Lady of the House

Managing Editor's Note: That photo will be familiar to fans of BBC TV. It's Keeping Up Appearances' Hyacinth Bucket (that's Boo-kay!) answering the phone with her standard "The Boo-Kay residence. The LADY of the house speaking!"  Not to be confused with our own Cathy Jameson, but a fun photo nonetheless.

By Cathy Jameson

“Wrong number,” I replied. 

Every few weeks someone calls the house looking for a woman named Rosa.  I can tell right away that it’s either a telemarketer or a collection agency.  Sometimes it’s a recording for Rosa to please call the 800 number back.  Other times when I’ve pick up the phone I recognize a fuzzy sound in my ear and think uh, oh.  The low sound with a bit of static muffles some of who I know is in the background.  It’s the distant chatter of hundreds of operators sitting in a call center.  That sound is a tell tale sign that comes with a knee-jerk reaction--don’t breathe; they’ll know I’m alive and will think they can start talking to me.  The lone operator assigned to track Rosa with my phone number is relentless despite the “wrong number” responses I’ve given in the past.  I’ve had to adopt a new strategy when I hear that muffled noise when I pick up the phone:  hang up quickly.  It saves me more time.

The last call I got caught me off guard.  I answered the phone thinking it was a friend.  I waited a few seconds after I’d said hello and realized the call wasn’t for me.  It was for Rosa.  I decided not to hang up right away and answered again with a long, drawn out, “H-e-l-l-o???”  The collection agency was once more trying to get a hold of Rosa.  Using one of their underpaid, irritated automatons pretending to sound chipper I heard, “Good morning!  May I please speak to Rosa?”  I replied, “You have the wrong number,” and politely tried to hang up.  Cutting me off the operator said, “Ma’am, are you the lady of the house?”

I had to laugh.  Lady of the House.  What a catchy title!  It reeks of regality and privilege.  I pictured myself lounging, completely lazy and fully catered to by wait staff on a lovely afternoon.  I saw myself sitting poolside with a tasty adult beverage in hand.  What fun!  Too bad for me though.  It’s so not how I really am or really see myself, my situation or my home.  Frumpy, exhausting and a tad on the disorganized side describes more of me and what’s going on around me.  This was especially so on the morning of that call.  If I was the Lady of the House I surely wouldn’t be answering my own phone.  I’d have someone else do that.  I certainly wouldn’t still be in my pajamas at 10am eating cereal with a plastic kid’s spoon.   I definitely wouldn’t have driven my children to school in those pajamas either.  But I did.

“Ma’am?”  

Back to the phone call.  “Are you the lady of the house?”  I paused long enough to envision myself this time being pampered in a mansion sitting atop an impeccably landscaped lawn at the edge of the ocean.  Stammering I said, “Lady of the house?!  Nope, but thanks for that thought.  You have the wrong number.” 

This call was turning out to be entertaining.  I didn’t want to hang up as quickly as I usually do, so I added, “Rosa doesn’t live here.”

I stayed on the line wondering what would come next.  Clearly tired of making calls for someone else, the operator sighed and asked again, “So you’re not Rosa?  We need her to contact us about her account.  Do you know where she is? ”

“Nope,” I sputtered as I crunched through my gluten-free Koala Krisps hoping to at least finish breakfast before it was lunchtime.

The disgruntled debt collector pressed, “Do you have the authority to make decisions for the household?”

I almost choked on the next spoonful. Obviously the operator clearly hadn’t heard that Rosa isn’t here, nor was she ever, and I don’t give a lick about her debt since I have enough of my own to worry about.  “Okay, I’m going to hang up now.  You have the wrong number….”

“But, do you have authority to make decisions…”

Click.

After I hung up I sat back and smirked.  Do I have the authority to make decisions?  Of course I do.  I make decisions all the time.  Some of them have been really great ones like finding a program that suited my son’s needs.  Another one was catching him up on skills to really master them.   Investing thousands of dollars to give Ronan the chance to grow after spending hundreds of hours researching therapy and educational options was another big decision.  One of the greatest ones?  Promising to never give up on my child.  Sticking my neck out while stepping over other people’s decisions because I had to ensure proper treatment for Ronan—yep, I’ve made that one too. 

Have I made some really awful decisions?  Sure.  Who hasn’t?  Here’s a peek at some of the bad ones:

-Trusting medical providers who gave me their one-sided vaccine education spiel, “They’re all good, every single one of them!”  (Um.  No, doc.  Not really.  And, not for Ronan.)

-Vaccinating my children without educating myself beyond knowing the name of the vaccine plunged into their body (Thankfully, the “Oh, Now I Know What I Should Have Done!” phase is so much more empowering.)

-Dwelling on the past wishing it all away (But, like I’ve said before, if the past hadn’t happened I wouldn’t be able to shape the future to make it better.  Some days I whole-heartedly believe that.  Other days?  Not so much.  Hopefully time will heal some of that pain in order to bring a full peace of mind.)

-Letting the nay sayers get me down in the dumps (How they sometimes try to weasel their way into my life!  Sometimes they break through.  When they do I fumble through feelings of grief for past decisions.  Other times I am stronger, and I’m able to ignore the taunts.)

-Hiring people for Ronan’s care who only work for a paycheck (More about this in another post; what a story that will be.)

Decisions, decisions. 

Life is full of them.

As Lady of the House of Jameson, where a little boy depends on me to make the biggest decisions of my life, I now educate myself as much as I can.  I read. I ask lots of questions.  I seek advice.  Then, I read some more.  I don’t take anything lightly or for granted.  I can’t.  My son’s life could literally depend on a decision I have to make. 

Sometimes I feel like I’ve got more decisions than anyone else.  Sometimes I want to run away from those and run from being the one in charge.  Sometimes it doesn’t seem fair that so much weighs on my shoulders.  I don’t want to have the kinds of conversations I’ve had or make the endless phones calls I do for Ronan’s needs.  Other people with a different kind of authority are on the other side of those conversations.  It’s a wonderful thing when someone in authority works with me to help Ronan.  But, some people do get tired of how much I’ve had to speak up for him.  They think they are more privileged than I am even though I know my kid inside and out.  When they hear my voice I wonder if they think I drone on and on and then might want to hang up on me!   Standing up for Rona has got to be done, and who better than the Lady of the House to do it.

I’ll never be the fancy pants Lady of the House I envisioned from that wrong number phone call.  Being that person is far from any dream or reality I want in life.  I’m more of a let’s-make-things-happen-now kind of person.  I don’t expect someone else to hand me everything I want or need to make Ronan’s needs easier to manage.  I won’t sit still waiting for someone else to do something for him or for me.  I can’t relax completely because too much work is still yet to be done.  Someday I hope to be able to stop long enough to enjoy a quiet day with nothing to do and nothing to worry about.  Someday that time will come.  My dream is for Ronan to be free of some of his struggles and to again be able to do typical things like typical kids.  Since I am a firm believer in dreams coming true I’m willing to work every day to make that happen.

Cathy Jameson is a Contributing Editor for Age of Autism.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Comments

[Kendra Pettengill]

The internet itself has become the smart bomb of unwanted phone calls. I recently went to a site to read an article on diabetes that answered a question I had about my Mom's blood sugar readings. It was a great article, but following that read, the next morning and every morning since, for a month straight, I get a phone call wanting to supply me with MY diabetic supplies. I tell them, "I am not a diabetic". They ask if anyone else in the house is and I honestly tell them NO. They then apparently feel the need to convince me, without telling me they used stealth investigative techniques to procure my phone number from my little visit to the diabetic website, that I MUST BE Diabetic! I am sure they think I just don't want to talk with them and no matter how many times I ask to be removed from their "list" I continue to get the calls, a few times even twice in one day. Very scary that this can happen from a single visit to a website about diabetes. It is because the billing to insurance and social security is so lucrative, they want your business for diabetic supplies. It is to the point I do not even want to answer my phone. I have to think of a more clever way to get back at them. Any Suggestions????

[Rosa]

sorry you are getting all those crank Rosa calls....

[Jen]

Well Cathy, thank God someone else does the driving in the robe thing. Some of those telemarketers can be very brazen - maybe they should try pharmaceutical sales. Hyacinth is hilarious!

[Ya know?]

Funny how docs now get the same harassment training as telemarketers. No wonder you had a flashback.

Thank you for this.

[Tim Kasemodel]

When I was single and got those calls, I used to say, "Yeah, he's here, hang on" and then I would go crank Ozzie Osbourne into the phone.

When Thomas was still eating gluten other bad stuff because we did not know any better, he used to make the same sounds, very bizarre sounds, over and over. Back then I used to like to say, "Yeah, he's here, hang on" and then I would hand the phone to Thomas.

Now when we get lots of different calls like that. When we got into autism politics, we linked up with both political parties here in Minnesota, so we get fundraiser calls from candidates and political PACS on both sides. I LOVE these calls.

I start out by explaining that I do not have any money because I have to spend so much money on my son's medical needs because Minnesota G.I. docs don't give a rats ass about autistic enterocolitis, that insurance companies and Medicaid does not recognize that his medically necessary OTC drugs and supplements should be reimbursable because they are keeping him alive, And that every dime I might give them is like stealing it from Thomas.

Then I go on about working with the politicians (of the party of the particular caller) and getting absolutely nowhere on important issues like safe medicines, planning for ASD individuals in adulthood, the skyrocketing rates, etc, and so on and so on......

IF they haven't tried to squirm out of the conversation by that time I move on to what autism is all about, living with severe autism and how my friends and family feel about it. Sometimes it moves into a totally cool realm where the caller actually is interested because they know someone with autism, someone who is pregnant and wants to know more about vaccines, or they want to know more about therapies, diets, schools, and all those wonderful things we autism parents have to make decisions about...

If they are silly enough to actually ask me WHY autism has
skyrocketed, heaven help them!!

I am pretty sure I am on a "no call list" somewhere.....

[Benedetta]

Cathy if you were vaccinating your children without educating yourself beyond knowing the name of the vaccine -- even that changed when they got older. They never said in the teenage years they were giving another DPT or DTaP shot -- they just called it a tetanus shot.

How do you fight with something as sneaky as that?