How NOT to help us get through this.

How NOT to help us get through this: (Nathan’s A.D.D. ishy brain getting help with stuff and medications)

• Tease us about being late. Especially tease ann about being late. Esp. if you didn’t know ann before she was dating younger people and was known & respected for her on time- ness. We aren’t having fun with this and the lite hearted joking other people think is funny is the fights and cryin later that you don’t see. The lost sleep, the stress, the lost income, and its just freaking painful.  Ann is not an “im just late” kind of person. Being seen for who I am is paramountedly important to me, so being teased about being late just hurts on all the not sexy ways.  It would mess this up if ann heard something about being a partner who chooses quality of time with her partner who has time management issues and getting teased vs. doing things separately or bailing on him.
• Sit in judgement on ann for doing a crappy job when she didn’t want the job at all. After the experiment with tyler working at home and ann learning that ann HATES telling other adults what to do. Ann did NOT want to be nathan’s coach. This is why Ann is NOT a dominatrix. She fought the job (nathan’s time coach) for 6 months before agreeing to do  it for nathan just after tyler moved out. She has hated every minute of it and been trying to get out of that role for years. There isn’t a single damn thing that I have been coaching or trying to help Nathan stay on track on that I wasn’t basically forced to by the short hairs pulling on to accept the role of. So judging for not getting it right, or thinking I am enjoying it, or basically anything other than saying -”hey I see how hard this is for you, I see you trying, I see you REALLY love this person or wouldn’t be willing to do this at all” is not going to be helpful. IF you really want to help, do it for me. Someone else take the job; I don’t want it. I want to be the girlfriend, not the boss or the coach. We have tried for over 3 years to switch out of this role. We have tried him going to school, we have tried him working outside of house, we have tried him working with other people. As below, the issues come up at school, at other work, not here and not because of ann. Am I getting it right? Probably not,  just tell me who the frick to hire and I would be thrilled, but wait, that would help, wrong essay.
• Tell us we shouldn’t have had kids. None of us knew these challenges in concentration were going to get worse before we hatched the pups and it isn’t about the pups. So unless you are willing to behead one of your own offspring step off that subject. Either help or stop being righteous about it. Nathan’s issues have gotten worse at a time after the puppies were already born. We literally lost one of the puppies because we couldn’t WAKE up when /mori was stressed,we were so damn tired we couldn’t get the crate rail up right and we lost one of our babies because we were too tired and didn’t get it right. the grief there and then having people think we would ever want to not have our others…. I do not understand the callousness some people have shown. The timing of parenting and morning stuff was already a challenge and it’s made the stress fractures bigger but those issue were already there. They (our fuzzy children) are here, there are staying and they aren’t the problem. The dogs we already had AREN'T the damn problem. Blaming the real issues we are coping with on the children isn’t fair or kind. Letting other people do it and not telling them to stop isn’t kind either. IF Nathan had cancer it is unlikely that people would think it made any sense at all to say - “well, it was that third kid that did it, have less kids that tumor will clear right up, faster than chemo”. These things need to stop being conflated if people are going to have any empathy at all or be able to actually be there for us. Nathan’s health issues are NOT about the pups. It affects the pups, it’s created difficulty caring for them. So does asthma, so does a car accident. So either help us find ways to be good parents while we are having the physical and head/brain health stuff or STFU -even when we aren’t there and if you hear people running us down about it think it through and ask if you really want to be around people who do that. Be kind. This is our family.
• Try to force Nathan into stereotypes instead of understanding how hard he is trying. “Man up” “grow up” “just do it”. Not helpful. Nathan isn’t having fun with this. Please stop having fun at his expense or oversimplifying a complex issue. Oh, … yeah - wait… it's because he likes computer games, don’t forget to make that a thing.. (as if he has time to play anymore)
• Most important - best way to hurt us and divide and conquer: assume ann made the rules and is running the show and emasculate Nathan by thinking he’s just blindly following. Just blow right past the thought that maybe he signed up for the whole package voluntarily AND then realized he had challenges AND then keeps getting up and that he has a partner who’s stood by him even when it’s not possible for him to meet the goals HE set.
• It would probably totally mess up the not helping if people actually appreciated how much fire and broken glass we have walked over to try EVEN with all the shit we’ve had come up. Try to remember not to tell us that it is kind of amazing that we keep getting up together even with the hits we’ve taken.
• So if you want to make it harder dig those heels on into the idea that Ann just randomly assigns shit and has control issues and isn’t trying to keep her head above water to regain some stability and control of her own life and her own world. It’s good to turn a blind eye to the fact that ann actually had a life where things were paid on time, where she owned 3 properties, had riverfront property, was semi retired by early 30s, had successful career and a full on life where there wasn’t the late, the money messed up, the stress of trying to understand people not being able to get up on time with their own alarm, manage their own schedules, and just plain “do” life”.  I have spent the last 10 years in service to the people pack, the last 20 in service to the woofers. Is ann a control freak? Yep. I miss control over my own home being clean. I miss knowing things are safe. I miss my bills being paid on time and being able to control my money. I miss control over my own sleep. I miss being known for being a good budgeter and good with money and good with time.
• I miss losing control and getting to be the one who has the sleeps, who gets to have the crying days and who doesn’t have to lead, so it’s good to keep reminding me I like to be in control or I might get confused and think I prefer to feel … like feelings.
• So if you want it to hurt while it’s being hard, keep not seeing that. Keep thinking I have an agenda of controlling those I love.

AND if you want to help us through this…. Just reverse engineer this letter.