Friday, January 31, 2014

Rock Sledding

This evening Sebastian dropped his helmet and it hit his lip. He screamed out in pain. This kid can scream. We were in his room when this happened. I thought he had bit his tongue. Judah came running in from the living room. He was very concerned. He pointed to Sebastian & looked at me saying, "Ouch". He wanted me to kiss Sebastian's "ouch", so I did. Sebastian had stopped screaming but was still hurting. Judah touched Sebastian's lip a few times and then held his arm to Sebastian's forehead a few times (taking his temperature). I asked Judah if he wanted to give Sebastian a hug, and he hugged him. Judah had a look of huge concern the entire time. He had the same look tonight when I opened the bath drain while Willow was still in the tub. Usually he LEAPS out of the tub if I put my hand anywhere near the bath drain. He panicked when I opened the drain while Willow was still in the tub. He started screaming, "Wait! Wait!!", while trying to pull her out to safety. Willow sat comfortably in the water, smiling. I am pretty sure he believes that the bath drain can suck people down with the water. He probably thinks I am the devil for opening the man-eating drain with my baby in the tub.

Judah & Willow had a long bath, both refusing to get out. At one point Judah was standing up with his bottom near Willow's face. Willow said, "Judah! Don't poop on me!!" hahahaaa This morning I redirected Sebastian to get dressed a few times. After my final attempt at redirecting him, Willow looked at him and said, "Sebastian! Dressed!!" She's been really loving with Pixie the last 2 days. She hugs her & lets Pixie go so far as to lick her mouth. When Willow was in the tub tonight she pretended to be a dog, perched on all fours with her tongue sticking out, barking. I tried to make her laugh, but she was very serious about being a dog. She did this for an unusually long time.. it started to get awkward!

Sebastian was making inventions in the garage while the other 2 kids bathed. He was stacking strollers and ride-ons. He was basically trying to create a carriage for himself that he expected me to parade around the garage. He got one idea to work. Then he wanted to put Willow & Judah on his stack of large, wheeled toys. I had to shut down his factory at that juncture.

I was just on Facebook reading a post a friend wrote. She is looking for a personal aide for her autistic son. WESD gives him 2 half days (shocker). Like Judah, communication is a huge mountain for him to climb. She knows that her son needs more than 2 half days a week. Their solution to that was to put him in a daycare/"preschool" 2 more days out of the week. The daycare (not a place I'm fond of by the way) put him in the nursery with the babies - he's 4. They will not put him with his age group because he is not potty-trained (for lack of a more humane word). Apparently the only way to get around this is for her to HIRE a personal aide for her son. This aide would stay with him at preschool. His/her entire job would probably be to take this boy to the bathroom, probably one time.

So her problem got me to thinking about the idea that the play therapist had planted in my head. She suggested getting a few parents together to have a "mock" early intervention preschool. She also suggested trying to contact OHSU for information as to what to do in the classroom. Judah's teacher won't give me her curriculum. I've asked 3 times. Anyway, I'm going to talk to my friend (mentioned above) about it & see what her thoughts are. She's been trying to have play dates for kids on the spectrum at her house, but it didn’t sound like they were working out as well as she had hoped. There’s got to be a way to get these kids more class time.

Judah brought his brand new $8 train outside to drive through the rocks and dirt this afternoon. When I realized what he was doing I quickly told Sebastian to go inside & get Judah an old car to play with. Sebastian came back with one of our nicest trains. I explained to him more clearly what the situation called for. He came back with a new car Judah had gotten for Christmas. I gave up. My Pinterest brain turned on & a truck ramp instantly came to mind. I grabbed the biggest cardboard box I could find & tore it into a ramp. Then I told the kids what it was and tossed it into the rocks. Their eyes lit up! They all jumped on it as if they were expecting a magic carpet ride. Anyway, it basically turned into what I would call rock sledding. They had a blast. Cardboard boxes are always, always, always fun for kids.. of all ages.

They didn't rock sled for long. The rain came not too long after we had gotten outside. Scott pulled the van out of the garage and the kids rode their ride-ons in a circle in the garage, chasing each other around, usually Willow & Judah running on foot after Sebastian on the Krazy Kar. He is so good at that thing. He can control it unbelievably well. His bike is broken, so he has resorted to Judah's Krazy Kar for outdoor fun. He seems to have mastered this toy. Judah rode it too. He's slowly getting better at it. Anything Judah rides Willow demands and begs to ride 5 minutes after Judah gets on it. Her legs aren't long enough for the Krazy Kar. She sits in it & goes nowhere, getting madder & madder because she can't make it work.

Judah wasn't showing huge progress today. Sebastian & I laid down a blanket of pillows on the living room floor directly in front of the couch. The kids love to jump off of the couch, landing softly on pillows. It seems to wear them out - a bonus for us. Judah was eating dinner as Sebastian & I laid out the pillows. He started to get up & I told him he needed to finish his dinner first. Jumping off of the couch is one of Judah's favorite past times. For him to sit there & finish his dinner while we put together his favorite game in plain view, watching his brother take "test jumps" off the couch, was a ginormous challenge for him, there's no doubt about that. But he did it. He sat right back down, ate all of his dinner and then came over to jump - and had so much fun. This kid can jump off of the couch and go right into a somersault on the floor. Tonight he did a headstand!!

That reminds me, I still need to check that gym out that I found for the kids.. I'll do that tonight.

Judah did some imitating, but not much. When we played outside he livened up a lot. He had the same burst of joy when he soared off the couch. I think he may be mad at me because of what happened yesterday. When Daddy helped him on the potty this morning, Judah was extremely less agitated & even sounded like he was having fun!?! As soon as Daddy was off work Judah was climbing on his back and having the best time with him. I can't say that I had any experiences at that level with Judah today, although he did come to get me & take me to the living room when everyone was playing in there this evening.

Scott worked from home. He picked up Sebastian from school (and dropped him off too!) After that they went to lunch at the mall. This gave me time with Judah since Willow was napping. I tried to get him to work on his snowman book from preschool and had no luck. He even scrunched up the pages & threw them. My next attempt was the Thomas matching game. He held interest in that for maybe 5 minutes, at most. I showed him how to flip the cards over & match them. I made a match & he smiled. Then he went away, begging to watch Wubbzy. At this point Willow was awake & playing with the Thomas cards at the table. I got no real Judah time today.

Willow woke up crying to have her diaper changed in the middle of the night last night. That was weird. It turned out that she just needed to poop. Seems so strange to me that someone would wake up in the middle of the night to poop.

Dad sent a DVD & info on a professor at ASU who does a lot of autism work. This prompted me to Google ASU and autism the other night. I found a really great site. http://autism.asu.edu/

The only link I've looked at so far is this one (which has been incredibly helpful & informative) : http://autism.asu.edu/Docs/2013/Summary_of_Treatments_for_Autism-2013.pdf
I think it's like 53 pages long??!

We are considering trying melatonin to help with Judah's sleeping issues. His last doctor recommended it but we never tried it. Nothing has improved as far as his sleeping goes.

Judah took his usual meds - Vitamin D 2000 i.u., 1 tsp fish oil, 1 probiotic, .2mg L-carnatine. He had two doses of Miralax & also a large bowel movement (in the real potty) after an hour or so of screaming/crying "Help!! Help!!", bending over & holding his tummy. Often it would get worse when he was on the toilet (I tried to get him to stay on for a while). So I think part of it may have been that he wanted to just go in his diaper. This is his 4th? time in a row pooping on the toilet - I thought he would be okay with this by now, but maybe not. Had he not gone today we would have had to do his first suppository, something neither of us want to put him through.. we desperately need another option. Judah wore pull-ups all day today - I forgot to put him in underwear. He wet every one of them.
 

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