is recuperating after her CABG and pacemaker surgeries. It's a slow recovery, but we hope she'll be feeling good again soon. Rebecca has been quite concerned about "An' Mah-get in da hospital. She not feel good!"

Lisa Grubbs is having her ostomy reversal surgery tomorrow. Please pray all goes well with her surgery and that all her "plumbing" remembers its important function! Our Mrs. Joy will be spending some time with Lisa and her boys as she recovers, so we pray she has a safe trip.

Aunt Mimi (Marilyn Craig) took a bad fall and may have done damage to her back. She's having an MRI to see if there is a fracture that may necessitate more surgery. Please pray she doesn't have anything more serious than bruising and swelling and doesn't need anything more than rest and maybe some good drugs!

Julie and Adelaide ("Miss Ju-eee and Ad-dee") are settled in their new apartment in New York, and Julie will be starting her internship in just three weeks. Derek still hasn't landed a job and, although he's out there with them right now, will be returning to California to wait it out, unless he gets a job offer this week. It's a really stressful time, so please send some prayers for a good IT job for Derek, a fabulous childcare situation to fall out of the sky, and for Julie to have an easy transition to being a full time working mama. (Like me, Julie's been used to having a lot more time with Addie than being away from her, and she's gotta transition in a new environment without much support!).

More things to remember

Our crazy Rebecca comes out with surprising new phrases and sentences all the time. In keeping with trying to remember them, here are a few:

Friday afternoon, Ramy had put the television on the Asian channel, which shows several Filipino programs every afternoon. Yes, for you Tennessee/Alabama people to whom this is a new concept, the shows are all in Korean, various Chinese dialects, Tagalog, etc. And the news on the Filipino news show is all two weeks old. I don't know why. Anyway, Ramy was watching it, although I'm not sure why, since he doesn't speak Tagalog and all of a sudden, Rebecca piped up and said, "I'm a Fin-a-pee-no!" We have no idea where she learned that bit of information or when she learned to say it for herself!

Yesterday, I made chocolate cookies. When I gave one to Rebecca she squealed, "For me? Ohh, tank you, Mama. Is de-nish-us!"

Last week when Rebecca was staying with my mom, they had done a craft project where Rebecca got to glue little foam pieces on a sun visor. Of course, it was tres chic when she was finished. She was wearing a little pink pillowcase dress my mom had made her, but she accessorized her ensemble with a denim belt, the sun visor (with some of her foam stickies falling off), and bronze sandals on the wrong feet. She looked up at Grammy and said, "I bee-u-ful and I happy."

"Beautiful" is an adjective that Rebecca claims as her own. I came in from work one day and Rebecca climbed on top of me and said, "Mama, you look bee-u-ful"! She put a hairbow in Sydney's hair and told Sydney she was "bee-u-ful." The same night, I mentioned Nanny Rebecca's name, and our Rebecca piped up and said, "My Nah-ee Becca is bee-u-ful!" She also refers to her new big girl bed as "my bee-u-ful bed."

Rebecca is very in touch with feelings right now. Saturday morning, she and I were sleeping in, and she rolled over in the bed and looked at me and said, "Hi mama. I NEED a snuggle." So I snuggled her up next to me and she said, "You happy?" I assured her that I was happy. She said, "I nov [love] you, Mama." How could anyone's heart not melt with that? She then followed it up by saying, "I nov Daddy too. And Daddy novs Becca. And Daddy novs Mama. And Mama novs Daddy. Gammy novs Becca. I nov Gammy too. I nov Ha-ee Syddy [Paddington and Sydney] too. I nov Jesus too. And Elmo too." I'm glad she included Jesus on the list...even if he was stuck between the dogs and a furry red cartoon character.

Speaking of Jesus, I wonder if he laughs about the ways in which he is implicated in our nighttime routine. There is a crucifix just above our bed. Rebecca points to it frequently and tells me it's a picture of Jesus. One night, when Ramy and both REALLY wanted to go to sleep but Rebecca did not, I was listing all of the people she knew who were asleep. "Grammy's asleep. Aunt Brenda's asleep. Aunt Mimi's asleep. Miss Julie and Addie are asleep..." Rebecca chimed in with, "Aunt Mah-get's as-eep. Ha-ee Syddy's [Paddington and Sydney] as-eep. Baby Ooo-cee's [Lucy] as-eep. Jesus on the wall as-eep."

Rebecca has learned the beauty of excuses. Some of her favorites are, "I'm seepy," "I scared," "Jus' a minute." She's also learned the art of procrastination. Any time she dumps out a big assortment of toys/blocks/things with many small pieces, we generally remind her that when she is done playing with them, she'll have to pick them up. She's usually pretty good about doing it, but sometimes she pulls out an excuse to try to get out of it. Saturday night, she and I had a battle of wits over one such incidence. She had dumped out all her Disney characters all over her bedroom floor. When she was done playing, I told her to pick them up.
Rebecca: "Jus' a minute."
Mama: "No, now."
Rebecca: "No, I seepy."
When it was obvious that didn't work, "I scared."
Then we had a brief stare down, and I pulled out the dreaded counting to three routine. 95% of the time, I never get to three. Unlike a lot of people who don't follow through, Rebecca knows that me reaching three is an unpleasant way of her being forced to do whatever she was instructed to do, so she usually hops to it and does it herself. This time, however, she decided to be defiant. So I picked her up and made her pick them up. She did a good job but missed one that was near the edge of the bed, so I pointed it out to her. Rebecca heaved a giant sigh and said, mostly under her breath, "Oh come on!" I wonder if this is a glimpse of her teenage years to come."

Weekend

This week went by so quickly, I can't even believe it! I'm constantly busy at work now. I have my schedule kind of nailed down into somewhat of a routine. On Mondays, I have an open time at 8:00 to see people who just got discharged from 5150s and have to get triaged for follow-up care. Then I have a scheduled intake from 9-11. I keep Monday afternoons open for testing cases. On Tuesdays, I have an open time in the morning to do crisis interventions and walk-in appointments. In the afternoon, I have a couple of individual appointments and then I have supervision. On Wednesdays, I have 8:00 open for crisis interventions, screenings, or crisis walk-ins then scheduled intake from 9-11. I have a child treatment team meeting from 11-12. In the afternoon, I have individual appointments and time to get paperwork done. Thursdays, I'm at the Perinatal clinic. I have supervision with Dr. Thorn at 8:00, then I'm in the clinic to see the girls come in with their babies, before the Co-Occurring group. Then I go into Co-Occurring Group but generally only stay for about 30 minutes before I start pulling people out who need individual appointments. I do 3 individual appointments before lunch. After lunch is the All-Staff/All-Client group. I can pull a couple of people out of it for individual sessions, if needed, or I stay in the group and help keep it to only mild chaos. The girls are done for the day at 3:00, but some of them have to do their urine tests, and it takes awhile for them to get the kids collected and ready to go. Then I have supervision with the clinic director Jane and do all my notes from my sessions that day (I don't note between sessions there, because I do 45 minute sessions with clients, back to back so that I can get 4 appointments in 3 hours, which leaves no time between for charting. Fridays are the intern day, and we have an hour of general internship business, then we have an hour for a case presentation, then we have two hours for a speaker/training session, and then we have our countertransference group and we're done. We have really great trainings, I have to say. This week, we had a training on narrative therapy, which was something I knew nothing about. I am not sure how well I could employ it at County, but it would be great in a college counseling center or private outpatient clinic where the clients are a little higher functioning!

I had some really difficult cases this week. Sometimes, honestly, I am sitting with clients, hearing all this stuff and I half-expect a cameraman to pop out and tell me I'm being filmed on Punk'd or something. Some of the things we hear are just unbelievable. Some are unbelievable because it's hard to believe all the shitty things that can happen to one person in one lifetime, and some are unbelievable because they are so crazy, you wonder how they ever made it into the building. I had a client this week who was an Ambassador for Jesus "which is a dangerous thing to be in this day and age," because the WORLD GOVERNMENT is run by Satanists, but he gets messages sent to him from the television from God through a headset implanted in his brain. However, the five voices he hears can also hear those messages and they are always threatening to tell the Satanist government about his missions, so he has to scramble the messages from God so they can't understand them. He has auditory, visual, tactile, and olfactory hallucinations. This person looked like a cross between the Unabomber and Charles Manson. What did I do with him? I took his story down, scheduled him with a triage appointment with our psychiatrist, made sure he got a nice big shot of Haldol, and sent him on his way. I also had a very nice, but quite severely mentally ill client who kept looking at the pictures on my wall. In between questions, he stands up to get a closer look at one of them. THen he said, "That guy [Ramy] looks really familiar. Is he a lawyer? Is he in the Pomona courthouse?" UN-BE-LIEVE-A-BLE.

Anyone who thinks we don't need a national healthcare overhaul with universally guaranteed coverage is completely welcome to come spend a day in my clinic.

One of the highlights of our week was that on Monday, we bought Rebecca a big girl bed! We didn't go to the store intending to buy it, so we didn't have the truck with us and Ramy had to go back and pick it up on Tuesday. We made the mistake of telling Rebecca that Ramy had gone to get her big girl bed, so when he got back, she was convinced it was going to be all set up and ready to go. So as to not disappoint our daughter, Ramy commenced with the assembling of said bed around 8:30. Of course, her crib was still up in her room, and there really isn't enough room to have them both up. So we had to get the crib out. The crib wouldn't fit through the door. Ramy took the door off its hinges so we could get it out the door and stash it in our room for the night. Of course, that would have necessitated taking another door off its hinges, which seemed ridiculous to us. Instead, he unscrewed the gate from the stairwell so we could take it (fully assembled) and move it down the stairs. We could then move the new bed (which had been assembled downstairs) upstairs and put it in place in Rebecca's room. At this point, it was well after 11 p.m., and I was quite cranky, since I'd awakened at 3:45 to take my mom to the airport that morning and had really been keen on an early bedtime. I'd like to say that Rebecca hopped into her new bed and we all fell asleep, but of course that would be too simple. She hopped into her bed, rooted around for awhile while we read stories, and tucked her baby dolls and favorite stuffed animals in with her. Then she hopped up and announced she wanted to go to bed...in our room, in our bed, of course! Since then, she starts out the night in her bed and eventually ends up in bed with us. Oh well, she won't want to do it when she's in high school, I'm pretty certain, so I'm not sweating it.

Thursday

Boy, this week has really flown by. I've been super-busy at work. My mom left on Tuesday and is safely back in Tennessee. My aunt Margaret is still in the hospital - she had a little heart arrhythmia setback and needed a pacemaker put in. They think she'll be discharged tomorrow, however. At least it happened while in the hospital and not when she was at home alone.

I've had a lot of clients this week, which makes my days extremely hectic...but fast! I finished up a testing case and got the report done last night so that I can give it to my testing supervisor today. On Tuesday, I had to go to an uber-boring training session. I'd gotten up at 3:45 to take my mom to the aiport for her 6:00 flight, and then the room for the training was chilly, dark, and had comfy seats. I thought I'd die of sleepiness. I thought I'd go to bed early that night, but alas, we had to put together the big girl (toddler) bed we'd bought Rebecca. This project began at 8:30 p.m. and ultimately necessitated us taking the door off her room and manual labor to maneuver the crib down the stairs. At least it is put together, and she finds it a great novelty, even though she doesn't spend all night in it (last night, she started out the night in the toddler bed and then came into our room and got in bed with us in the wee hours). Oh well, she'll get there and probably won't be sleeping with us when she's in college.

Back to the rat race

Gosh, weekends go by so fast now! I get out early on Fridays, so it is nice to get a little jumpstart on the weekend. However, I definitely miss having those extra two days a week off. My weeks at work seem to go by fast, probably because I'm only at my regular clinic on Mondays-Wednesdays, then at Perinatal on Thursdays, and we have our intern day on Fridays. This past Friday, we started our countertransference group, which was interesting and will certainly get even more interesting over the coming weeks and months, because our group has some bold personalities. My first month of internship is already finished! That's hard to believe - I'm 1/12 of the way done! Hopefully these next 11 will go by just as quickly.

We had such a nice weekend. Friday night, we ate dinner at a great little hole in the wall Italian place in La Verne and went to Target. On Saturday, we went to Carrow's for breakfast and then went to Victoria Gardens. I had to return and re-buy some stuff at Baby Gap that we bought last weekend, which we could then get 30% off for...but of course we ended up with more stuff rather than saving money. We ate dinner at a fun little 50sish diner. Yesterday morning, we went to 7:30 mass, which must have been a bit early for Rebecca, because she fell asleep on Grammy and slept all through church! Afterwards we got breakfast at Bravo Burger (I am in love with their breakfast quesadillas and Rebecca can certainly put away some pancakes!). We went to Brea Mall to pick up some new shoes for Ramy's birthday and also to buy Rebecca some "running shoes" that fit and that she can put on herself.

My aunt Margaret's surgery on Friday was successful. Now we're just going to keep praying that she will continue to do well and that she'll be coming home early this week, after no complications.