Wednesday, January 15, 2014

Counting to Eleven

Developmental Disability has come through with getting us Pull-ups! The most expensive diaper there is! (for kids anyway) We have also been approved for the K plan! Kelly is coming by next week to fill us in on details. The K plan had some particular benefits that we need.

I dropped Sebastian at school this morning. Every morning he gets out of the van, does a dance, throwing his arms in the air at the end, smiles and walks away beginning conversation with the first person he ends up walking next to. Today he was literally skipping into school! When Sebastian opened the door this morning Judah greeted the passing children, "Hi!!!" Judah & Willow love saying goodbye to Bastian. They get excited when his class gets out too.

Recently I was trying to use up some Rite-Aid credit soon to expire. I took advantage of their deal on Diet 7-up, since we never drink soda anymore I thought it looked good. Willow & Judah have been requesting it when I drink it. Willow has named it "ew!" because that's what we both said when she took her first drink and realized how different it was. Her eyes watered. So everyday since then (I'm almost out of "ew") she asks me for "ew". Today she asked me for it & I told her to bring me her cup. She comes back to me with a bucket! She held it out & requested "ew", hahahaa!

Willow is also a trickster. Sometimes she will act dramatically upset and ask for "ice" (to make her feel better). Ice is ice cream. Today I wouldn't let her have the scissors. She laid her head on the floor pretending to be upset, while she snuck the scissors underneath her to take them away!! She's already better at this stuff than Sebastian!

Sebastian's friend Henry gave him his artwork today because apparently Sebastian said that he wanted a gift yesterday. Henry said, "Well you said you wanted a present!" haha. Sebastian was very pleased about this. I found Sebastian in the living room watching some gory show about injured animals this morning (we left the TV on a non-kid channel & he doesn't know how to change channels with the remote). Periodically I will walk into the living room in the morning and find him watching something bizarre (like the 7am showing of Cops). I run over to shut it down as he sits staring at the TV, in a complete daze. Sometimes he realizes that he shouldn't be watching what's on and turns it off. He follows that by telling us all about it. He's never been able to keep things he shouldn't have done a secret. But that isn't 100% anymore, it's fading. It's finally turned into something that is too good to be true, as I always suspected it would.

 
Sebastian & Gramma bought a Barbie for Karla (the girl Sebastian always talks about). He’s told me stories of her saying that she “likes” him. He doesn’t understand what that means. Tomorrow he will gift her a really pretty, glitter-winged Barbie that he wrapped with Daddy tonight. He wrote his name on it after I wrote the “Dear Karla, From..” haha. That’s what he wanted me to write! He picked out a green bow, figured out how to make it work and placed it under the  written tag, which is specifically where he wanted it to be. I took a picture of him holding her gift. He says he will always have that picture to remember this time.
Willow & Bash had to sneak out of the house to meet Gramma outside this afternoon. We were trying to avoid upsetting Judah. Instead of making him go through being upset why not just deceive him? Why not just have him think his siblings miraculously disappear from time to time & return at night with Gramma.? Ugh, so hard to find a good way sometimes. How do parents handle that situation?? Willow & Bash stayed with Gramma while Scott & I took Judah to do a trial run of play therapy.
 
We've been waiting for a month (I think?) to try this therapy with Judah. The therapist let us know part of the way through the session that her therapy would not be a good fit for him.
 
Charlene (therapist) said he couldn’t communicate enough to do her play therapy. This is exactly what SocialSibs (a Portland program with lots of free therapy because students do the work) had told me. Charlene advised us to get the curriculum from teacher, talk to doc about what to teach him at this point, call OHSU. Told us about a school in Corvalis.. the Mills? Said he needs much more than 2 half days of early intervention a week. Her thought was that he needs 4 FULL days. She recommended starting a co-op with other parents – renting a room and basically setting up a mock early intervention classroom to teach the kids & continue social skills.  Friggin amazing idea! Now to figure out who the “other parents” are!! I was telling the OT therapist (business owner where Judah goes) yesterday how it felt like all of the parents with children similar to Judah were unreachable. We are all scattered & don't know how to find one another. There are a LOT of us, but the circle hasn't been formed yet. It DESPERATELY needs to be. The lack of services & no local support groups specific to autism helps to keep us scattered & lost. 
 
Judah played well until we started talking with Charlene. Then he destroyed her entire play area, dumping doll houses, buckets of toys, play-doh.. She kept telling us not to worry about it, haha. It's always an insightful experience seeing him work with others one-on-one, I love it. She commented a lot on his imaginative play. She said if he is understanding some cues he may just be choosing not to acknowledge the others, which I know he does at times. She brought up REPITITION - which I instantly remembered learning at the presentation I went to not long ago, but unfortunately had forgotten about. I felt very disappointed in myself that I had not been doing that with him, that repetition had not been a gigantic part of teaching him. Repeat activities/phrases 30-40 times. Which ones? That's when you need the teacher/doc/OHSUinfo! She said to keep the area simple (another one we knew but weren't doing). Take out one toy at a time. We are going to have to build another room in the house to accomplish the last two! I told her that he doesn’t respond to me like he does the speech therapist when I work with him. She pointed out that it’s likely too busy, too many toys around & plus he thinks of me as a different person. A lot of what she said made sense. I had many questions to ask but she never stopped talking. She did answer some though.
 
Judah was talkative & happy after Charlene, pointing & labeling all the way home. Responded “did” when I asked him if he had fun playing with Charlene. I mentioned the clock  & he got excited. He is interested in clocks lately- we need to get him one for his room. Tonight he showed me a Mater video that involved a clock inside Mater – maybe that's why he suddenly loves clocks? Talkative, happy, playful, expressive at home. I think he wanted me to sit next to him when he was eating dinner, he used his spoon as a slingshot to splatter applesauce on the wall, seemed like he was rebelling.  He counted to ten on the way home. He’s been able to do that for a very long time. I counted to eleven when he was done, putting emphasis on the eleven. The rest of the drive home I counted to eleven many times. At one point he hit himself on the head – showing me that he wanted me to stop (I kept going). The entire rest of the time he was listening, staring at the window. Tonight with his sibs he was counting – just to ten, but I know he knows eleven.
Judah & I are bringing his class tortilla chips for their food cupboard and a bunch of puzzles for their play area tomorrow. I’m emailing Shelley tonight or tomorrow about the food goal not being done, telling her to make sure he is pottying every day, asking about the support group- if it’s happening, and asking for the class curriculum once again! I’m also telling her we want him in a smaller class asap, like we had discussed in the last meeting. I am letting her know we want him in school 4 days a week and asking her how to go about getting that accomplished. Then I’ll see her face to face in the morning as well, so I’m hoping most of these issues will get taken care of.
Judah had Miralax and Benefiber today. He was in pain this morning through about 3 pm. Between then he had two gigantic liquid diarrhea poops. No pain at all after the last one.
 
I spilled the dog food tonight, less than a minute later Scott spills my coffee all over the kitchen. It was pretty comedic. Sebastian was laughing hard while Willow & Judah were just staring at the situation. They didn’t know what was going on, haha.
 
 
 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 

 

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