How long have I been sleeping?!?

Where have I been?

Working and sleeping it seems.

Work is sucking all the energy I have right now.
Hopefully after this week, I'll get back in the swing of things.
So, week 2 and I wouldn't go as far as saying I enjoy my job, but I do enjoy the quick connection I have made with the kids.
Each day I learn something new about them, and I've also quickly picked up the need to knows.
I'm more comfortable with jumping in whenever assistance is needed.
My one on one has been in and out of school for the past 2 weeks, so my days have been kind of slow.
The one thing that speeds up the day is being able to play my guitar for a solid hour.
The kids connect so well with music, it's amazing. Absolutely amazing.
You should see how much it calms them down and how much they LOVE it.
That time of the day is the only time I see them sitting still and quiet...
And for most of them, that's hard. Especially for a long period of time.
Heh, You might as well call me Raffi, cause I've had to switch it up and learn childrens songs.
Ya know, such hits as: The itsy bitsy spider, You are my sunshine, apples and bananas, and my all time fave- The ABC song.
Only the classics.
It's been fun, but man! My fingers are raw. In fact, it hurts to type right now.

I shall continue this tomorrow...

Sleep it off.

I've had a long/rough day and I just really need to sleep it off.

This has been the longest week ever. The days are SO slow and get even slower the last hour of work.

My student has been out all week, with one tiny appearance on Tuesday.

I did get to meet her for a bit.

She's adorable and the sweetest girl. We're going to have a good time and many laughs. I can already tell.
When I was introducing myself, I asked her if she could say "Ms.Sanchez"
She looked at me and said "Of course" she thought about it for a bit and said "Ms.Sandwich"
I wanted to laugh out loud so bad, but I didn't want her to think I was laughing at her.
She is one of our verbal students, but still not so clear.
I have to say that it is quite humorous when the students are learning my name.
Through out the years I have gotten:
Ms.Chest, Ms.Sunkist, Ms.Sanji,and My all time fave- Ms.Sunchips.

This week, since my student has been absent, I've spent most of my time working with the other kids and getting to know them.
One student in particular you have to be super careful with.
You say or do something wrong to upset her, she quickly will turn on you.
This then turns into Punching, hitting, kicking, screaming, scratching, biting, spitting, cursing, pulling your hair or what ever is free to grab.

This was all stuff I was warned about on Monday before she arrived.
Well, today I got to experience all of that. It broke my heart.
It happened so fast, i'm not even sure what triggered it.
She quickly became upset, started spitting, super tight grip on the hair- it took 2 other people to get her to let go.
As soon as I was able to get away, she began punching herself and screaming so loud. It was awful. At that point, I didn't know what to do to calm her down.
I could tell she was trying to control herself, but she just couldn't do it.
As I was trying to calm her down, she was screaming and crying out "sorry sorry, good girl, good girl"

The other teachers said to leave her and let her get control of herself and that the more attention I gave her, she would only get worse.
As much as I hated to, I had to walk away.
Tears started to fill my eyes.
I felt helpless and annoyed that there was nothing I could do to calm her down.

I've experienced other meltdowns before and controlled them just fine. But this one was by far the worst I've ever seen.

Later on she snapped out of it and was happy as could be and acted like nothing ever happened.

I have to learn again what it's like to be in this environment again. I have to learn not to get so attached and so involved. Not to take things personally and most of all, toughen up and get control of myself before I handle the situation at that time.
Talk about draining.
It can only get better from here...right?

At this time, it is way past my bed time and I'm ready to crash.

Rm 600

Day one and all I have to say is Wow.

Today went well, but I'll be honest, there was a point where I had a horrible attitude.

I feel that I was a tiny bit mislead in my interview.

I walked in to a totally different environment than expected.

I'm in a classroom with 6 adults and 5 students. All of which are girls.

Each student has a one on one. Which is usually ideal and what the parents want, but most schools don't have that in their budget or they shaft Special ed completely and work with what they have.
Luckily these parents have fought for it and succeeded. That's awesome.

So here's the deal. The deal that I wasn't expecting.
I'm back in the severely disabled classroom.
It's been a while since I've worked in that area.
Not that there's anything wrong with that, it's just a tad bit harder and a lot more draining.
Don't get me wrong, I'm blessed to even have a job right now. It's just that I had plans/wishful thinking of not being in a classroom again and being able to work in full time ministry as my career.
It'll happen. I just have to be patient and do what I have to do until then.
I'm trying really hard to have a positive attitude about all of this, and stay motivated.

I didn't get to meet my student today. She was out sick.
I did get to hear a lot of stories and study her IEP a bit.
She is the highest functioning kid in the classroom. Verbal and mobile, unlike a couple of her classmates.
She's 13 and the center of attention. All eyes and attention are on her. She is known as the "DIVA" of the classroom.
She LOVES music and knows every Disney, High School Musical and pop song out there.
Good to know we have a couple of connections already ;)
In her case, she has something called Wolf Hirschhorn Sydrome.
Wolf-Hirschhorn syndrome results from the deletion of the distal short arm of chromosome 4. A genetic error.
It causes malformations in most parts of the body because the genetic error affects- fetal growth and development.
Some of the symptoms of this disorder include:
Distinctive facial features such as prominent forehead, wideset eyes, and broad beaked nose.
Brain and muscles - profound mental retardation, small head, seizures (50% of individuals), low muscle tone, poor muscle development.
Bones - very short stature, facial deformities, malformations of hands and feet, chest, and spine and heart defects.
She suffers from seizures here and there, but those are pretty controlled.
She also has Prader Willies syndrome.
PW is an obsession for food and to eat continually without control and everything & anything in sight. Whether it's in the trash or on the floor. It doesn't matter.

I'm excited to meet her and I know my attitude will change as soon as I do.

I think today was just a bit overwhelming, unexpected and exhausting.

I came home and slept for a solid 3 hrs...in my work clothes.
I usually can't sleep during the day, but today - no issue at all.

In other news:
I traveled to NOVA Sunday after church, in hopes of selling my car to either of the 2 possible interests.
They were both pretty promising and seemed one of them was ready to go with the cash.
To make a long story short, One wasted his and my time and the other flaked.
Gah.
So, the car is still up for grabs.
It's parked in front of the Keipi's house right now and Mr & Mrs. Keipi are passing the word on to the people in their ministry.
*Sigh*
Soon enough, it'll be out of the way. Right?

Ok, I can't keep my eyes open much longer, so I will have to end here.

CHEERS&JEERS:

Cheers: I looked super cute on my first day...ha. Classy, yet youthful.
Jeers: I came home yogurt and other unmentionables on my clothing.


Cheers: Getting to hang with Aaro and Graham for a bit during the car escapades.
Jeers: leaving Alexandria later than expected and ended up being pulled over in front of my house with the Mr.Policeman questioning if I had been drinking or not. Heh.

First day of work!

I'm about to get in the shower, but had to write a little something!

Today is my first day of Work at Norge Elementary. Woot.

I'll be sure to write about it later tonight.

But first, check out my badge. It's waaaaaaaaaaaaay better than my FCPS picture. Ha.


Alrighty, Catch ya later.

Sunchips is back.

Yep, that is correct.
I received the call this morning. I got it. I got the job.

I'm back in the classroom.

I will be at an Elementary School with Special Ed.

I will be working specifically one on one with a student.

At the moment I'm not sure of the disabilities or age of the child I will be working with.

It's always a challenge stepping into new surroundings and learning about a new student.
So much goes into working with Special Ed.
It's more than just learning their name.
You have to learn each and every thing about them, and their disability.
You study that IEP until you know it from beginning to end.

Not to sound uber cheesy and what not, but It's SO rewarding working with special needs.
I actually prefer it over regular ed.
They are brilliant, disability or not. It's amazing how they connect with you and only you, and know every emotion and feeling without you displaying it. They know.

Heh, Do I sound like I've been doing this for 7 years?

Man, I'm old.

Anyhow, My prayer would be to be able to connect with the student and understand him and his needs. Patience and a lovely work environment. :)

It's time to put my professional pants on.


CHEERS & JEERS:

CHEERS: Hooray for being employed again, after a month of free time.
JEERS: Not having that much free time.

CHEERS: Making monies.
JEERS: James city county not paying as much as Fairfax county. HUGE pay cut.

CHEERS: Chatting with my brother everyday. He's a character, that Paul Sanchez. Cracking jokes, making me laugh. Just like the good 'ol days.
JEERS: Calling me "Yoko" and finds it fitting for my new, short do. Not funny.

CHEERS: The overly friendly Williamsburg community.
JEERS: So friendly, they feel the need to "holler" at me as I walk to my car "Dang, I wanna tap that. Can I tap that? Hey, i'm talking to you"

This is the one and only time...

Ok, don't make fun.
Just a little video instead of the forever long blog I usually do.

Ya dig?

Old friends, New lives, Marriage and such.

I just heard that one of my friends from back home (tx) is getting married in a few days.
I didn't even know she was engaged!

Ya see, there was a group of girls that I hung out with in high school and pretty much up until I moved to VA.

We were close.
We were in sports together, classes, youth group, musicals and even trouble... but only the good kind.
Most of our mothers taught for the school district and one of our dads happened to be a judge in our hometown. So..only the good kind of trouble (I promise mom)

They were even set to be my brides maids when I was planning a wedding.

I'm just saying, It just makes me sad that we have lost touch over the years and we have missed out on so much in each others lives.
I mean, I can't speak for them (with each other), but I'm totally out of the loop. SO much that facebook has to be the "life updater" to let me know that one of them is engaged or getting married.

I miss them all very much and plan to keep in better touch. In fact, phone dates are already in place.

Heh, it's kind of funny.
I was the first of our group to be engaged (7 yrs ago..wow) and then break the engagement.
And now, they are All or soon to be married.
Now I have ended up to be the last.

But that's ok. It doesn't bother me so much. Being single these days doesn't bother me as much anymore.
I mean, I should be freaking out because of my age....right? heh.

Although, the one thing that DOES bother me is when you haven't seen someone in a long time and one of the first things they ask you is "are you seeing anybody?", "how's the love life?"


I think my response has always been "It's not a priority of mine right now." or "I don't have time"


Lately it seems to be the most popular question. Some one just the other day told me that they were going to find me a "man".
I'm surprised.
It kind of died for a while and now it's back and ready to attack!

Great.

So, what do I say about it now?

Don't get me wrong, If the opportunity ever came up, I would make the time and make it a priority and give it the attention a relationship needed.

But what people don't understand is, it's not my place (or theirs ) to make it happen.
Song of Songs 8:4

It's the same thing I tell my youth and it's the same thing I tell adults.

Go about it the right way.
I've learned Many of lessons and still healing from those lessons too.

There have been interests before. Heck, I was even engaged. But it was not of God's interest, so I had to let go and move on.

Trust me. It's not worth the other route.
Been there, done that, Have the t-shirt...in multiple colors.

All I can say is, God knows.
He knows my heart and my deepest desires.
He and His timing will let me know.

So there. That is my answer to THE Question of the past 2 weeks.



I can be patient....can you?



CHEERS & JEERS!

CHEERS: Enjoying a day at the beach. Beautiful weather, good company and Waves that knocked me over on several occasions. That was fun
JEERS: The waves knocked me around so much, I was sliding around all over the sand and snagged a few "sand burns" Ooouuch.

CHEERS: Starting off my week with a phone call from the school district ready for an interview.
JEERS: Not being able to sleep due to the excitement of a possible job opp.

CHEERS: Being able to share things with friends and knowing that they're going to listen (even if they don't want to)
JEERS: Realizing, after the fact, that there's just some things you don't share. Even if you're dying to get it out of your system.

CHEERS: First time ever going to an interview with tattoo's and nose piercing :)
JEERS: Praying that the spiral part of my nose ring doesn't stick out during the interview.

CHEERS: Spending time with some of my close friends last weekend.
JEERS: losing a few of those friendships a bit at a time.

CHEERS: Finally getting to see Sarah McBalli!
JEERS: Not getting to spend much time with her :(