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Chasing Joy

Chasing Joy

Category Archives: Uncategorized

transitions, holidays & scratching

02 Friday Nov 2018

Posted by Suzanne Buchko in Growing a Daughter, Journaling My Days, Uncategorized

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Tags

Boston, education, family, home, politics

F8FE9971-36D3-4C2F-9DAF-16512D3E1919State of my world:

Julia’s head scratching has not abated with the delousing and aftermath.  She is losing hair and areas without hair are increasingly visible to the casual observer.  I think she is doing most of her scratching at night before she goes to sleep and when she is alone in the bathroom.  Anxiety, habit, stimming or something else?  Years ago, the way she finally stopped scratching her skin was on a three-strike-and-she-was-sent-home-from-school program.  It was radical and it worked.  I don’t know right now how much scratching is going on at school — I’m checking.  I don’t think that school staff would be willing to put such a discipline into effect.  Of course, if it is mostly at night, that it wouldn’t work anyway. I am in full worry mode.  We will visit our doctor next Tuesday and her shrink on Thursday.   OT is working on it as well. Needless to say, I am without control.

I spoke with a local reporter yesterday about Shabazz High School and my experience last spring when Julia applied for admission and was first asked for an interview and then rejected before the interview took place.  I talked about inconsistent messages and requirements, and apparent exclusion of kids with IEPs.  I told him that just before school closed for the summer and we were about to travel, how I got a call that they were reconsidering everyone who had applied and was rejected.  (I don’t remember if it was rejected without interview.)  Julia couldn’t interview before traveling and when we returned home, I check out the requirements again.  Julia had been summarily rejected for not doing grade level math.  Neither the requirement for doing grade level math nor her math skills had changed.  I decided not to put her through an interview.  I acknowledged to the reporter that the school has been good for kids there and I didn’t want to jeopardize the school for those kids.  And yet, what of kids like Julia?  I am conflicted. Continue reading →

19 Thursday Apr 2018

Posted by Suzanne Buchko in Travels with a Daughter, Uncategorized

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

Australia, travel

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Sometime in February, I decided that we would be going to Australia this summer.  I have both  a friend and cousins in Sydney.  I nailed down timing—Julia’s spring extracurricular, the Penguin Project, has a closing night of June 24.  Cheer (crossing my fingers that the new coach will allow Julia on the team) begins around August 1.  With those date in mind, I bought Quantas tickets in the middle of March.  Unfortunately, I bought them two weeks before a sale and paid a few hundred bucks more, proving that there is no way to insure the best price for plane tickets.  There is a recommended time frame in which to buy international tickets and I was right there.  I had seen a sale around Christmas but I wasn’t ready to commit.  There was no way of knowing that Quantas would have another sale.  I wonder if a travel agent could have done better? Continue reading →

Florence

04 Saturday Jul 2015

Posted by Suzanne Buchko in Uncategorized

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Siena

04 Saturday Jul 2015

Posted by Suzanne Buchko in Uncategorized

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Chase Joy with Us

We are a young artist on the autism spectrum and her warrior writing mom making family and discovering the world. Home is Newton, Massachusetts in a blue house where we are spending ALL our days and nights. We’ve loved traveling together and we hope to do it again when COVID19 is a memory. Visit awhile, read and comment. Nothing like a good conversation to keep us all sane during this unexpected adventure.

Check out Julia’s art blog: https://quarantineart.wordpress.com

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Italy 2015

Pizza with procuiltto. Better than pepperoni!
Pizza with procuiltto. Better than pepperoni!
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Waiting for the taxi
Waiting for the taxi
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Duomo of Siena
Duomo of Siena
View from inside the Doge's palace.
View from inside the Doge’s palace.
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First impressions, lasting memories.
First impressions, lasting memories.

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