Thursday, September 29, 2011

Never Ends Does It?

It doesn't matter how well your day is going when you are the parent of an Autistic child there is always something to deal with. When you are the broke parent of an Autistic child the stress begins to pile so high you can't begin to see the end of the tunnel. There is always something in the back of your mind giving you the nagging feeling that you are forgetting something. I have found that forgetting is not that hard to do when you have almost a dozen different things to give your child each and every day. Then there are therapy appointments and doctor's visits just to have lab work done because your child is on so many supplements. It's expensive.

I read somewhere that it costs approximately $50,000 a year to raise an Autistic child. I'm still wondering where that's coming from. I don't think we can cut anymore corners but somehow it's always all right in the end.  I have to gather up all of the little ones supplements so I can write down the names and doses for our next doctor's visit. I am so confused right now I can't even find the child's clothes without going on a treasure hunt in the mornings. I am so far behind and I'm so tired right now that I have no idea what to do.

I used to have a schedule that was second nature and now it's kind of flown out the window. Oh well, today I will type up pages from old diaries to destroy the paper copies and still have record of things that I need to go read to see just how far I've come these last few years. I'm going to get back to work on that now since I latest project is stalled.

Saturday, July 30, 2011

A week off to prepare for school

OK only one day left in July which means that I have approximately twenty-five days left to finish potty training the kid. The 25th is the first day of school for the Head Start and there is no transportation provided this year. This is going to make for a fun school year. Monday morning I’ll begin to get up at 5a.m. in order to get used to it in time to get the kiddo to school by 7:45. It’s really hard to believe that the summer is almost over and we’ve done very little.

I still haven’t purchased the new uniforms that she’s going to need. I have to go on a treasure hunt for them and I’m really hoping that they’ll be some available small enough during the tax free weekend. That’ll save us a little bit of money even if I only get her two or three. I am currently working on everything possible to come up with the money to get her two complete outfits because at the moment I can only get partial outfits.

We’re trying the schedule for the potty and I’m leaving her there as long as she’ll stay. It seems that typically the longer she stays on the potty the more likely she is to use the potty. We’ve made amazing progress this summer and I need to step up the game and finish it up. The fact that she has the ability to tell you she has to go to the bathroom is a good thing, bringing that ability out is something else.

Right now there is recycling on my front porch that needs to be loaded up and hauled to the bins. I think that I’ll do that when we go on the treasure hunt for uniforms. I found the data sheets for potty training in my desk drawer and the last time I had used them was back in mid-June which isn’t that good. There could be two reasons they hadn’t been used in so long. The first is that she was having too many accidents to count. The second is that I was too busy working and no one else would do the data for me. At the moment I’m relying on a time to tell me how often to take her to the potty. I’m going to go with every thirty minutes now that she has drinks in her.

I’m going to increase the time between trips now that the diarrhea she had last week has hopefully past. Too much detail I know.

OK I have to get back to work and I have some pictures to put on disk so I’ll be going I’m hoping to put the pictures on disks while I go through her clothes I have to separate my photos into smaller albums so that I know what I have saved and not saved or I may save them all online and take them to disk later.

Sunday, June 12, 2011

Figuring it Out

Theresa has a test that I can't pay for that I have to get. She's being good today just sitting in the bed with me. That means she forgives me for going to the store without her yesterday. It's rather unusual for me to go without her but my back was hurting something awful.

I've been trying to move for a couple years now but it's not going to happen anytime soon. I really wish that I could afford to move now. I'm not coping well with all the repairs that have to be done. I hate it here but I'm stuck here. I lost my flash drive and I really need it. I can't work without it because I don't have enough space on my computer. I'm sick and tired of being sick and tired.

Monday, May 30, 2011

Memorial Day Means the End of School

Today we celebrate all those that gave all they had to ensure our freedom. Today for me also means that there is only one day of preschool left for my little one this year. There is no summer speech for Theresa this year from the school. The speech therapist sent home a speech packet and the teacher sent home some a packet with worksheets and mini books to make in it. That should do us about a week before I'm back to printing out my own for her.

One of her three therapists (she has five during the school year) that see her year round is a half page behind because she doesn't listen if she's in a hurry. I gave her some of the worksheets and she copied them after saying something about so I could do them at home. I'm pretty sure she doesn't realize I have my own pages to go over with the child and I was trying to get her to focus more on academics than teaching my child to be a mimicking monkey. My biggest pet peeve is that people usually don't ask they just assume that if it's something they would let their child have then your child can have it too.

I have to work, watch the kid, take her to therapy and some how keep my house from looking like the city dump. I may be behind on more than one of those fronts. My other half is off for the summer and supposed to be finding a job to make it through it. I'm really hoping that he is going to find one because with the blows to my income we're going to need him to have a job year round to take the sting out of it.

Thursday, March 24, 2011

Changing the therapy schedule

Friday's we now start our weekend later. We now have speech at 11:30 instead of 9:30 in the morning. That gives us two extra hours before we leave in the mornings. It just means that I won't get to start my weekends until 12:30 on Friday mornings. If I get up early enough I can do a load of laundry to hang out before we go.

I just made the mistake of letting Theresa do "S" by herself, when she finished she threw the sheets. Now she's having a screaming fit that only she understands. I think that she's telling herself "good job." Or at least she was until I gave her some paper with glue on it and an old container filled with dried peas to glue on it.

I'm already tired. I have managed to add about a paragraph to each of the articles that I was writing. I really wish that I had more time to work, and this summer I might.

Finances are going to be a little bit tighter from now on, until I can get back on track with the writing and submitting articles to various places.

Tuesday, March 22, 2011

A sick child is a hyper child......

once they start to feel better. At least mine is. The pizza she split with her daddy for breakfast didn't agree with her. So she got a bath and a change of clothes, my kitchen floor and part of my carpet got a bath too. A couple of my towels got thrown away and I got to take a shower and change clothes in the middle of the day. So far she hasn't seemed to notice that she didn't have therapy today. I never realized it before but as much as I enjoy those days when I don't have to go anywhere, they are the days that make me the tiredest.

I've done three loads of laundry, working on folding that now and re-hanging the ones that are still damp b/c I put them too close together on the line. I was running out of clothes pins. I did dishes and made lunch. Now I get to do dishes again, they're soaking in the sink as I type and enjoy a pot of coffee to stay awake. It's not helping but I like the taste. I've got to refill my sugar container now.

I got a call from the clinic where Theresa gets therapy this afternoon. The next time we go up there (hopefully tomorrow) I can pick up an application for a grant to go to a two day Autism conference. I want to go but it's awful early in the morning and I don't have child care. There isn't anyone I really care to leave Theresa with either.

The highpoint, at the end of the week it's supposed to be 79! That'll be a relief to me, I'm hot already. I don't want winter to come back though.

Friday, March 18, 2011

Finally Friday!

It's Friday night and I get to pretend to rest for the next two days! I saw pretend because I have to attempt to get some writing done and submitted to various sites. I hope to cram about a week's worth of articles into two days, at least the initial writing and a couple edits. At least that's what I hope to do but lately no one wants to co-operate so that I can get any work done. I've been doing editorials all week, I even published a couple so that I could say I did something. I got one article accepted by Constant Content and I'm happy with that, now to figure out what to write next for them.

Theresa has decided to wear a bandanna on her head, it seems to calm her. She's rather hyper so I'm reconsidering my decision to leave her off of her special and restrictive diet. It helps with the behaviors and I want her to calm down a little. Not much, she'll get too silent but a little less of the running through the house making my nerves jump would be nice.

The leaky faucet on the bathtub in the master bathroom is fixed. Now for hubby to get under the house and  fix that pipe once and for all. That'll help with the utility bill a lot once the well pump stops shutting on and off. Now to get the duct work fixed so that we can have air conditioning without an outrageous bill this summer.

I made more laundry soap today. I made it double concentrated because my washing machine isn't doing it's job. I used the powder version this morning and it cleaned a little bit better but I prefer the liquid because it dissolves better in the water.

Friday, March 4, 2011

Progress!!

Theresa has had a rather good week despite the fact that we're both exhausted. She wrote the letter "S" correctly this week! We've spent months drilling that particular letter because of her tendency to write it backwards. She was in ABA and they were working on getting her to do what they did. The little sneak did it on the first try because she didn't think I was watching. I caught her singing along with the radio too!

Ok that's all of the little one, for now. I'm learning to work my new camcorder so I have proof she's doing cute stuff.

Tuesday, February 22, 2011

No therapy today

We didn't have speech yesterday and we won't be having it today. The therapist has a family emergency of her own to deal with, she deserves time off but I do wish it was under better circumstances. Theresa is behaving well for her age today.

We've only had one accident in the area of potty training so far today. When she did it she came to me screaming "paper towel, paper towel" she wanted to clean up the mess she had just made. That's a good sign even though she didn't tell me that she had to use the potty; it's an acknowledgement that she was wet. That's an awesome sign.

I spent a few hours picking her toys up last night just to find my living room floor in order to vacuum it. Guess what she's now in the process of undoing everything that I picked up. I'll be cleaning the kitchen a bit and baking homemade bread today. I'll be squeezing in a little more work too because I don't have a choice.

Tuesday, February 8, 2011

It's Sinking In!

Over a year since the Autism diagnosis and it's becoming clearer everyday that all the time spent pulling our hair out was worth it. Theresa is going better than ever and she proves it everyday. Since I put her in cloth more often she's actually making an effort to potty train because she doesn't seem to like having a dirty rear end. She's also having more spontaneous speech after speech which proves something, somewhere is sinking in! 

Theresa's supplements need refilling but it'll be a little bit. I'm going to call next week and schedule labs so we'll know then what she's taking and what she needs to take now. I'm supposed to be working so I'll be going now.

Sunday, January 30, 2011

Quiet Weekend under my Blankets

Well after the shock of the actual light bill reading and realizing that I'm the only one that appears to stay cold I spent the weekend under blankets while I worked. The little one agreed to put long pants on and her father seemed to enjoy the fact that I was not burning everyone out of the house. I must admit I was more productive working with the window coverings open to let in natural light first thing in the morning and my eyes hurt less than they have in a long time.

Theresa's potty training was put on hold since she spent most of yesterday in disposables but she's seems to have picked up where we left off this morning. She's staying dry longer and longer which is a very good sign. Two out of three private therapists are assisting in the efforts and the other one well, Theresa will tell her she has to go then refuse to go. That therapist would be building the cooperation factor through other exercises and taking Theresa on a schedule they had previously worked out.

I actually enjoyed the chill in the air at night. I turned the thermostat down to 60-65 to keep the chill out of the air and the heat didn't run all night like it did when I set it higher. We've decided to invest in a space heater for the coldest rooms in the house. I'm looking at something with a settable thermostat for the smallest rooms in the house like the bathroom so that we don't get too hot. The baby has to have the chill out of the air when she takes a bath. I have to finish ripping up the carpet in there. Problem is I'm hoping for something with a cooling setting too so that they don't have to be stored and exchanged during the summer months. Is that too much too ask? I have to finish ripping up the bathroom carpet but that's fine too.

Theresa is enjoying Mickey Mouse right now. She has pre-school in the morning and I have four hours to work, clean house and run to the grocery store. I also get to stop and put air in my tires myself since I dear other half under inflated them last time. Neither measurement matched but both were below the guides for the tire. I think I'll get him a digital or rather me a digital so that I know what's what.

My biggest surprise this weekend was getting to read some out of each of the two books I'm reading for relaxation. I still have to find time to read the third but I"m keeping up with the posted study of it so I'm doing good in my world here.

Thursday, January 27, 2011

It's Almost Friday!

Well, it's Thursday which meant that yesterday we had preschool and ABA. We were supposed to have speech but it was cancelled yesterday and today because the therapist was sick. After ABA and before OT she's always a bit testy now.

I'm not really happy with the ABA this week actually since June Theresa has been having compliance issues after ABA sessions. It's these times of non-compliance that make working from home the most difficult. The fact that the ABA isn't focusing on potty training now and wants to wait irritates me a bit. The fact that I can keep buying disposables or continue taking her to therapy hasn't seemed to dawn on her yet.

Theresa loses potty training progress on Monday and Wednesday. She won't be able to go to her grandparents for even a short visit since they're well lazy since the invention of disposables. That and they don't listen any better than one of the therapists at the moment. OK I lost my thought so I'll be going now.

Sunday, January 23, 2011

Too Smart for Our Own Good....

That's what little Theresa is. My little darling has managed to get out of all her supplements today. I'm not sure how it happened either. She didn't get them this morning, of course I still have to buy some of them because she's out. Once I get them all together again she'll be getting them like she's supposed to. She spent the day being cute and making requests that for some reason she won't make for one of her therapists.

Theresa has school in the morning, she's going to be excited. She loves school and she made some progress on potty training this weekend. This afternoon she went into the kitchen and opened the refrigerator. When she was asked what she was looking for she said "special treat." At the start of the weekend I told her that if she worked hard and made an effort with her potty training that she'd get a special treat. I ended up making her peanut butter cookies. She's got a memory on her I'll give her that. There are times when I wish that it wasn't so good.

She did a bunch of cute stuff today but to keep from drowning you in cute I'm gonna call it a night.

Friday, January 21, 2011

Starting the Weekend Far from Quietly

This morning we had a speech appointment at 9:30. Well, of course it being Friday I wasn't paying attention first thing in the morning. I managed to get Theresa up, fed and dressed what I didn't do was remember to give her morning supplements or put her on the potty. See a problem yet? We got ready to leave and I was about the put her in her car seat when I noticed that not only were her pants wet but she was still peeing.

Of course this meant that I had to take her back inside. Did I mention she doesn't transition well when there are changes made to her routine unexpectedly? She started screaming and crying as I brought her back in the sit her on the potty and change her clothes. It seems that tiny change in the normal routine was enough to make her think that she was in trouble. My little princess was afraid that she wouldn't be allowed to go to speech therapy this morning.

We finally got to therapy and she great once she realized that she was allowed to go with the therapist. She did great during the session and since we came home we've had potty training progress. OK back to life, cartoons may not be ideal but they're a great reward for my little angel when she uses the potty.

Wednesday, January 19, 2011

Oops.

OK so Theresa's four and doesn't know what a fork is. She doesn't get one yet, she's a bit to hyper for me. OK so I'm paranoid careful, she makes me nervous. Now I have to teach her without it. Potty training is going well sort of. She has to wear pull-ups to school still because I'm not sure just how long she can stay dry and I don't want her to have an accident while we're waiting on the school bus.

OK so now we have to learn fork with pictures and other peoples. I'll be back later. I just found a news article that I want to do.

Tuesday, January 11, 2011

Talkative today

Theresa began the day talking! She was in her crib singing a rainbow song that she heard on "Mickey Mouse" the other day. She was putting the colors in order. It was just too cute. She even ate her breakfast although the little sneak did spit out her Vitamin C tablet this morning.

This afternoon I have to pack her a nice snack. We have speech and an hour after it lets out we have feedback with Dr. Cotter for her diagnosis re-evaluation. I'm hoping for a better diagnosis or at least a more specific diagnosis this time. The last one was more of a she falls in this catergory but we don't have enough to give a specific diagnosis so we're putting her here, come back in a year to go over her progress.

Well, I learned something this morning. My mail box is too far to walk barefoot when the ground is frozen. Ok just I'll be going now.

Sunday, January 9, 2011

Theresa isn't getting back to her routine just yet

We went back to our regular therapy schedule last week which was good. Theresa needed out of the house a couple hours a day. This week we were supposed to start back to preschool but the weather has other ideas.

All the schools are closed tomorrow including the preschool because it's under the city school system. She's gonna be upset when she realizes it. I'm not sure but I'm guessing that we're not likely to have therapy tomorrow afternoon unless something changes.

We managed to get some therapy done at home today between preschool shows. I'm hoping that tomorrow will warm up quickly. I am wishing that I had some fire wood because these days are great for fires.

OK my tooth ache is getting worse so I'll be going now.

Saturday, January 8, 2011

Saturday

OK I managed two loads of laundry, mopped the kitchen and vacuumed some of my living room; the part not taken over by toys. Theresa did get to watch a few cartoons and pretended to nap today. We managed to make a little progress on the potty training front. We'll running out of cloth tomorrow though, she has six pair and she's been going through them really fast today. I'll be washing them tomorrow afternoon as soon as she runs out, Monday she'll only use one or two, then Tuesday she'll be in them all morning.

I managed to find time to sit at the end table and do a little therapy with her today. We did a few words on her chalk board, some dough and a couple pages out of her workbooks this morning. At the moment I'm printing out a page or two for tomorrow. Monday I'll be going over flash cards and requests since we only have an hour or two and she'll work all day between preschool and therapy. We're doing more shapes coloring and the letter A tomorrow. I haven't decided what else.

She has speech, OT and ABA therapies. I'm having a bit of trouble lately fitting in what she has to do in therapy with what I'd rather she know at times. We're going to go over things that she does and doesn't know tomorrow and she'll get to color again. Following directions is the most important thing. I plan to take a few minutes on each page so she doesn't get frustrated.

Well, that about sums up today and the plans for tomorrow.

Friday, January 7, 2011

Progress I hope.....

Theresa has started to say "I'm sorry" when she has an accident wearing cloth underwear. She doesn't say anything in disposable pull-ups. Hopefully that's a sign this long road of potty training is fixing to make progress. We have the rest of the weekend to leave her in cloth. Monday school starts back so she'll have most of the day in pull-ups.

I'm not looking forward to next week, we have an appointment Tuesday afternoon to get her feedback. I hope that it's good. I want to know but I don't want to know.

I haven't gotten the results of the lab work yet. I hope to get it soon but I'm not sure that I want to know that either. OK I lost track of my thoughts so I'm going to go check and see if there is an article I can write.

Tuesday, January 4, 2011

Long day today and tomorrow

OK Theresa began her day with an 11a.m. testing appointment. She did fairly well. She started almost following directions and answered more questions that I would have hoped for a year ago. She had a bit of a problem with arms and legs. It seems she doesn't know them yet, it was kind of hard to tell with a picture of a teddy bear. I didn't know that bears had arms, I always thought they were four legged creatures that had the ability to stand partially upright. By the end of the testing interview when it came time for me to answer questions that ear bleeding  rather high pitched scream was back.

This afternoon she had a half hour of speech that turned into mostly play time because she was so tired. She had worked hard this morning so the therapist gave her a break of sorts. After therapy she wanted to stay and play because the clinic had new toys I'd never noticed before.

Tomorrow we have her four year check up. I have to write down her supplements so that the doctor has them in front of him. I also have to get referrals sent to the doctor we saw today and to the O.T.s office, the referral she had expires tomorrow. I have to remember them or we can't have either of the upcoming appointments. All that's left is to take the green sheet from the preschool teacher the day before the feedback session and we'll be good to go.

Tomorrow after noon we have speech and ABA therapy. That's going to be rather interesting to see how that goes. When school starts back it's going to be even more interesting to figure out, she'll have school, lunch, speech then ABA therapy.

Well, I'm tired just writing this so I'm gonna go. I haven't decided if I'm gonna update the other two tonight or not.

Monday, January 3, 2011

therapy went well

Theresa was a bit in her own world at the start of speech today but by the end she was focused and working well. She's holding out still when it comes to talking. I put her rocking horse in front of the television to get it out of the way. She pushed it back and it got stuck. She covered her eyes and said 'why did you do that?" Amazing!

She's 4 now! I can't believe it! I got my ink refill kit today. I have 3.5 refills total and I reset my printer to print economically. That'll help to make the cartridge last until I can afford to order a new one so that I don't mess up my printer. I've got to order a color refill kit next. I hope it's as easy to refill as this one was. I can copy the pages of her workbooks now so we can work with them. I can print out things from online too! 

Well, that's about it, we stopped at the grocery store and she was a little angel. So now I'm going to update Odds and Ends.

Sunday, January 2, 2011

We go back to almost normal tomorrow

Well, tomorrow we go back to almost normal for us. Theresa doesn't go back to school until the 10th but we go back to speech tomorrow afternoon. He daddy doesn't go back to work until the end of the week. Theresa has been rather relaxed these last two weeks and she's starting to protest when we do anything to interrupt what she wants to do. Therapy couldn't be starting back a moment too soon.

She demanded cookies this afternoon so I threw together some sugar cookies with the aid of a baking mix. She's happy with them, the rest of us on the other hand aren't as thrilled with them. I have everything that I need to make another batch after she goes to bed or in the morning. That way I don't have to worry about Theresa touching the hot oven.

Theresa learned that there is more than one t.v. in the house over the holiday. She even learned that she could reach one of them to turn it one without the remote and figured out how to change the channel with the remote. She had to figure out which remote was for changing channels first.

At the moment she's having a tantrum because she's not doing what she wants so I'm gonna be going.

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