missmaryr

My son Philip tended to experience chaos throughout his education.

Part of this was due to his parents being divorced. He stayed with his father and stepmother for a time because he got along with with his stepbrothers and his father could not stay with one job, so he attended six schools within seven years. He endured a lot of bullying at two of them. As a result, his stepmother tried homeschooling all the children. This failed, but with one good result. Philip was tested, and we discovered that he had Asperger's Syndrome. Children with this problem often need medicine to focus, and are bully magnets, but desperately need socialization. The psychologist testing Philip insisted that he must go back to school. On hearing that he was going back to the school where he was miserable, Philip threw a tantrum, demanding to come live with me. He was in seventh grade.

Pissed off, my ex-husband called, and when I consented to take Philip, demanded that I do so immedately, in the middle of the semester. I gathered later that he believed that no matter where Philip was, he would be bullied, and he would want to come back when he discovered this fact. My ex did not know that the Christmas before, I promised Philip that once we hit summer, I would get him back if I had to go to court to do so. I didn't want to move him from a familiar school in the middle of the year. For some reason, he never told me about the bullying until after he came to live with me. The school district where my other son, Charlie, attended had and has strict rules regarding bullying, and the class Philip attended decided to support the new kid instead of give him trouble. When I had my first meeting with the school counselor and Philip's teachers, going by the rest of the recommendations of the psychologist, we discovered that Philip did not need the IEP (individual education plan) as previously thought; with the security of knowing he would not be tormented, Philip thrived within his classes and made solid progress.

Two weeks later, Daddy calls telling me to bring Philip back, right after I asked him for the child support he promised. Before this, we each had one child, and so there was none even though he made considerably more than I did. I told him that Philip was not a ping-pong ball, but I gave the phone to Philip when he asked. Philip said, and I quote, "No, I don't want to." That was the end of the matter. Both sons visited with their father about once a month, and after a time I had Daddy's wages garnished for the child support. Surprisingly, he never held that against me, and everything settled out.

In his first semester of high school, Philip ate lunch with his brother. Charlie was and is a big, quiet boy, who made the other students uneasy because they weren't sure what he might do if challenged. I never thought of this, as Charlie did not get into trouble in high school except once, but one of my sisters, who is also a teacher, enlightened me. She said, "I wouldn't mess with Charlie, and I promise you, neither will anyone else." She was correct. As a result, Philip, who is slight and small, did not encounter problems either, and by the time the semester changed and they no longer sat together, Philip found friends. He did well in high school, and took a lot of science and math, including some engineering classes.

Here, chaos reasserted itself. Figuring he would have no more trouble in college than he had in high school, he decided to go to college at a fairly large state school. He also stopped taking his medicine. He failed out. I insisted that he try the community college nearby. His first semester at the community college, he did not fail out but did not do well. When I told him he had one more semester to bring his grades up or he was out of school, he straightened up and did much better. Unfortunately, this put him an entire year behind, as the engineering classes have few teachers, and run on a strict schedule. But he buckled down and retook the classes he made poor grades in, bringing up his GPA and getting back on track. Once again he made friends, and matters became more organized. He entered his second year confident again, and again did well.

The final semester for most-Philip would have to take a summer class to get in one non-engineering class- holds a class called Design Project. Due to having a mostly absent professor-not mentally absence, but physically absent- the students were on their own after the project itself was decided on and the parts purchased. Philip and his partner worked together weekly to get the machine built and the programming done, with many a stumbling block, but that was part of the nature of the project. Nothing was graded along the line; the grade depended on getting the work done and recording progress along with way with a journal and weekly e-mails to the absent professor to report successes and problems. The notebook comprised a significant part of the grade, with strict rules regarding how to record progress so that backtracking was difficult. Both partners put a significant amount of work into the machine.

Exam weeks at any school creates tension. Philip wound up with a term paper and two exams on the first day of exams, while trying to finish the project.He recorded his work Wenesday, but included a lot of detail in his weekly e-mail about his Thrusday and Friday work, and so did not put it in his journal. Finishing the term paper on Saturday, having worked on the project for hours the prior Wednesday, Thursday and Friday, Philip began studying for the two exams on Sunday when he decided to take a break and record Thursday and Friday's work.

He came into the kitchen wild-eyed. "I can't find my journal for the Design Project," he said, as he made quick, jerky gestures. "That's a big part of my grade! If I don't have it I'm going to fail the class." When I questioned him on where he remembered it last, he only remembered working on it at home on Wednesday, and started crying. "I want to be finished!" he wailed. "I'm going to fail and take another year of this. I thought I was almost finished? What am I going to do?"

I convinced him to take his work into the kitchen and proceeded to search his room, then the living room, then both cars, and finally the kitchen. I found nothing. Charlie searched behind me. Nothing. Philip came close to hysterics before I grabbed his shoulders and shook him. "It's not the end of the world," I told him, and eventually he calmed down and started thinking. He texted his partner to ask if the young man had seen the journal, and thought that he may have left it in his project classroom. Philip also thought he could use the weekly e-mails, though these were not greatly detailed, and between them, and his partner he could put the journal together. He managed to focus enough to study.

Monday came, and with them the two exams taken and the term paper turned in. This relieved some of our stress. Unfortunately, Philip did not find the journal, but his partner agreed to help by letting Philip borrow his journal for the dates they met. He did not have it with him, and did not bring it on Tuesday when they discussed their presentation.

Tuesday Philip had his first job interview, but after that, he met his partner to discuss the final presentation of their work. The partner did not provide the help he promised, as he did not bring his journal for Philip to look at. When Philip tried to reach him Tuesday night, he did not respond.

I was certain that Philip could not recreate the journal, though I did not tell him this as he was too upset already. Instead, I called one of my sisters and ranted for twenty minutes. College, even the community college, is not cheap, and I was paying out of my own pocket. My older son Charlie was just finishing his degree this year as well, and I was looking forward to school being almost over for both of them, in addition to hoping they would find jobs once they had their degrees. Charlie looked for work for years with real dedication, and like so many other searchers, had no luck. All he could find was volunteer work, and there was competition even for that. Philip had focused on his classes, as graduates in his major are normally snatched up as fast as they graduated.

Wenesday and another exam finished, Philip still did not hear from his partner, and texted me that he began trying to write the journal anyway. To my surprise, I got a text at work that he was halfway through in two hours, and finished in three. Not only that, but he was confident that the journal was accurate and as complete as his original. When I got home, he showed me evidence of why.

Philip and his partner texted each other almost every day they met over what needed to be done and what was done. There, in Philip's cell phone, was a backup to that journal, in black and white, one made inadvertly without any idea of its importance, but accurate nevertheless. Through those texts, Philip had no trouble at all recreating the journal, and told his partner and his professor that he found it. Which he had, though not in the form he originally intended.

Until this point, we resigned ourselves to believing that failure was inevitable. While we still believed it was likely, we did have some hope. We felt even better when Charlie pointed out that graduation was Saturday, so the grades had to be posted on Friday, giving the professor only a day to read through the entire class' journals and grade them. How could he do anything but skim them?

The presentation went well, and Philip turned in his journal with the class. The professor assured them that the grades would appear by Friday afternoon. I called about one to speak to Charlie, but Philip answered the phone. When I asked about his grade, he went to check it on the computer.

I won't repeat what he said at first, but what he said next shocked me to my toenails. "It's an A," he said in wonder. "I got an A."

When I got home, he told me he also got the job.

Sometimes chaos can be helpful.