Splat Goes Life.

My son said those words to me last night. I said (to myself) "Huh?" Jack's school has a huge problem. It's a regular public school, with supposedly trained Intervention Specialists, but I have begun to question what exactly they're trained in. Talking a good game? Making an utter mess out of everything? Yesterday I had to pull him out of school. The principal officially referred to it as an "emergency removal", which the school staff concurred was "appropriate". (Why thank you). Thing is, I didn't ask permission. I didn't stick around to hear what my son did that was so awful. I didn't even stick around to question why my son was in the dark, sitting there with 3 adults, one of which I have never even met. (I know her name now, but have absolutely zero idea what her capacity is at the school, and why she was there "helping out"). Jack is in 3rd grade. We're half way through the year, making it about 4 years s...

I haven't told Jack that we're planning to transfer him to a new school in the Fall. The biggest reason for this is that every time he gets in trouble, or gets upset with a student or teacher, he will throw that up in their faces as a sort of "Screw you! I'm out of here!". He does it already, although he has a particular school already in mind- not the one he'll be attending. Earlier I got a phone call from the office letting me know that Jack was having a rough time. Usually this means they don't know how to handle him, and they mistakenly think that I can soothe him over, and then he'll be able to return to class. Sometimes (a lot of the time), I end up taking him home. The last two times, I have left him there. It gets to be ridiculous for them to call me in to do their job for them. They called me today because the gym teacher didn't put Jack in the same group as one of his "BFF's" (a boy he really likes), and he pretty much...

In life, we get thrown for a loop in a lot of ways. Maybe we didn't pass a test we studied hard for.. or we didn't make the football team.. didn't get that great job we not only wanted, but needed.. somebody broke our heart. Then we have kids, and while life still punches us in the gut on occasion, we now share those punches with our kids when it happens to them. It's almost as devastating. Our kids are a part of us. What makes them happy makes us happy. What makes them sad makes us sad. It is part of our nature to want to shield them from disappointment. On Wednesday afternoon, Jack informed me that he was going to stay after school the next day to try out for the drama club at school. I saw the flyer come home the week before, but pretty much dismissed it outright. Savannah tried out in the Fall and didn't get in- this was her second attempt, and I was kind of surprised she tried out, because she had previously decided not to do anything extracurricular asid...

I'm sitting here trying to collect all sorts of documents for Jack's redetermination visit with the psychologist tomorrow morning. This would include a current IEP, ETR (MFE), any psych evaluation and diagnosis, and why not throw in a Functional Behavior Assessment for good measure? As if that weren't "bothersome" enough, I have to fill out the first-time patient crap, telling them whatever the other documents will tell them in *much* more detail. I am absolutely dizzy going through papers to answer these questions. What kills me is that the County has all of this information, but what.. they can't be bothered to pass it along for me? They're the ones judging whether or not my son still has Autism, by their standards. Some people would think I would be happy for Jack to "graduate" from Autism, but with the behaviors manifesting the way they are, and the apparent need for medication (or some sort of behavior management and social skills train...

Every Friday, I pick up the kids and breathe a sigh of relief. The weekend is upon us, and I don't have to worry about what type of (bad) behavior Jack will be displaying in school the next few days. I don't have to stick by my phone like usual, because nobody on the school staff is going to call me. I don't have an after-school email from the teacher (or Intervention Specialist) to be anxious about, wondering what report they're going to have for me about how things went (good or bad). I don't have to feel embarrassed either dropping Jack off or picking him up, because of something he did the day before, or something he did that day that I have yet to find out about. Most parents can't wait for Monday to come, so their kids are in school instead of at home, driving everyone crazy.. and yes, I do feel that way to an extent.. but in this house, with Jack, the anxiety of not knowing how his day at school will go makes me a nervous wreck just about every single d...

Only one of my kids went to preschool. As you can guess, that would be Jack. He was in a special program through the county, offering Early Childhood Education. His classroom was run by 2 head teachers, and 2 assistants. The program allowed for peer models, which were typically developing kids of the same age. Savannah was not in the peer model program, although Jack's teachers did let her stay one day, which was absolutely great. (I hadn't had a morning all to myself in some time, so it was much appreciated!). In all honesty, I did not even think of enrolling Savannah in a preschool, because I worked from home when she was born, and didn't feel I needed to leave her elsewhere. She could go with me everywhere. (She's in the 98th and 99th percentile for both Math and Reading, respectively, in her grade, nationally , so I don't feel that I did her a huge disservice). Jack was in preschool for an additional year, starting Kindergarten at age 6. This wasn't pla...

Last year in second grade, Jack made himself a really nice friend named J. J is a very polite boy, and his parents seem to be understanding about Jack, so when there was first talk of "play dates", I was happy that finally Jack had someone who truly seemed to like him. J called many times over the school year to come over, sometimes without the knowledge of his mother. He never seemed to get upset when all Jack wanted to do was look at his (J's) Nintendo DS. They would sit side by side on the couch and play their DS games together. It was really great. Jack mentioned a few other friends he often played with at school, one of which he met up with frequently at the pool during summer vacation. I wasn't too sure about "B", though. He's sort of annoying, and always calls me "Jack's mom", as in "Hi, Jack's mom!". I think he's one of those kids who is odd in his own way, and looking for a good friend. (Things that ma...

"Breath of Life" by Florence + The Machine, for the movie Snow White and the Huntsman. I just can't get enough of this song, and I love to play it.. loudly . I couldn't care less about the movie (although I do like Charlize Theron), but Florence Welch's voice, with that orchestra behind her, is truly something. Sometimes I think I could use my own "Breath of Life".

Every day at 4pm, the alarm on my phone goes off. This is to remind me that Jack needs to take (one) of his medications. 1.) He gets his asthma medicine at morning, and at night. Sometimes he doesn't get it at night, because he falls asleep before I can give it to him. (If and when this happens, he's likely to get a bloody nose. I've taken him to an ENT Dr. to see if he needs surgery, because he's prone to them anyway. It's something we just need to keep an eye on). 2.) He gets his Intuniv at 4pm, because after testing out the best time to give it to him while over winter break, this was the time least likely to knock him out at school, and most likely to have him sleepy for bedtime. 3.) As the Intuniv doesn't seem to work as well now, I have switched him from Melatonin (1mg isn't effective anymore, and 3mg was a nightmare- I took one myself and thought I was dying!) back to Clonidine (.1mg). He gets this about 9pm, so that if it does its job for 8 ho...

I seem to have a problem. I expect too much, or I expect too little. Either I expect that I won't get what I want, or expect something that should seem like a no brainer, only to be failed on all accounts. Jack's psychiatrist suggested to me that he doesn't really know where to "take things" at this point, and he doesn't want to "lead (me) on". He suggested that we could try anti-psychotic medication, but that seems too drastic to me (call me crazy!), so I did ask if there was an anxiety med or something we could try first. Not that I really want to do that either, but it seems less drastic somehow. Maybe I'm kidding myself. With another visit 2 months out, and a script for Zoloft in my hands, I decided to take Jack back to the pediatrician to see if he would be willing to do some blood work, to see if anything else might be going on. I mean, it seems reasonable to me to rule everything out before I put my kid on that path. I know there ar...

I'm 39 this year, and (if I'm lucky), I will have lived for about half my life already. (um, does that even make sense?) I'm a woman living light years away from home, raising two kids with someone I met 16 years ago. I never got started on a career, though I did graduate college with a couple of degrees. Once Jack came along, I became a stay-at-home mom. Really, it worked out for the best, considering how much attention he's needed, in terms of therapy, etc. Plus I'm basically on-call as far as the school is concerned, if anything goes wrong. It's ok, I mean, it's my job. I'm a mom. I do sometimes wonder what I would be doing if I didn't have kids. Not that I don't want them, or would rather not to have had them, but they do make you change your priorities. In my case, I think I've grown so drained by dealing with Jack's issues, that I couldn't even tell you what I liked to do in my spare time. Obviously I'm online- I do...

My adorable kids.. Jack, 9 1/2 in March, and his older sister, "Savannah" (as she would have liked to have been named in another life), who turns 11 in a matter of months. When I first was pregnant with Jack, the OB/GYN called my kids "Irish Twins", which I have to say is both stupid and amusing. My son thinks this means they're actually twins, and I have to explain that no, they're just really close together in age. I've been noticing little things here and there with my daughter, leading me to believe we're on our way through puberty. She's still quite small (barely 70 lbs), and only just started noticing a visible difference "up top". She did try to show me some hairs under her arms, but I'm not sure that's anything more than the peach fuzz she has elsewhere. I have been gradually talking with her about body changes for some time now.. probably since she was 9, as another mom told me that some 9 yr old girls in her daughte...

So, my son has been on meds for maybe a year now? "Jack" started off on Focalin , which the psychiatrist has recently informed me is form of Ritalin. Nice.. well, when he was first on Focalin, at 5mg, I believe (the starting dose, if I can recall correctly), it seemed to work ok. Then we noticed that it wasn't working quite as well- Jack's focus wasn't as good, he was more easily upset, and things of that nature. We could definitely tell when it had worn off after school. When we bumped up to the next dose, immediately he became a mad person. Not angry, although yes, he was angry. I mean insane. I was called to the school to find my son cornered in the board room where I've spent all of my IEP meetings with the staff. He didn't want to leave, but he clearly couldn't stay. I was attempting to get him to come with me, and the school principal was making sure he couldn't leave the other way. Jack was pushing chairs in front of him, growling, yellin...

Last night I attempted to go to bed around 10pm. This is pretty much the usual, and has been since I can remember. The problem is that my stomach was in absolute knots. This could have been from the Excedrin Migraine I took (doing some evil upon my ulcer), or the fact that my son had yet another horrific day at school, leading to detention. So basically, I was up for hours just worrying. I can think back to when a certain younger, male cousin of mine, needed meds for ADD or ADHD- honestly, I'm not sure which. I only know from talking to his older sister, that he didn't like to take them, and often hid them under his mattress. Knowing how rough his family life was at times, my thought was that he didn't need medication, but needed someone he could really talk to. I still would like to believe that most kids just need somebody they can confide in, who actually gives a crap. You know? But being the parent of a child with all sorts of problems, I have been forced to realize ...