Revvin' in 2011

Hello all!  Here's hoping as you read this you are reflecting on happy times during your break from school and what not.

The Loo-Loo Crew is holding steady:

• Mr. Man has gone 6 weeks with no aggression!
• Miss Fabulous is making continued slow progress in her attachment to family members, having real feeling and owning them, and taking responsibility for her choices.  We have even seen some appropriate big sister behavior and interaction with Lil Bro.  Fantastic!
• We had our Family Anniversary Day and everyone shared what that liked best about the other members of the family and what they liked about being a part of this family.  Lil Bro at age 4 said, "I wike being in this fam-o-lee because I wike to wuv my Mommy and Daddy."  He gets it!  Love him!
• The Hubs and I just celebrated our 17 year anniversary!
• They have all been sick with the usual colds and cough and we have finally lost the battle and are saddling up to see the pediatrician today in fact.
• Big Sis has been doing well. We are dealing with the hormonal 11 year old stuff where her mood swings like the wind is blowing. But no major issues as yet.
  
  
 The PJ crew!

Big Sis making doggy treats!

Big Sis with the Fur Babies - Jasmine and Chico.

Mom and Miss Fabulous at school!

Mom and Mr. Man at school!

Miss lookin' cute!

The Cuddlers!

Gotcha Day No Mas

I let go of gotcha days.  Maybe they will make a come back later.  They are unsettling to my kid with RAD and no one noticed when we did not do them. 

Yesterday was Miss Fabulous 5 year anniversary as a loo loo crew member. 

She had a major blow out Thursday evening.  But didn't blow out again through out the weekend.  In fact she did great Sunday and that was her gotcha day.  She has never done well on her gotcha day, accept she did.

She and I spent 40 minutes in a therapeutic talk Friday about her blow out Thursday.  We talked about what was really bothering her.  She doesn't like it when we get down to the nitty gritty.  She feels outed and she doesn't like that.  Understandable.  But she can't work through what she won't admit to.  So we are working on that.  It's going pretty well.  In the past she would have tantrumed and raged to avoid the talk.  After a big bad battle it would have avoided the talk, but not any more.  Now after the rage we go back to the talk.  So at least some of the time she is skipping the rage.  Progress.

She is doing better than ever in school.  Her beginning of the year assessment last year was "low intermediate" and "beginner" scores which are as low as they go.  This year she scored "high intermediate" on everything which included reading, writing and listening skills.  I gave it to her and told her she should be proud that her scores actually showed how smart she is this year.

But it seems that since she is doing better than ever at school we are getting more mess at home.  As Jeri said, we should be flattered that she is comfortable enough to release her anger on us.  I am working on it.  As her behavior therapist stated "she is comfortable enough with you all to hurt you."  Well we are working on that too.

Keep moving forward...

He Loves Banana School!

Okay so I am a little heartbroken that he is in love with Banana School (fake name, real name - different fruit).  He is the baby and it has been a bitter pill to swallow to part with him each day from 8:30 to 1:00 pm.  At first I thought that maybe I would be justified in removing him from banana school since he hated it.  But I thought the experience would benefit him and since he goes to Kindergarten next year and he was having such a struggle separating from Mom I concluded that he likely needed the experience.  But loving Banana school is a bit much!

And ... the teachers are spoiling him rotten.  He is pulling this crying business every time things are not going his way.  Like tonight he wanted cereal for dinner and not meat loaf.  The answer was no you may not have cereal.  He had a tantrum with mad crying and demanding cereal.  I asked him if this is what he does at banana school and he said, "yes!"  I asked if Miss Teacher picks him up when he does that and he said yes again.  hmmmmm  Me thinks it is likely so.

Miss Fabulous is still holding it together, impressively so.  She was doing some of the fake I don't know how to spell cap in the second grade business tonight while I gave her a practice spelling test.  I reminded her that any word she misspelled she would need to write 3 times so that she could remember how to spell it for the test.  She was not happy about that information and started to growl screech at me.  My new phrase around here is, "If you need to have a tantrum that is okay, we can handle it.  And when you are done with that we will get back to _____."  _________ is whatever the tantrum was supposed to be getting the person out of.  Since we have started putting that into practice it seems like maybe some of the tantrums are being thwarted, dare I say it.  Be sure to read that in a whisper. 

Q TIP

I am finding this post kind of swirly in my head but I'll try to be coherent.

When Mr. Man was in his wonderful pre school class there was a sign on the wall made out of cotton swabs that said Q TIP.  I asked what it meant and the teacher explained that it was their reminder to "quit taking it personal."

Clearly that's an easy thing to understand but over the years I have had a much harder time accepting that phrase.  I have learned the roll of the therapeutic parent and I think I do okay for someone that never had a back ground in psychology or social work.  But my Mommy heart still takes it hard when my kid screams that I'm not her real Mom or that she wants her real Mom.  Or when she is a raging ball of fury and I can't fix it. 

Quit Taking It Personal

But somewhere inside I wrestle with what haven't I done?  Where have I gone wrong that I can't get her to truly accept that I am her Mom and that we are her family forever.  And the realization that this is how she sees things is even more difficult to accept.  More difficult to Quit Taking It Personal.

Tonight Miss Fabulous had a major rage.  She was screaming all kinds of things at her father who was helping her and she started screaming, "Mommy doesn't love me.  I love her but Mommy doesn't love me, she hates me!"  She said it repeatedly.

Once she was calm we moved a head with bath and afterward while I was doing her hair I asked what made her think that Mommy didn't love her.

Quit Taking It Personal

See my mind and heart had heard that she thought that I don't love her.  That wasn't the case at all, she is very clear that I do love her and that "You think I am pretty and sweet and special."  She said, "B___ my real Mom hates me."  I hate that real Mom term but it is her term and how she sees things at this point in time and so I can respect that, I know what she means. 

She explained why she felt that way, very simple and to the point.  And I got it.  The realization that her problems have nothing to do with me actually sunk in to my heart and not just my mind.  Quit Taking It Personal because it has nothing to do with you, I got it.

The rages over hair and bath and being told no and whatever else are not about me, about us.  Whoever the punching bag might be.  I got it.

Now I just have to keep remember it.

This Morning They Made Hot Cocoa

Can we make hot cocoa?

Sure it's only 91 degrees already, go for it.

Big Sis can you help me?

 Yes, let me do it.

Gathering of a box of cocoa involved lots of instruction and bossiness and a stool.

What's a serving size mean?

It means that you only need 1 packet of cocoa that you absolutely should not use 2 packs of cocoa to make your one self a serving that's what it means.  You only need one.

Oh.

Gross!  Don't taste the dry powder!

Oh.  Why?

Because you need to wait for the water first before you taste it that's why.

Oh.

My finger hurts.

You aren't supposed to touch the hot water, duh.  Get a piece of ice for it.

Oh.

Keep the ice on it because if you don't it will hurt a lot worse later, trust me I know.

Oh.

Two minutes later they strolled out of the kitchen with their mugs in hand as if they were 22 years old.

BTW his finger is fine, no children were truly harmed in the making of this post. :0)

I had visions of being a cool parent but ...

I have resolved with in myself that is not happening.  I'm okay with it.  Really not as disappointed as I might have imagined about it.

I have determined I can't be cool and be right, I'd rather be right.  I got sucked into the "can my friend come over" thing today.  I made it clear up front that we were going to have good behavior.  That didn't happen.  Not that it was anything terrible but I have a child on the autism spectrum and he is the least of my issues in this house.  We have to have order and a reliable way that things are done - consistency is our life line here.  And I could be cool and let the friend do what she will like using every piece of expensive equipment in this house in an unsafe way and without permission, but I ain't gonna. 

Yes I sacrificed cool to be right.  I told friend to call Mama to make sure someone would be there when I brought her home.  Looks of shock and dismay.  I had no time to deal with it because I was moving Miss Fabulous into the bath just moments after she had banshee screamed in the back yard and gave consideration to taking on the above ground pool in a karate show down because someone tagged her in a game of tag.  Go figure.

At any rate I didn't have time to deal with the tweens opened mouth shock and dismay.  Friend called Mama and Mama really didn't want her to come home.  Hmmm?  Asked if Big Sis could sleep over instead.  Nope.  But here's the deal ... and I explained to friend that they did things different at her house and that was fine but that here when someone comes into the house they have to respect the way we do things because otherwise the children here with special needs start to fall apart and I am not really into that, you can understand.  I pointed out the banshee scream episode outside with Miss Fabulous and reminded her that things can get ugly quickly around here.

She got it and admitted that she had not been behaving herself.  The tweens got one more chance and they pulled it together and behaved.  Go tweens!

Tuesday Miss Fabulous went to finish her testing at the university.  That evening her Behavior Therapist comes to visit.  She hasn't raged in front of him in months.  We all kind of thought she had moved him over into a teacher status Tuesday I said, "Good to know that you are still in the family." 

Miss Fabulous raged, all of the sudden and out of the blue because she got very angry at Lil Bro when he touched one of her toys.  Dad was home and he redirected her and blocked and redirected her but her brain left the building the minute that Lil Bro touched that toy.  Dad had to hold her and keep her safe and the CBA got a lovely report out of it and told Dad what an excellent job he had done.  Go Dad!

She also has had a 'swiper no swiping' thing going on for the past few weeks at camp.  She tried to leave with someone else's DS game and today all the kids got a special something for their hula day and she decided she would take 2 of those things after it had been explained that everyone only got 1.  She hides these things in her cubby and when Nan picks her up Nan inquires as to what it's all about and then asks the staff who are quite surprised that Miss has whatever in her cubby.

It will be interesting to see how that all works it's self out.

And so it goes...

Thanks for the thoughts regarding how to help with the eating situation!

We go the high fiber low sugar route.  Carrot sticks, salad, apples and good stand-bys and a small serving of nuts.  The issue that Mr. Man has with this med is volume.  I knew of a man that was morbidly obese and his favorite food was oranges.  Too many calories make a person gain weight no matter the source.

We are trying to do better with the water suggestion.  Mr. doesn't like to drink water.  All the kids drink watered down 100% apple juice as a main drink of choice but there are still extra calories.  So we are working on it.

I also think that his metabolism changes on the med.  I have no clinical proof but this is what I think.  I think he becomes more prone to weight gain even with limited calorie intake.  I have one kid who is like that by DNA.  That falls in the not fair category.  Keep the suggestions coming, it all helps!

BTW our Mr. Man is a happy little guy again.  It is great that we have the right med to help him but it also makes me sad that he needs the med.  Honestly I had hoped that we would take him off the med and find that he would do well without it.  That was a no go.

Thanks also for the concern as to where I have been bloggy wise lately.  All is well just busy with the summer goings on.

We went to a congregation gathering yesterday evening.  It is always nice to be with fellow Christians, up building and happy.  We don't get to sit in a chair and visit however while the kids go and play.  We have a child that must be monitored around other children and we are the only ones doing the monitoring.  We also end up monitoring other peoples children, like the kid that kept terrorizing the host's birds.  The poor cocktail birds (Mr. words, ha ha) cockatoos were screaming they were so upset.  I moved him out of the room and followed down behind him every time he decided he would go in there.  He got the point and moved on.

When it came time to leave the party Miss Fabulous didn't want to go.  Shocker.  She started to throw a fit outside of the van.  I was a few steps behind the rest of the gang and when I walked up she said, "I don't want to leave the party!"  I said, "Oh okay, well go on back inside."  Looks of confusion.  I said, "Sure, not a problem go on back into the party they won't mind."  Then she said, "NO!" with crossed arms and angry looks.  I said, "Oh okay then well buckle up cause we are leaving."  Then I said to Dad over the top of the car that if that fit got going up the block turn around and bring her back.

She thought about it but held it together and did not tantrum.  I also didn't push the envelop and did not direct her to get a bath even though she was sweaty gross.  Pick the battles I say.  I knew she could bath in the AM.  Everyone else got a bath and went to bed nicely.

I never offer a choice that I don't really mean.  I was absolutely prepared to march her back into the party and explain that she was having a temper fit about leaving and ask who was willing to bring her home on their way home.  There were a half dozen families who live close by that were still there and who would have done it.   She really had been looking to have a fit all day but we had the Toy Story 3 movie planned that afternoon and I made sure that they all understood anyone having a fit would not be joining us.  Then we had the party at 6 pm and I made sure they understood that anyone having a fit would not go.  But when it came time to leave the party there was no more incentive to put her best foot forward and hold it together.

This is where the medication stabilization comes in.  If she isn't stable on her meds it doesn't matter what the incentive is she is going to lose her cool and tantrum. 

We have also entered into the fake o complaint phase of life again.  She has more pains and problems than the geriatric population.  Funny thing is that getting sent back to bed to "rest and make those hurts feel better" seems to miraculously heal her in about 3 minutes flat.  I am thinking of writing a paper on the matter and submitting it to a medical journal, they are going to want to know all about this phenomenon.  :0)

I love that kid, she keeps it interesting!

Nan is RADified

I have to share this.  Our Nan called me from work this morning to report in on how the drive to camp went.  Miss M wanted to go to Hardee's for a biscuit for breakfast and Nan said not today, but another day sure.  Then she asked if she wanted this or that for breakfast.  Miss M was not happy with this or that but she was holding it together. 

On the ride to camp the sun was on Miss M's side of the car and she started a dramatization about, "The sun is in my face.  I can't see the sun is in my face.  Oh oh  help help the sun the sun the sun the sun..." 

Nan had a plan. 

When they turned and the sun was now on Nan's side of the car Nan started her own dramatization but amped it up.  Miss looked at her with confusion and said, "What are you doing?"  Brilliant Nan said, "Oh I'm doing what you did.  Did that work to get the sun out of your face?"  Miss looked at her and said, "No."  Nan said, "Oh darn I was really hoping that would work!"

Nothing more was said about the sun.  Holly cow that made me 'bout pee my pants!  Go Nan!  She said, "I'm learning!"  That's right, out crazy the crazy!

What’s Dem-A-Crazy?

I was just reading the accidental mommy blog and commented that parenthood was not a democracy and my little guy said, “What’s dem-a-crazy?” Funny stuff!

It means that parents make the decisions because it is our God given right and we know best and have the child’s best interest in mind. That said, sometimes we mess it up. We aren’t perfect either.

Shortly I’ll be going to pick up the fabulous Miss M from Grandma, I have that pit, I might puke, feeling. Being in an abusive relationship is not easy, you never know what is going to set the abuser off and it is more complicated when the abuser is your child.

She has had a good visit with the grandparents, she always does. She even wrote a little song and Grandma e-mailed it to me.

TODAY IS TUESDAY, TODAY IS TUESDAY

APRIL 27, APRIL 27

YESTERDAY WAS MONDAY,

TOMORROW WILL BE WEDNESDAY

HIP, HIP HOORAY!

MY GOING HOME DAY

That sounds like such a sweet awww kind of a song, doesn’t it? All I could think was holly heck she is going to kick my butt when she comes home! We talked to her on Monday and gave everyone an update on Mr. When she is at Grandma’s house she has a whole different voice tone, very sweet and kind of sing songy. That’s the voice that started out on the phone and then she realized that Mr. was with Mama and I heard her wheels start turning and her voice tone changed and … frankly I’m dreading the reunification of our clan. I am trying to talk myself out of it, it isn’t going as well as I hoped. The break from having to always be on watch and on alert is so needed and helpful but it’s hard to go back to reality. I always wonder was it a mistake to go for the break?

Maybe it will all go well and we won’t have any major acting out.

Maybe pigs really will fly!

Speaking of Chores

I mean how cute is he!?

Little Man insists on getting the water bottle and scrub brush to "cleanz da for" when Mom and the big kids are doing chores.

These two are no good at chores but they sure are cute!

I charge for tantrums!

This process of healing, moving on, maturing and so forth has a lot of twist and turns. And frankly sometimes you throw up a little, maybe that’s just me.

We know that Miss and Mr. are not going to go with out having meltdowns and outbursts but our goal is to teach them how to manage these outbursts acceptably when they occur. They have been taught over and over breathing techniques and self-calming techniques and where to go when they are losing control. Mom or Dad is always with them and helping them to remember what to do and in the process of being there for them we may just get whaled on a little.

These kids are getting older and bigger and there comes a time when they begin to have to answer to the law for their actions. Well in the Loo-Loo Household that time is now, I charge for tantrums! More specifically I charge for assault. The severity of the assault determines the amount of the fine. I am the judge and jury so I review every assault charge and determine the amount to be paid to the pain and suffering jar.

And for this moment/week it’s been working. I always know how much money each kid has. They have the opportunity to earn money here at home and sometimes grandparents send them money. The two offenders are ‘have a dollar spend a dollar’ kind of people but I am making sure that they have some money on hand.

If it is a situation of a more minor assault but the offender responded to block and redirect techniques and regained control then that would probably be a 50 cent fine. If things became violent and Dad had to hold the individual to keep them and others safe then that’s an automatic dollar fine.

The reason I came up with this is because there is not much that Miss cares about. It’s a really tricky thing when you don’t have a motivator that the person cares enough about to make the choice to change their behavior. One thing that Miss does care about is HER money.

Last Friday Miss had a moderate rage. She did become violent but she put a stop to it her self with out Dad having to hold her. She trashed her room and boy didn’t I wish those beads for making necklaces had been put back up in the top of the closet! But she picked every last one of those darling beads up and did a great job. When I sat with her about what assault had occurred she looked at me blankly because of our new word “assault”. I reminded her that it meant someone had been hurt. She said, “Oh yeah, Dad. I slapped him pretty hard a few times.” Gotta love the honesty, right!?

I said, “Okay, was there any kicking or punching?” She said, “No, I tried to kick Dad but I couldn’t.” Meaning she could not get to him to kick him. I said, “Okay well for slapping Dad you are going to need to pay 50 cent of your money to the pain and suffering jar and you need to give Dad a proper apology.” She said, “Is 50 cent two big coins?” I don’t know how but with a straight face I said, “Yes that’s right, two big coins.” She went in her moneybag and brought the 50 cents to Dad to put into the pain and suffering jar and she told him sorry with a big hug.

I don’t know how long this will motivate the troops but for now it seems to be helping them have prospective on assaulting their family members. Once there is enough money in the pain and suffering jar the adults will use the money for something relaxing.

Heartstrings

So for us it is Spring Break this week. So far so good. Miss goes to her day camp during the day and she loves it there because it is pretty much like Pre-K was in that there is no schoolwork and all fun all the time. They ‘get her’ which is a huge blessing so they will call her on the mild stuff she pulls from time to time and when a “tension” shows up between her and another camper they are right on it and so she feels more secure there than she does at school where she can bulldoze the grown ups. So interesting how our kids don’t feel safe when they can get away with their stuff.

Any who the other 3 are doing well on the home front. My Fibro Myalgia has been flaring big time and in harmony with the time change the fatigue is kicking my butt so we have not been able to go and do much yet. We did make a stop by the Good Will and we picked up a Hannah Montana board game and this is where the heartstrings portion of this post comes in.

Big Sis is asking the questions involved in the game and the question that was asked to Mr. was, “What is your favorite childhood memory?” Big Sis clarified for him, “You know from when you were younger than you are now.” He is seven. That sweet little man said, “Well I guess that would be the day that Mommy came to get me because then I was a part of this family.”

I was standing in the hallway listening in but they didn’t know it. It was one of those, “Thank you God” moments. He sure is a challenge but he has such a sweet heart and he loves his Mama and his family. I can’t bear to think of what his life would have been if adoption were not available to him. And although there are days when I wonder, I am thankful he is our little man.

Funny and Embarrassing

First I want to report that Nan’s thumb is doing okay. She had it looked at and the joint is what cracked, it is swollen and so she has a nifty splint to immobilize it. Nan rocks!  Thank you for all the healing and supportive comments too!

A lot of funny and embarrassing things happen when you’re a parent.

For instance my OCD little Aspie likes to use Microsoft word on the computer but he calls it “Microscopic word” which is funny in it’s self but he also changes the zoom to about 500% which makes me wonder if he really does think the program is too small?


There certainly are some pluses to taking little boys potty in public. The no sitting required feature for one. But on occasion everyone has to sit to take care of business, if you know what I mean. Such was the case this past Friday when I had to take Lil Bro to the potty at Wal-Mart.

We have discussed before that I should avoid the Wal-Mart bathroom at all cost because things just don’t go right for me when I am in there but as life happens and I shop with kids and they always have to go potty, so… Lil Bro makes his move to sit on the potty at the Wal-Mart and I quickly use my ninja like Mom reflexes to keep his hind parts from touching said toilet and put the paper cover down. Shock upon shock but there actually was a paper cover available. I am thinking that Lil Bro has to do # 2 because why else would he sit? When he proceeds to pee all over my shoe, his sock and the floor. I hear myself saying, “What are you doing man? Hold it down!” All the while using my hand as a shield. He didn’t even have to do # 2!

I am not happy as I try to clean off pee from my shoe and his sock and gather paper towels to dry the floor with. This stuff is not in the parenthood handbook, ya know?



On a separate day Lil Bro and I visit a public potty. I take out a personal from my bag. Lil Bro looks at me with a “you have got to be kidding me face” and announces in his loudest voice, “Moooooom why you wearing your diaper for? Dat so silly! You a big girl you not wear a diaper!” He breaks into hysterical, little kid, fake laughter while holding his face in his hands. I am hushing and hissing at him to “stop that!” and “be quiet! shhhhh!”



The kids all help out with chores and Miss is kind of our self-appointed recycle person, Mr. is the trash guy, Big Sis handles the dish chore with great ability accept the other day she did get mixed up and put DAWN dish liquid in the dishwasher and the kitchen looked like the Freaky Friday movie (the first one).

Anyway apparently Miss is taking this recycle stuff pretty seriously. I went to throw a plastic spoon in the garbage this week and she looked at me with those ‘I’m watching you eyes’ and says, “You know that’s recyclable, right? It’s plastic and when something is plastic we are supposed to recycle it. Right?” Awkward pause and crickets chirping, “uhhhhhhhhh right sweetums.” Needless to say I fished said spoon out and disposed of it properly.

Ahem.

Give A Day, Get A Day

After being told about the Disney Give A Day Get A Day promotion our family signed up to participate. Going through the list of options it was difficult to figure out what would be a good fit for six people with the youngest child being 6 years old (Lil Bro was too young to participate). Some good options didn’t allow children that young to volunteer and then I came across an organization with horses. Bingo!

I had wanted to have Miss and Mr. participate in horse therapy last summer but it was expensive and we just could not swing it for both. I thought this would be a great opportunity to see how they reacted with the horses. Mr. has a very common fear among Aspies, he is afraid of bugs and especially flying bugs and spiders. He has had MAJOR panic attacks that were the likes of a TV movie hallucination. Even around our big bouncy Daisy the Dog he tends to me jumpy so how he would react to horses that have been rescued because of mistreatment in most cases was definitely a question mark.

Miss has these grandiose fantasies where she rides like the wind on back of a Spirit the horse however the reality of her actually meeting a horse for the first time was that she flipped out and refused to get out of the car. So I definitely had a question mark there too.

But … what was the worst that would happen? They or even just one of them would flip out and we would leave the ranch and not go to Disney. Life would go on.

To our surprise they both did amazing! We knew that Big Sis would be in horse heaven because she has wanted to be a veterinarian since age 3. The kid would ride a tiger given the opportunity. When she attended zoo camp this summer she was the only kid a lot of times that would pick up or go in to feed the less desirable animals. So there was no question mark regarding her. And she did great!

My two first grades brushed and groomed a 23-year-old Clydesdale horse. They went tromping through a pasture of horse poop and marched right up to this gentle giant and brushed him like his was their best friend, it was amazing! Mr. was very in charge and had no fear around these horses. He helped clean horse gear and polished brass with his Big Sister. Miss stuck with Mama and we did lots of talking to horses and feeding them apples and carrots and putting away helmets and such.

The organization pegged The Hubs as capable right off the bat and had him doing all kinds of manual labor. They were really grateful for the help. One benefit was that everyone that volunteered had the opportunity to ride a horse.

Mr. was a hoot! He was very assertive about wanting to ride the horse and at one point I thought he was just going to jump on. Impulse control is not his strong point. But the staff were very assertive too and safety conscience so that handled him well. Although Miss did great with interacting with the horses when it came time to ride she said, “Mommy I’m scared and I’m not doing it.” I said that was no problem and she could come with Mommy and watch the others ride. She seemed disappointed in herself but we all kept commending the great work she did that day and how brave she was with the horses. She had a minor meltdown when it came time to leave. She started picking at Big Sis and that did not go in her favor but we all just moved forward and when The Hubs started the van she jumped in and decided to abandon her stand off. Gosh is takes years to figure your kid out and know how best to handle a particular situation with said child. One thing I have learned is if I seem completely oblivious to her misbehavior and keep everyone in the group moving forward she is not going to let us get out of sight. As soon as she shuts it off I give her positive attention of some sort, in this case praising her again for her good work with the horses. We just move on and act as if we never noticed her naughtiness. It sometimes gives her enough time, even just a moment, to plug her brain back in and move forward with the rest of us. Thankfully it worked this time.

I am definitely going to be exploring what options are available closer to home for the kids to interact with horses. The therapeutic benefits truly are amazing.

Now as I mentioned Lil Bro did not attend this event with us so that meant that he needed a babysitter. We just don’t leave our kids with babysitters. The last time we paid a babysitter Big Sis was age 4, she will be 11 in May. Usually we would organize for Grandma to come and stay for a day or so and then she would baby sit Lil Bro at home. Well Grandma being the traveler that she is had just been away on a 2 week vacation with Paw Paw and their friends. They had a wonderful time by the way but it was too soon to ask her to come for a visit. So this meant we needed a real babysitter. We arranged for some friends of ours to watch Lil Bro.

He announced, “I’m not staying here. I go wit you Mom.” I used our phrase, “Mommy always comes back.” This is something that he likes to role-play often at home. Although he has had no other form of trauma in his blessed little life the one trauma he experienced was loss of birth giver and then loss of foster Mom and family. They had him from the time he was 2 days old until he was 14 months old and in my arms forever. So separating from Mom is somewhat traumatic and we have worked to make it less upsetting for him. He is allowed to call Mom on the phone for reassurance and yes I was in the middle of a horse pasture assuring Lil Bro that I was coming back.

All in all the family that watched him did a great job of keeping him busy and distracted and he did okay. He slept well that night and has been okay since.

RETRO

Sometimes I get tired of being a therapeutic parent. I like to fix something or get over it but either way I'm looking to move on, move forward. However, it seems with the challenge of raising traumatized kids they just keep going RETRO!

Miss M has been experiencing some wonderful healing over the past months. Her moods finally stabilized and that seemed the ticket to everything moving forward. But the trauma these kids experienced changed their "wiring" in the brain and we the therapeutic parents are kind of like the electrician working blind folded with one arm tied behind our backs while we "rework" the "wiring" and try not to get killed in the process. On good days and months we get more wires plugged in where they should be and on not so good days we get shocked a lot. :-0

Miss has been pulling out some old behaviors lately. She had a major tantrum yesterday with some mild aggression over the oh so important subject of not wanting to wear long pants in 50 degree weather. Lil Bro had dressed himself dunt dunt da … in shorts. That was going to be addressed but it had not been addressed yet because he had not asked to go outside yet. Miss M's "that's not fair" button had been pushed and she was ready to tango.

When she calmed down we were able to talk about what she could have done differently and how that would have made things better. Second verse same as the first.

There seemed to be a thousand and two RETRO behaviors over the weekend. The one that really made my brain go, "Are you kidding me? Are we ever going to get past this stuff? Where is MY get out of jail free card?" was dinner and eating her vegetable. I mean honestly this is way old stuff we are talking about from the land of been there and done that.

The incident involved lying so I called her into the kitchen and asked what was up with the veggie deal and lying about it? She did not want to talk about it. I sort of talked her through the situation. We talked about what happens when you tell a person lies. She said, "They don't like you." I explained for the one millionth and two times that Mommy likes you and loves you even if she doesn't agree with your behavior. You are not the things that you do so I can like you and love you with out liking the things that you do. We had a reminder lesson on lying and on that note she wanted to give Mommy a real hug.  (She has been Mommy's big girl helper aka restitution.)

A few minutes later she was playing and Lil Bro was being loud, not in a tantrum way but he is just a loud kid. It startled her and she said told him "Don't do that!" And then she said, "But I still like you." :-) It was a nice moment because she was not aware that I was observing her so the statement was not for show.

Mr. was a bit off this weekend as well. The Loo Loo crew has been sick and with their history of asthma (yes all of them) and pneumonia (yes all of them, last winter was a real treat) they have to take breathing treatments and prescription cold med at night. Miss M is better than she was last week but is still on antibiotics and breathing treatments. All of that affects their behavior, I know this but it doesn't make it easier to deal with.

I am going to make this a TO BE CONTINUED post because I am sick too and my asthma is giving me some challenges and I be tired. Over and out!

Getting to the Heart of It

Christine has put up some awesome video clips regarding therapeutic parenting and traumatized kids.

In the maze of RAD, Bipolar and Autism Spectrum Disorder that we have here in Loo Loo Land I try to attend what workshops and seminars that I can. One thing that really helped me to let go of feeling that I had not been doing things just right for my child and that I was a bad parent was a behavior workshop that I attended to help parents with kids on the Autism Spectrum.

I tend to make everything my fault. It's a self-destructive habit and it doesn't help my kids. The reality is I have not caused my kids problems. But they are MY kids and so I would internalize their problems as my doing because I am their Mom and I felt I should be able to fix them.

The woman speaking was from CARD and really knows her stuff. I really felt she was a total blessing to our family and to me. She came to our home and met with us regarding Mr. She also happened to know our CBA and said, "Do what he tells you and you will be okay." When his recommendations have felt foreign to me I have reflected on that statement.

She also works with the police departments in our county and teaches them how to deal with autistic people as well as those with RAD. So when she made this point that really helped me get past where I was stuck, I felt confident that she knew what she was talking about. She said to the group, "You aren't wrong, your way of parenting is not wrong but... it isn't getting you the result you want. So what does that mean? It means you have to change what you are doing."

That really helped my confidence and to stop beating myself up. I wasn't wrong, I wasn't a bad parent but I did need to learn a different way to get the results I was looking for. Boo-ya! I could get that through my head.

Sometimes I could not see the forest for the tree in my immediate way. I was afraid of letting something go at the moment and not teaching the long term lesson of how to be a good upstanding person. And so much of what Christine has shared is just dead on with what I have learned too.

One of the first people that I learned from was Nancy Thomas.  One thing that really spoke to me when I was able to go to a seminar with her was, "You gotta love them anyway." I was having a hard time getting past some of the abuse that was perpetrated on siblings. I felt caught between that Mother Bear instinct of protecting my young and the fact that the danger was coming from another one of my young.

It was hard because she fought attachment so in reality she felt like a visitor to me instead of my child. That doesn't feel nice to share and it isn't true now but it was true way back. Focusing on that statement, "You gotta love them anyway" in part helped me past that. When I felt negative feelings and thoughts toward my child I remembered that I had to love her anyway. She was not the behavior she was displaying. I could love her with out liking the things that she did.

Some of Nancy's phrases that she used with her kids helped me until I got my own phrases so that I did not get sucked in to the fight. My child healing from RAD used to LOVE to fight. Sadly it was her comfort zone. It has been a longggggggggg road, but she is moving in the right direction.  Although today was no picnic with Miss.  Sigh.

I too have learned that the lesson has to be taught at a later time. We can talk about the big feelings that were behind the behavior, I can ask "How did that work out for you?" but later.  Also play therapy at home with Mom and siblings has been a great way to help teach the lesson at hand, but later.

To all the parents that keep on keepin on here's a big (((((HUG))))) to you!

Liar Liar

We openly admit that we are a work in progress here in loo loo land but what has worked the best is to take the wind out of the little liar’s sails. The cookie example that Cory mentioned I have learned not to say "did you?" or "why did you?" the evidence is obvious and since the kid thinks that they will push my buttons by having taken the cookie I might say, "If you want a cookie sweetie just let Mom know." And then I'd hand the child a cookie with a big smile and walk away. Totally throws her off balance and there is no crazy lying because there was no chance to lie. At the same time I acknowledge that I am aware of the offense.  That is not how I would handle the situation with my typical children.

With stealing I would go through her room while she was out of the house and whatever I found that did not belong to her I would lay on her bed. When she came in she saw that I had found x y and z. Once I knew she had seen the things on her bed I would put them away where they belonged. It took the feeling control out of stealing, I guess. I don't know but it worked. 

Since so much of the RAD stuff is about feeling in control I kind of go in through the back door so to speak and try to take the control out of it that way, for a typical kid that would not work. With children with RAD nothing improves until we can get into their hearts and start attaching. It's a different game plan.

For my little one there is no consequence in the world that is going to get into her head right and wrong. What was I going to take away when she didn't care about anything?

What she does want is attention and she is tickled pink with negative attention so we had to relearn that too. This is where the CBA has been particularly helpful.

We do work on teaching our kids to be responsible. For instance the person that poops their pants gets the pleasure of scrubbing those poopy pants. We even have a special little brush dedicated to the activity.

When a person gets the dropsies and spills their drink every 2 minutes it's not a problem because they get to clean up the spilt drink and the next go will simply be water so that clean up is a breeze. They also get to take as long as they feel they need to to get said spill cleaned up.  No rush.  If we need a big ugly tantrum first that's okay and when we are all done tantruming we get to clean up the mess. Love those opportunities for learning!
I have heard other Mom’s say this and it really is what I found to be true, for my child with RAD it isn’t about the consequence it’s about her attaching to me and developing that natural parent child relationship where she the child has a desire to make Mom happy with her. Until that begins to happen (at least for us) it became more about damage control and being responsible for our actions. Natural consequences work best for her too.

For instance a certain little lady likes to wear dressy shoes when she goes out. They are not good for walking in and will in nothing flat start hurting her feet. Now I can state all this and say no and I have. One guess as to how well that works with a kid who will tantrum and rage at the drop of a hat. Instead I say, “Sure you can wear those shoes. Let’s bring your sneakers and socks in case your feet hurt later.” She does not like to bring the sneakers but she will. Now she rarely puts the sneakers on but there is no complaining and drama routine about sore feet because I have already insured that she brings the comfy shoes with her.

There was a time when honestly I resented that stuff. Why should I have to go about this way? I am the Mom I know best the shoes are going to hurt her feet so just wear the appropriate shoe from the start. But for my little one she doesn’t learn that way. It simply becomes a battle of me against her and who’s going to win this challenge and that does not promote an unattached child to attach.

So I counted up my prison sentence and decided to make the best of it. She turns 18 in the year 2021. On bad days I have a little song I sing in my head, “In 20 21 I’ll be done!” Hey it gets me through.

She didn’t have to like me or love me. I realized that her best option was to have small doses of me and for me to focus on gobbing on positive attention in those moments. This is when she started attending the after care program at school. She gets home around 5:30 and from then until bedtime I devote as much of my attention to her as is possible. I feed her dinner and give her a bath. We do her homework together and when she pulls the RAD stuff I just ignore what I can and continue positive attention where I can. If it is becoming a power struggle I put it away and we work on it again the next night. What we cannot finish we do over the weekend and her teacher is aware of why and is supportive of the work being turned in the following Monday. It is rare now that we do not get it all done during the week.

In reality my little one learned a lot of things before she became mine. She learned that big people will hurt you, that you can cry for a long time and no one is going to help you, if you want food you need to find it on your own, that others will be feed and you will not be feed, and most importantly trust no one because they will hurt you and they will disappoint you.

So when she wants to play the - I can’t buckle my seat belt game at almost 7, I play along. “No problem babe, that’s what Mom’s are for. Moms help their kids, there you go!” Same for the - I can’t zip this zipper game. I just look at it as time to make up for all the times she was left with no one helping her when they should have. It used to drive me nuts because it is so obviously deliberate and untrue. The child could feed herself soup at 2 and not spill a drop. Not a drop. She can certainly get the darn buckle done and the zippers zipped. But it isn’t about that.

The other day we were out and about and this creepy man was going on and on about how pretty Miss M is. It used to be that she would have really played into that and ate up the attention and poured on the charm. But this time she did what she should do, she grabbed Mom’s hand and kind of scooted behind me. She knew two things – he made her feel uncomfortable and Mom was there to keep her safe.

I don’t think there is any one right way to help traumatized kids. They are all individuals and I am sure some of what works for Miss M would not work for another child. But I think the key is to focus on how to get into their hearts, until that happens it's a losing battle. 

Keep On Keepin On

Mr. made it through Wednesday okay. We are working on a more structured earning program regarding Wii/Computer time and his ADHD med has been adjusted again.

Mr. CBA was here Tuesday evening and Dad came home for the visit too. Mr. CBA was talking about the cycling that we are seeing with Mr. and the behaviors that are with the elevated aggression like sleep difficulty and increased appetite. I have to say I don't like the sound of that. Those are some of the things that we see with Miss M in relation to the bipolar when it is not regulated.

We just can't get around the fact that we are looking at a lot of inconsistency with Mr. and his frustration level. We went on the trip up north a month ago and I fully expected him to act out because of all the change but in fact he did great. He had been doing well before the trip also. The week following the trip, even before Dad went out of town, Mr. went south behavior wise and has not leveled back off.

So we will just have to see how all that unfolds.

Someone said, "Have you ever considered just chucking the Wii and Computer?" Yep I have and if it comes down to being a problem and not a benefit then I won't shed one tear as it goes up on craigslist but we have a kid on the Autism Spectrum who can have some way out there melt downs and is getting bigger all the time and the thing that is of most interest to him the most motivating to him is Wii and Computer time, so we use it.

Big Sis can get it if she loses a privilege for a period of time for poor choices. For instance she had the notion to cut her screen out of her window because she wanted it open. Well let's see would calling an adult for assistance been a good choice in this situation? Yes I think so. At any rate she will be making restitution for this in the form of paying for the screen and assisting Dad with the repair.

Sister Shot

People of Wal-Mart

Since shopping for food with young children in tow can prove to be challenging I try to wait until after the youngest of our kids go to sleep and then I head out to the Super Wal-Mart. For one I hate the size of this store and trying to navigate my way around it and for two dodging the other shoppers who try to run me down with their over flowing cart. But add to that the nincompoops who want to shop with their toddlers at ten o'clock at night and it really is too much to handle.

So last night was no different. As soon as I enter the store and the produce section there is a late twenties couple with a toddler who is probably almost 3 and a baby who looks to be about 9 months old. Mom is laying someone low on the phone because really isn't the produce section the perfect place to do that? Dad is sporting a dirty mullet and a bad attitude.

(example photo)

I move on my merry way but come across them in the frozen food section later on. The toddler is beginning a melt down and the poor baby is so tired she can't stand it anymore and starts crying and waving her arms, obviously wanting to be picked up so she can go to sleep (likely). It is 10 pm so why aren’t she and brother at home asleep with Dad watching over the house while Mom does the shopping? Dad was doing a whole lot of nothing including refusing to pick up the tired baby as if she was to learn some lesson from this experience.

It takes a whole lot of restraint for me not to say, "Hey! Pick that baby up and give her a cuddle so she can go to sleep and why you are at it head to the car so that you can drive her home and put her to bed where she belongs Mr. Mullet sir!" I do use restraint and I don't say anything but I did nearly burn a hole through that Mullet with my glares of disapproval (okay so I was behind him and he never actually saw the glare but I knew I was glaring).

Where were all the older ladies who want to give me advise in the Wal-Mart about my kid/kids when I needed them?

Speaking of advise, when we took the walk the other day to calm down one of my neighbors was outside with his dog Susie the Poodle.  She is the cutest sweetest little thing and wiggles her way up to us for the kids to pet her.  She was a great diversion.  Her owner proceeded to reprimand us and advised we be careful not to let the kids in/near the street while walking.  I just smile and say thanks but I was thinking - one Mom, one Nan, and 4 kids walking down our neighborhood street = visibility from a far I believe.  And secondly these kids have some size on them by this point in time and we haven't lost one yet to a traffic situation.  But apparently I command advise just by my very presence.  Go figure.  It must be that look of confusion which I wear so well. 

Day 2 - WOD (without Dad)

Sunday went okay all in all.  The Nanster and I decided to be industrious and finish grouting the living room for the Hubs.  He really may think twice before leaving me in charge again.  hee hee

Here I am hard at work.

The Nanster at work.

We finished it up this evening while the kids watched a video.

Notice in the pics that we are working directly next to the couch; this is where Miss M was (and Big Sis and Mr. C too most of the time)

We took the kids to Golden Coral for a late lunch.

This is Lil Bro not wanting to cooperate with the photo taking.

Following the Golden Pig Out we went to Wal-Mart for a few things for the kids lunches tomorrow. I suggested that we all pick out soup for dinner and so they picked out Spongebob soup and Princess Spaghetti O's. They also rented another DVD from the Red Box at Wal-Mart.

Let me just say that Mr. C has been a toot all day. He had a major tantrum and assaulted Nan. I dealt with the tantrum and video taped so that Mr. CBA can review it Tuesday. Mr. C had been non-stop machine gun style verbally harassing me through out the store because of his lack of ability to find a Red Box DVD that he wanted to watch. It wasn't fair, I never let him do anything, on and on blah blah blah etc. The whole perseverating on it thing as Mr. CBA calls. I call it pain in the butt syndrome but whatever.

As we were leaving the store he wanted to go back to Red Box for a DVD. I said, "Did you earn a DVD with your behavior in the store?" He said, "Why do you always answer my questions with your questions?" Cause I am a trained Mama that's why!

Anyway, he and Nan walk ahead of the rest of us and the sticker lady at the Wal-Mart says, "Do ya'll want a sticker?" I honestly wanted to slap her but I did not because that would not be Christian of me plus the whole video camera evidence thing. So she gives one to Big Sis, Miss M and Lil Bro. Lil Bro is not impressed and gave his to Big Sis because honestly she was the person closest to him. Miss M says, "That's not fair!" I said, "What's not fair?" "She has two stickers." I say, "Why does she have two?" "Because Lil Bro gave her his." "Right. So what's not fair?" At which point she gave me the quiet mad look and I moved forward toward the van where we found Mr. C nearly melting down and still perseverating on the whole DVD situation.

Anyway we all got in the van. The house is less than a mile away. We drive into the driveway and Big Sis has been singing some song on the radio and Miss M is trying to sing along too. In the past she did lots of things to simply annoy others but that is not what she was doing this time. She was being six, she admires her big sister and she wanted to sing along too. Big Sis decided that now was the perfect time to be 10 and tell Miss M that she "can't sing." We all remember that the sticker thing was 7 minutes ago at the Wal-Mart? So Miss M is ready to rage. She starts the angry crying and a scream session all at the same time followed immediately by stomping the back of the seat in front of her. We all move forward with unloading the grocery bags and I have the key to the house so I start directing the bag carriers to place the bags by the front door. I get on the phone to call the CBA who lives near by just in case he might be available to stop by because we now have Mr. C and Miss M going at it in the front yard at the same time and the only thing better than a melt down is a double melt down. I look at Nan and whisper we are not opening the front door we are going to take a walk because if we go in that door it's all over and the holes in the wall are going to start and we don't have The Hubs here to do CPI is need be. She said, "Right."

So I announced, "Come on everybody we are going to take a walk, hooray!" And I start heading down the street. Miss M stomps and protests but quickly starts to follow when I say, "Come on we are going for a walk." With in 30 seconds her brain switches back to positive and she wants to say sorry to Big Sis. I said we would take care of that in a minute because Big Sis was up ahead of us. In reality Big Sis needed to apologize for the rude comment that started the whole thing.

Mr. C is complaining, "I don't like to walk. My leg hurts. I can't believe we are out here walking when it looks like it is going to rain. Have you ever thought about it raining on us? What are we going to do if it rains on us?" To which I said, "Then we'll get wet but that's okay because you are not made out of sugar so you won't melt." He continued on and on and by this time we had walked a few blocks. I let Mr. C know that if he was not able to be all done with his complaining before we got back to the house then he would get to take another lap around the neighborhood with Mommy. He said, "I do not want to walk around this neighborhood all all day. Can you hear me Mom?" So I said, "Well then you better stop the complaining dear." Before we made it around the last leg of our lap toward the house he had become interested in something that Big Sis was talking about and he knocked it off. We all went into the house and preceded on with bath time and he kept a lid on it the rest of the evening and so did Miss M. Mr. C said, "How am I doing now? Aren't I doing better with my behavior now?"

So all in all a productive day and no one raged.

The end.

Here is a sweet pic of my baby blogger assistant who wandered out of his room where he was supposed to be sleeping.