Being a vulture

I think everyone remembers the "Snoopy Vulture" in Peanuts.
My cat, Little Garfy. does the same thing and has the same look as Snoopy. Little Garfy sits on the printer and stares down as if to let you know that he is watching and it is likely that your hands will become dinner if you don't stop typing soon.

Paying attention to the little things, like the kitty who is doing the kitty rub to get your attention is kind of like what goes on with the boy.

The boy is doing a "Vulture" look- which as a Mom, I believe is from him being insecure. His insecurities stem from a lot of different things. From his hatred of his Aspergers, to his appearance (clothes) to him telling me that he was not happy to find out that something potentially could have been posted on You-Tube. (Thank you to the person that told him it was a hacker. He was absolutely furious.) The You-Tube posting thing has him almost paranoid. I keep telling him it will be OK and no one will do anything like that without his permission. He isn't buying it right now.

The sad thing is, it happened MONTHS ago. Really, it was a long time ago according to the calendar. Every time he gets worried or nervous about it; to him, it is like it happened yesterday and we are back at reliving it all over again. It is like a bad "B" rated movie that never seems to go away. The cuter half and I work hard to distract him and to tell  him not be be concerned. Which, if you think about it, really hacks the cute one and I off that we have to relive the entire thing all over again...with the boy leading the pack of anger, frustration and all the rest.

As far as distraction go, we were fortunate in that there was a cooking contest at my office. The boy has had a positive push this week. He entered the cooking contest and won. It's done for fun and it really is a blast for the participants and the eaters. For him to try, especially after his Mom gives him the "talk". You know the "talk": "It's not important if you win, or if you place. It's important that you tried and maybe you improved." He did improve. He is more experienced with flavors and tastes and what looks good and tastes good than before. He won. I was floored. I texted him right away but it still took me 20 min to convince him that his good friend and I weren't "Yanking him around." and that he really did win.

It isn't often a kid like ours wins. It was perfect timing. He was fussed about the postings he saw....the contest came at exactly the right time. It built him up a lot. He tells us he rarely wins anything any more so this was huge for him. His ability to expend himself beyond his comfort zone is what the cuter half and i have been reaching for. Now to explain password security to him and see how far that goes......

Oddly enough, it is the important people that we know that are the most supportive. They back him up, remind him to study, tell him to work harder. Encourage him....and try to understand him, and the cuter half and I. We are fortunate that they have been willing to take us on....and on that venue we have been learning about social networking sites and we are doing well with what we have but the boy is still very particular. He showed me his "blocked" list and it is longer than I thought it should be. He is still overtly cautions and not very patient. Like with his parents, his ability to "Suffer fools" is probably lacking terribly.

Although most friendships for him are at all appearences different, we are lucky in other ways. We have the friends we have and are happy that things are the way they are. We are taking more time now to expand with television programing (much to my chagrin) and the boy is watching things that he never would have bothered with before (Jersey Shores is still too trashy for him- thank goodness)