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Thursday, May 17, 2012

Tough Love Freebie

So Monday is was a horrible sore throat. And Tuesday I was SO without energy ALL day long. Today? Migraine from HE Double Hockey Sticks. Oh yeah. I woke up at 5am in serious pain. I took an imitrex and a few crackers, and woke up again an hour later puking. Then at 7am, I took another imitrex and a dose of excedrine Migraine and 3 more crackers, and managed to keep those down. And felt HORRIBLE. I had Tom and Eme help get the little boys to school. My standards were , different clothes from yesterday. That's all I asked. Sometimes that good enough :)

CPT came home around 8am to get ready for work, and when he was getting ready to leave, he gave me a blessing. I went back to sleep, and set my alarm for 9am. I needed to meet a lady about a Miche purchase outside the gate at 9:30am. And, I felt TONS better. Still had the headache, but it was do-able. Thank you, Heavenly Father and my sweet husband and the power of the priesthood!!!! I'm very blessed to have that in my life!!!

I finished my business, and headed back home. And didn't even change my clothes for my 11am meeting. I was wearing flip flops, jeans, and a hoodie. And a bandana. No bra. Oh yeah. I felt THAT bad. And I didn't even change my purse shell. You know I feel like crap when I don't change my shell! LOL!

CPT came and picked me up, and we headed to PEAKS to meet with the therapist, then with Jake. And she was SO much better than the therapist that was there back in November when he was in for anger. SO much better! CPT and I were very impressed. She 100% agreed with the diagnosis of Aspergers. She said he was very typical Aspergers. And she said she was VERY proud of us for being so pro-active in our approach and the changes we were making in our home and family. And she said that it sounded like a residential treatment facility for a time would be good for him. He isn't making good enough choice to come back home right now. I agree.

We talked to her for a good hour before Jake came in. And the beginning of the visit was good. He seemed happyish to see us. But by the end, it was more of what we would expect. "You are ruining my life". Typical teenager rage. He asked to be taken back to the unit. The therapist said that she'd talk to him. We were all very calm, and tried to explain to him how serious what he was doing was. And how we were only trying to help him because we loved him and cared for him. But, of course, he's young and doesn't see that. He only sees that we are trying to control him and take away his freedoms.

We left PEAKS, and headed over to Marriage counseling across town. We were a bit late, but still got most of our session in. Then CPT dropped me off at home. And I had about 30 minutes before the bus got there. Leigh came over to chat real fast, and let me know that my Miche order was at the door!!!! That was FREAKING lightening fast! I'd JUST put the party order in the day before!!!! Less than 24 hours, and I had the order! Oh yeah :)

I spent the next 30 minutes dividing the stuff up. Julia came over and helped. She took hers and her sisters, and we bagged everything up. Then I worked to get everyone ready for baseball. Eme headed off to Piano. Tom and Eme were staying home with CPT (when he got home from work) and were going to scouts/activity days. I was taking Joe and Jim to baseball. I'd canceled my den meeting because of my headache. I was still there. I re-medicated on the way to baseball.

We left a few minutes early to pick up pizzas. I was in charge of main dish. And didn't feel like cooking. I hate buying fast food, but yeah, I wasn't prepared. So pizza it was. Yuck! Oh well.

We got to practice early, actually. And had fun visiting. Practice got over at 6:30pm, and we ended up letting the kids stay and play forever afterwords. I still felt like crap, and wasn't looking forward to driving home. So I just sat there chatting longer. And before I knew it, it was 8:15pm. We'd talked until dark. Finally, we gathered our kids and all headed home. I really enjoy those girls. Julia and Kari and Laura. I'm gonna super miss Kari when she moves in 2 weeks! Even though I joked with her and told her that I wasn't going to, that I was just going to replace her! hehe ;)

I got home, and put the kids to bed, and blogged real fast before CPT and the other kids got home from church activities. And it's 9:30 now. I'm headed to bed early. I need some sleep. Tomorrow, the bug guy comes to spray, so I have to be home in the morning. I'm gonna bake a cake, I think. Laura might come to hang out. She's pretty cool. Did I mention that she's Canadian?

Oh yeah, and just so there wasn't any questions, all 5 of us moms who got Jake to pee in the cup have special needs kids. Aspergers, full blown autism, bi-polar, HFA, PDD, you name it, one of our kids has it. We know how to deal with it. We are good moms. There was no yelling. There was no shaming. Julia held his hand and said calm words to him the whole time I was in the bedroom talking to the therapist. There was a lot of love and support going on. A lot of "We are doing this because we care about you". Just throwing that out there :)

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Wednesday, May 16, 2012

Tender Moments Freebie

OK, so my friends have skills. And my friend Julia wrote a BOOK! How freaking cool is that! She had it e-published last week! And I wanted to share it with y'all! Click HERE to download it!!!
Born to Guardians—gifted humans who battle demons and protect human souls—17 year old Rose lacks the abilities her family has used for generations to fight. When she and her father figure, an age old Warrior, are wounded in a demonic ambush, Rose rails against his replacement, Ouriel, who vows she can survive only if she learns how to protect herself from the demons she never intended to fight.

So, not feeling too good the last few days. Sore throat. Tired. I'm definitely coming down with something. Today, no sore throat. Luckily, I had a work order on the house, so I had to be here in the morning. I just bummed around, and waited for the worker dude to come. In my jammies. Yeah, I'm hot. It was high class :)

After he left, CPT came home for lunch, and helped me clean up. I had an "It Works" wrap party at 1. He did the dishes, cleaned the c ounters, swept, and mopped! He freaking rocks!!!

The party was fun. It was supposed to flush toxins, tone, and whatever else it does. It must have got lots of my toxins, because it gave me a headache. Mostly, it was fun to try it with my girl buddies. I don't know that I'd do it again, but it was fun to play.

By 3:30, everyone was gone, and it was time for the bus. All I know, is that now I was freaking exhausted. Totally wiped. I hung with the girls for about 30 minutes at the bus stop, then headed home. And I laid down until CPT came home. I was in a major stupor for the rest of the evening. And my head still hurts. And I'm sleepy.

I managed to get Eme her uniform up to her for volleyball (CPT dropped her off, but she forgot it), and then go up and get her afterwords. And then check a few things online. And get this blog post done. Major accomplishments, I know.

And Jake called, wanting to know if I was coming to visit. I said no, because we had prior commitments to sports. He was a little disappointed. But mostly because he wanted me to bring him and the kids hes been hanging out with there some playing cards. Sorry, Jake. That's not why you are there...

Anyway hopefully after some niquil tonight I will feel better in the morning :) Wish me luck!


Click on the link below to go to my account to download the PNG file, and leave some love if you like my work. Thanks


Monday, May 14, 2012

Quick Update

So yeah, I fallen off the edge of the earth. OK, not really. But it seems that way, huh? Things got REALLY crazy and serious around here. Seriously.

We got a tip from Kari's son, Justin, on Wednesday night, that we should buy a home drug test and use it on Jake. And that's all the intel that we got. Hmmm, strange. Really? But I took the advice, and bought it late Wednesday night, and woke him up early on Thursday morning, and directed him to pee in a cup. If it's good when you are doing a pregnancy test, it should be good for a drug test, right? Made sense to me.

Anyway, he claimed that he didn't have to pee. So I made him drink water. Still didn't have to pee. Hmmm. Strange. Doesn't eVERYONE have to pee first thing in the morning. Time went on, and still no pee. I got the other kids ready for school and off to the bus, and he was still being adamant that he didn't have to pee. Aspergers kids can be like that, though. And he swore up and down that he wasn't doing drugs, so that he shouldn't have to take that kind of a test. He's a great liar, reguardless of whether or not he was using. I told him just pee in a cup, and we could clear up the whole thing.

Still, no pee. He told me he was just going to go to school. Go ahead, I told him. And I'll just come on down to the school, tell the administration that I wanted to get you out of class for a drug test, and haul your butt back home. Sigh. Kari and the girls texted, and soon I had 4 other moms in my living room for backup. Kari and Kim and Julia and Erin and Me. Oh yeah. Power in numbers, right? CPT was at the range, so he didn't get to experience the fun day.

Well, he eventually did pee in the cup. No one can resist that much mom power. I took the pee cup into the bathroom to test it, and changed into workout clothes. We were gonna go hiking after getting the results back and dropping him off at school. Finally, I looked at the results.

Positive for marijuana. NOT what I wanted to see :( He had done that, and a lot of Spice.

I came out, set the pee cup on the coffee table, and asked the group of moms what we were gonna do now. It got super quiet. Group decision time. I was glad to have all those wonderful ladies there for me. I've never gone though a teen drug user experience before. I was at a loss. None of them had either, but we were all in this together! We also decided that all of our kids 13 and up were gonna be taking drug tests today. The group voted :)

We talked with Jake, and he gave us some answers. He had been using for about 2 months at the most. He was using during PE. At school???? Sigh. Alex was his dealer. No last name. He liked the way it made him feel. He didn't want to stop. Yes, these boys were his friends, because when he'd tried to buy the harder stuff (which he really wanted to try), they wouldn't sell it to him. Sigh. It's not fun listening to your son talk about drugs in such a frank manner.

Anyway, I went in the bathroom and called his therapist to find out what my next move should be. She said to take him back to school, and inform the school. So we did. And like dummies, we didn't search his person. Apparently he had a Spice (synthetic pot) pipe on him! Which he later passed off to a chick in English.

So off we went. We got him signed back in, the asked to speak to an administrator about a serious offense committed on campus. And with 5 of us, we got attention super fast. 3 administrators in the conference room within 5 minutes. Oh yeah. We're gonna pull the mom power card all the time!

They took us very seriously. We told them the situation, and they wanted to know more about the Alex character. I told them to WATCH Jake closer, and to make sure that it didn't happen again. They were gonna switch him out of PE also. And that was all for then. Off we went.

We went and got some lunch, then after lunch, we drove around post looking for things to help with teen drug use on post. And mostly got the run-around. Not so good.

CPT and Joe had hockey practice at 6pm, and Tom had a teacher appreciation evening at church. Tom was SO excited about it. I took Tom, and CPT took all the other kids. Well, while I was at the evening with Tom, I got some calls from CPT saying that he was talking to Jake, and Jake was saying how he would rather die than continue to talk to his dad. And CPT had been talking to Jake's Psychiatrist about PEAKS, and that was what we needed to get him admitted to the hospital. Suicidal thoughts. Technically that counts :)

So during the teacher meeting (which was SUPER nice, BTW, CPT dropped off the little kids with me, and he and Jake headed off to the hospital in NM). We finished off the eveving, visited with Tom's humanities teacher, then headed back home.

Tom babysat, and I headed out for a girl night. Veronica and Kari and Kim and Terra are all moving at the end of the month. So it was our last Girs Night Out before the move. And I didn't wanna miss it. Even though I was upset about the days events! I'd asked CPT several times if he wanted me to go and meet him at the hospital, but he said he was fine each time. OK :)

So yeah. That's where we are. The next day after, I was pretty upset. I didn't feel like doing much of anything. My friends all went to the beauty school for Mothers Day make overs, and I couldn't bring myself to do it. I was bummed out.

But by the day after that, I was good. And CPT and I had come up with a plan. We decided to donate/throw away EVERYTHING that he owned. It was pot stained anyway. He and his friends sprayed body spray/cologne on themselves to mask the smell. So everything stank of nasty cologne.

I threw away all of this clothes. And his stuffed animals. And gave away his hot wheels. And thew away his nerf guns. And light sabers. And everything. If you are going to do the crime, you are going to do the time. We threw away his bed. And he lost his bedroom.

It's back to the closet for that child. And I threw away his backpacks too. I went to savers today, Monday, and bought him khaki slack shorts. And I will cut out the pockets, and sew them shut. And I bought him polo shirts. And some slacks. Oh yeah. Don't mess with me, kid. I'm not playin'.

And, when he goes back to school, I'm going with him. To each and every class. To lunch. To before and after school. No more bus. I will make his life hell. Just like he as made mine. I got you, Jake. I got you :) Be this a lesson to all you Harty kids. DON'T DO DRUGS. It DOES not pay. I will find out. And you will lose. Jake, you picked the wrong parents to mess with. I will not turn a blind eye on your drug use or bad behavior. I know that Aspies turn to "self medicating" as a coping behavior. Not acceptable in this house. Find a better way.

I just found out that you can buy Marijuana drug test at the Dollar Tree.... Interesting :) I think I may need to make a stock up trip before my child comes home :) Random drug tests WILL become a way of life for a while in my household.